Workplace Culture – Page 19

July 31, 2017June 29, 2023

Justice Department Takes a Stand in Favor of LGBTQ Discrimination

LGBTQ prohibitions continue to make headway in the courts. While Congress has remained silent on the issue, more and more state and federal courts hold that the law’s existing prohibitions against sex discrimination implicitly cover sexual orientation and other forms of LGBTQ discrimination.

The latest appellate court to take up this issue in the 2nd Circuit, in Zarda v. Altitude Express. Just last week, the Department of Justice filed its amicus brief [pdf] in this case. Yet, in that brief, the DOJ argued that Title VII’s prohibition against sexual stereotyping as sex discrimination does not include LGBTQ discrimination. This position advanced by the DOJ is contrary to that already espoused by the 7th Circuit, many district courts, and the EEOC.

Just because the DOJ argues that Title VII does not include LGBTQ discrimination does not mean that you are not free to adopt anti-LGBTQ-discrimination policies in your workplace. In fact, I urge that you must. I predict that 10 years from now, history will view those that stood in favor of LGBTQ discrimination the same as it views those that stood opposed to the civil rights movement 50 years ago. Employers, it is time to take a stand, and stand on the correct side of history.

My challenge to employers? On this issue, do what is morally correct, the law be damned. Ignore Title VII, ignore the EEOC, ignore the DOJ and ignore the courts. It is incomprehensible that in 2017 an employer can legally fire someone because of who he or she loves, dates or marries. Do right by all of your employees. Enact policies prohibiting LGBTQ discrimination in your workplace. Send the message to all of your employees that you are an employer of inclusion, not exclusion.

And yes, I’m tired on sounding like a broken record on this issue. But until we as a nation come to a national consensus, this message is worthy of playing on repeat.

Jon Hyman is a partner at Meyers, Roman, Friedberg & Lewis in Cleveland. To comment, email editors@workforce.com. Follow Hyman’s blog at Workforce.com/PracticalEmployer.

July 25, 2017June 29, 2023

OSHA, What Say You About Michael Phelps vs. Shark?

This week is Shark Week on the Discovery Channel.

And the marquee event of this year’s Shark Week was Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps “racing” a great white shark. I say “racing” because Phelps did not race an actual shark. Instead, he swam against a CGI shark based on a previously recorded shark.

To create the CGI, the show had to record a shark swimming in a straight line for a pre-determined distance. And, since great white sharks are not known for their trainability, the job to lure the straight-line swim fell to this guy.

Yes, that is a man, paddling a pontoon bicycle, a few feet in front of a pursuing great white shark, wearing absolutely zero protection. #worstjobever

OSHA has thousands of standards that cover many of the specific safety issues that could arise in the workplace. While these standards dig into the minutia of the American workplace, I can guarantee that OSHA lacks one for “shark-race bait.”

OSHA, however, does not solely regulate of the safety of the American worker via its specific standards. It also has a General Duty Clause, which provides, “Each employer shall furnish to each of his employees employment and a place of employment which are free from recognized hazards that are causing or are likely to cause death or serious physical harm to his employees.” For example, OSHA used this general duty clause to cite Sea World of Florida following a trainer’s death from a killer-whale attack. If the general duty clause can reach Sea World, it can certainly reach Shark Week.

Jon Hyman is a partner at Meyers, Roman, Friedberg & Lewis in Cleveland. To comment, email editors@workforce.com. Follow Hyman’s blog at Workforce.com/PracticalEmployer.

July 24, 2017June 29, 2023

What Companies Get Wrong About Worker Happiness

From in-house yoga to free Netflix subscriptions and office game rooms, businesses are spending big bucks trying to keep their workers happy.

Despite the proliferation of offbeat perks, many employees are not genuinely happy or immersed in their work. According to a new Gallup survey, 70 percent of American workers aren’t engaged with their jobs.

As a growing body of research makes clear, fun company events or quirky fringe benefits won’t accomplish much if workers don’t feel satisfied, appreciated and proud of their work. For companies whose success depends on building a talented, motivated workforce, a more comprehensive approach to employee well-being isn’t a luxury — it’s a basic necessity.

The benefits of a happy workforce are difficult to deny. For starters, happy employees tend to work harder — and more effectively — than their unhappy peers.

According to a survey by Horizons Workforce Consulting, nearly two-thirds of happy employees regularly devote extra effort to their work. Research by Gallup has found that engaged employees are up to 21 percent more productive than those who aren’t engaged at work.

Dissatisfaction with a job, on the other hand, can take a toll on one’s health. Happy employees take 10 percent fewer sick days than unhappy colleagues, according to the consulting firm Happiness Works.

The company also estimates that happier work environments reduce employee turnover by 10 percent.

Add it all up, and it’s clear that businesses can’t afford to treat worker happiness as an afterthought.

Nevertheless, even companies willing to prioritize employee happiness have a hard time finding strategies that work. My own organization, Robert Half, discovered as much during a recent survey of 12,000 workers across the U.S. and Canada that we conducted with Happiness Works. But we also identified several effective ways that companies can boost happiness within their workforces.

That process starts by hiring workers who fit well within a company’s culture and mission. Our research found that the top driver of worker happiness, by far, is a sense of pride in one’s organization. Workers who are proud of their employer are three times more likely to be happy on the job.

When workers share in a company’s vision they find meaning in their work and enjoy a sense of accomplishment — all of which contribute significantly to overall happiness.

By the same token, businesses must be willing to turn down job candidates who aren’t good fits for their organizations even if they’re highly qualified. Whether your firm fights global poverty or builds enterprise software, a worker who isn’t committed to a company’s vision is unlikely to find joy in their work.

Fair treatment is also an essential component of employee happiness — and an area where many companies have room to improve. Our research showed that just 58 percent of men and 52 percent of women believe they are paid fairly.

Regardless of whether these feelings are justified, they certainly detract from employee well-being. Addressing this issue can be as simple as establishing clear guidelines for promotions and raises. Businesses can also provide opportunities for workers to communicate honestly with their managers when they feel disrespected or unfairly treated.

Giving workers the space to thrive outside the office is yet another way businesses can promote happiness. One-third of respondents to our survey were unsatisfied with their work-life balance. To address this issue, managers can encourage workers to leave the office on time and refrain from unnecessary after-work emails and calls.

Finally, celebrating employees’ successes goes a long way toward boosting well-being. Our research identified the feeling of being appreciated as one of the top two contributors to professional happiness.

In other words, don’t underestimate the power of a heartfelt “thank you” to raise a worker’s spirits.

Creative perks are great. But 30 minutes of on-site yoga can’t make up for 40 hours a week spent on joyless, unrewarding work.

Paul McDonald is senior executive director at global staffing firm Robert Half. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com.

July 20, 2017September 5, 2023

People Don’t Take HR Seriously; Here’s Why That’s Dangerous

Talent is what separates good companies from great companies, so why does the team in charge of managing and developing talent — human resources — get less respect that other core business functions?

I’d offer that the modern-day perception of HR is rooted in myths and stereotypes that simply do not apply to progressive companies that understand the critical role of people development when it comes to the future growth and success of their businesses. For this reason we’ve seen companies like Bonobos (recently acquired by WalMart) appoint chief people officers, and startups like Slice strip the HR verbage completely with roles like head of people.

The move from “human resources” to “people” is subtle yet significant, as it indicates a shifting understanding of the core mission of employee support within an organization. In many ways, the objectives have been simplified — keep the best people happy, motivated and engaged — as the talent landscape and technologies available to manage people proliferate and become increasingly challenging to navigate.

Here are a few outdated perceptions of HR and why they are dangerous to the future success of your business.

“HR doesn’t contribute to the bottom line.”

Without a direct P&L, HR gets no love. Sure, it’s difficult to make a direct link between revenue or business impact and the activities of a talent team, but the connection is there. Engaged employees are not only more pleasant to be around; they are also 22 percent more productive than their disengaged counterparts. In other words, happy employees get things done.

A recent Gallup poll revealed that 70 percent of U.S. employees are not engaged at work. Put a different way, companies that are not proactively taking steps to improve employee engagement are sitting back while productivity falters. They are leaving money on the table. Failing to see the business benefit of promoting an engaged company culture hurts the bottom line, whereas leveraging HR as the primary resource for building up a strong culture will have a tangible ROI when measured by output and the ability to attract and retain your very best people.

“HR makes things harder than they need to be.”

HR tends to have a tough go at it within an organization. From minor inconveniences like changes to seating arrangements to layoffs, HR is often made to be the bearer of bad news. We all know it’s not fair to “kill the messenger,” but since the beginning of modern workplaces, HR has been taking the fall for decisions that are oftentimes made outside of their own jurisdiction. Of course, this is often a strategic and necessary decision that’s made to protect senior leadership, but is it really fair to believe that HR exists to make our lives harder? I’d argue that it’s not.

In fact, at companies with healthy corporate cultures, the opposite is true. HR exists to make our lives easier and better. They exist to improve how we feel about our roles, our colleagues and our teams. They are here to listen to our feedback, and then find solutions for turning that feedback into action where it makes sense. Employee intelligence tools are making it easier than ever for talent teams to surface transparent (anonymous even!) feedback on an ongoing basis, which can be used to drive real change at an organization. At these companies, acting on regular feedback is flipping the traditional stereotype of “HR as the bad guys” on its head.

“HR primarily focuses on admin tasks and do not have a strategic function.”

It’s true that some of the more traditional functions of HR, such as managing payroll and benefits, are being replaced — at least partially — by technologies. So, are HR practitioners at risk fall victim to future job automation? In this narrow, admin-focused view of the role, I am afraid to say they most definitely are. Artificial intelligence will soon streamline most people management functions of HR, but the good news for talent professionals is that more time will be freed up to focus on people development.

And when we really think about it, isn’t developing and growing your best talent, and building a healthy and transparent corporate culture, the single most important responsibility of HR practitioners? One area where companies can improve is educating junior to mid-level managers in leadership.

According to the Harvard Business Review, most organizations wait a decade to offer any type of leadership training to their managers, creating a gap that can breed disengagement and attrition. After all, the No. 1 reason people quit their jobs: bad managers.

In a widely circulated HBR piece from a few years back, author and leadership consultant Ram Charan called for a splitting in two of HR as a function. He advocates a model in which the administrative function of HR forms its own unit, reporting to the CFO. The remaining function, reporting to the CEO, would primarily focus on leadership and development.

As the administrative function of HR is increasingly becoming streamlined by technologies designed to make people management more efficient, organizational leadership should consider re-engineering their teams to staff the right people against people development.

This requires appointing visionary talent leadership who possess the capabilities to train and educate employees within a transparent, inclusive corporate culture.

David Mendlewicz is the CEO and co-founder of New York-based Butterfly, a chat-bot that offers real-time leadership training and supports managers based on their team’s feedback and surveys. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com.

July 19, 2017June 29, 2023

No Such Thing as ‘Fair’ at Work

This past school year I had the pleasure of assisting in my daughter’s fifth-grade class as a room parent.

For the uninitiated, room parent is a fancy title for a classroom aide. We assist the teachers with classroom events and facilitate communications between the homeroom teachers and the parents for volunteers, supplies, etc. As the school year wound down and the kids approached lower-school graduation, my room parent duties expanded with a request from the teachers in regards to an end-of-year party, allegedly in the planning stages by someone other than me.

The request, however, was not for my party-planning assistance, but instead to send a note to all parents asking that any such off-campus, private parties be inclusive of all, and that no children be excluded, as word had spread of this “invite only” party, and some of the excluded children were hurt.

Equal treatment for all? Sounds fair, right? But is anything about the workplace fair? What does fair even mean, and, more to the point, does the law require it at work?

Nothing in the law requires the workplace to be fair. It only requires that you treat similarly situated people of different protected groups similarly. Equality across protected classes, however, is not the same as fairness.

Yet if society expects fairness, then unfairness will cause lawsuits, and members of the same fairness-expecting society will comprise the judges and juries that will decide the legality of your terminations. As a result, some basis of fundamental fairness should ground each employment decision you make.

What does fundamental fairness in the workplace look like?

Don’t ambush your employees. They should understand why they are being fired via prior discussions, prior performance reviews and prior discipline.

The punishment must fit the crime. Do you really need to fire the employee who is late for work occasionally? Maybe, if he or she has been repeatedly warned. But the first time? If the punishment far exceeds the misconduct, the employee will look for a reason for the mistreatment and unfairness, such as race, sex, age or disability. Do not provide an impetus to look past the stated reason. Alternatively, a sufficiently serious offense (e.g., sexual harassment, theft, violence) may support a termination on the spot. Otherwise, however, employees should have an ample and bona fide opportunity to correct their misbehavior.

Have documentation to support your decision. Do you have a performance review, written warning or other contemporaneous notes in a personnel file to support your decision? If not, it’s best to wait until you do. And, no, this is not an excuse to create a paper trail after the fact. Documentation should be contemporaneous to the misconduct.

Be consistent. Do you handle similar disciplinary problems similarly and to the same degree? If not, those that suffer the worst will ask why, and they may do it via their attorney in a lawsuit.

To make this concept of workplace fairness even simpler, do unto your employees as you would have your employer do unto you. If you treat your employees as you would want to be treated (or as you would want your wife, kids, parents, etc. to be treated), most employment cases would never be filed, and most that are filed would end in the employer’s favor. Juries are comprised of many more employees than employers, and if jurors feel that the plaintiff was treated the same way the jurors would want to be treated (i.e., fairly), the jury will be much less likely to find in the employee’s favor.

As for the party-fairness issue in my daughter’s class, here was my response:

“I believe that a party host should have discretion whom to invite and not invite. No one should feel obligated to invite the entire grade if they don’t want a gradewide party at their private event. To go one step further, if they don’t want my daughter to attend, and only after-the-fact invite her out of a sense of obligation, then I don’t want her there and would strongly counsel her against attending (and I think she’d agree with me). As awesome as I know she is, I am not naive enough to think that she is on the ‘friend’ list of everyone in the 5th grade (nor is she).”

Sounds fair to me.

Jon Hyman is a partner at Meyers, Roman, Friedberg & Lewis in Cleveland. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com. Follow Hyman’s blog at Workforce.com/PracticalEmployer.

July 17, 2017June 29, 2023

Ex-ExxonMobil Exec on How to Transition into Retirement

Bill Innes, co-author of “Your Next Season: Advice for Executives Transitioning from Intense Careers to Fulfilling Next Seasons.”

Bill Innes spent the bulk of his career with Fortune 100 firm ExxonMobil, retiring as president of ExxonMobil Research and Engineering Co. He recently co-authored “Your Next Season: Advice for Executives Transitioning from Intense Careers to Fulfilling Next Seasons,” with Leslie W. Braksick, offering keen insight to life beyond the boardroom. Workforce Editorial Director Rick Bell caught up with Innes via email to discover what winds are blowing through these changing seasons.

Workforce: Just what do you mean by “Your Next Season?”

Bill Innes: As the biblical quotation says, “for everything there is a season.” The idea of your next season is to suggest that the period after retirement is one that naturally has a different place in the span of a lifetime. It is a time when satisfaction and success can be defined differently; and unless it is approached differently, you may miss the joy and fulfillment of a wonderful opportunity. Seasons are inexact in their timing; there are patterns we expect with seasons, but always include surprises and weather that was unanticipated. Corporate transitions are similar. We prepare; we plant; we fertilize and we water, and yet what we expect may not be realized.

WF: What constitutes a successful next season?

Innes: The attributes of success in your next season are similar to other stages in life — a sense of purpose, self-fulfillment and self worth. What is different is that the field in which it can be found is wonderfully unconstrained — you don’t have to earn a living, you don’t have to lead the parade unless you want to, you can work to your own schedule, you don’t even have to be knowledgeable! What is the same is that you will be most successful if you are thoughtful and deliberate about the decisions about where to spend your time.

WF: Do people struggles with this transition?

Innes: Many people struggle with this transition. In many ways the more successful they are in their primary career, the more difficulty they may have in imagining another focus for their life that will be as fulfilling. It takes time and deep reflection to accept that a very satisfying stage in life has come to a conclusion, to let it go and to believe that another door is opening with possibilities that may be just as fulfilling. Tragically, some never succeed in making the transition. We have, however, found that those who prepare well for the transition, struggle less. This is why we wrote the book.

WF: You talk about “essentials for the journey.” What are they?

Innes: Essentials for the journey — like any transition these include a thoughtful and deliberate approach, knowledge of oneself, willingness to listen and awareness of the needs of others. In this particular transition at this time in life, health, openness to a newly defined purpose and companionship are particularly important. Your health defines so much of what you can take on. Openness to a newly defined purpose is essential to breaking the constraints of your work life and role; and companionship makes the leap into something new less daunting.

WF: Is “Next Season” applicable to anyone contemplating life after the workplace, or just corporate executives?

Innes: Your next Season is applicable to anyone contemplating life after the workplace, although the challenge for executives in situations where their work demands leave little energy or opportunity to develop other interests is particularly difficult. In every case the end of commitment to the workplace is one of life’s major changes.

WF: Who is this book aimed at?

Innes: This book is aimed in the first place at those who are approaching the transition to their next season. It may also be helpful for HR professionals who are important in helping executives prepare for this transition. More broadly we hope that this book may stimulate people to think about the nature of this change and how corporations may facilitate a productive environment pre and post retirement.

WF: When I hear corporate executives, I think old white guys. Are there takeaways here for women executives? Minority corporate leaders?

Innes: Several of the executives quoted in the book are either women or minorities. However the challenges would seem to apply to all executives. I think that any difference would be more a reflection of their position as individuals rather than their gender or race.

WF: Are there takeaways here for Gen Xers and millennials?

Innes: Nothing specific except, it’s coming! We see Gen X’ers and millenials doing a better job in general of ensuring balance in their lives. I am part of a “live to work” generation; they seem to be more of a “work to live” generation. Somewhere in the middle is probably right.

Rick Bell is editorial director at Workforce. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com. Follow Workforce on Twitter at @workforcenews.

July 11, 2017August 31, 2023

Beyond Great: Features of Today’s Legendary Companies

While solid economic and financial performance may be an indicator of a “great” company, legendary status isn’t solely based on stock returns.

Companies such as Zappos, Nordstrom Inc., USAA, Costco and Lego stand out as legendary brands in the marketplace because they obsess about both the customer and the employee experience. Their customers recognize and celebrate them, and their employees engage and act as spokespeople for the business. In this sense, customers and employees alike become loyal promoters of the brand, and it is the combination of the two that makes for a legendary status.

There are five characteristics that distinguish great and legendary companies: Others Tell Stories; Customer Value Focused; Live the Purpose; Promoting Stakeholders; and Transcend Industry. Let’s take a deeper dive into each distinctive characteristic.

Others Tell Stories

The word “great” refers to being big in size, long in duration, or above average in quality. The word “legendary” means something is remarkable enough to be famous. Legendary goes beyond great. A business has a legendary status when customers begin to tell — and retell — stories about their unique and positive experiences with the company.

Zappos has become known for exceptional customer service. The company trains its call center representatives to “go above and beyond” for every customer without worrying about the length of time they spend on the phone. They ask representatives to develop a personal and emotional connection with each customer. This high standard was showcased when Tony Hsieh, the CEO of Zappos, was with a group of hungry people late one evening in Santa Monica, California. Food service was no longer available at their hotel. They cajoled a woman in the group (not a Zappos employee) to call the Zappos call center, which is open 24/7, to find the names of local food establishments still open and willing to deliver at that hour. After a bit of understandable confusion and brief research, the representative provided the names of five pizza places still open, according to a 2010 Harvard Business Review article by Hsieh. He created a Zappos story with this experience — one which is being told and retold all over the world and has become free marketing for the company.

Adult fans of Lego, the Danish toy company, have organized themselves into groups. These fans know much more about Lego bricks and systems than the average customer and typically much more than Lego employees. Known as AFOL, they show incredible passion for Lego by constantly posting creations and ideas online. Members meet up at self-organized user groups and even have an annual exhibition called BrickCon. Most of the hundreds of millions of Google search hits and tens of thousands of YouTube videos on Lego come from this fan base. This is a good example of how customers share stories and promote a brand’s business.

Customer Value Focused

Companies that know their customers have a significant advantage over competitors. They educate their employees on the specific needs of their target audiences and provide functional product offerings that offer exceptional significance and value. By understanding their targeted customers, legendary companies develop the opportunity to create an emotional connection with customers by speaking to their needs and giving them a positive experience.

USAA, a financial and insurance services company, serves primarily military personnel and their families. USAA offers a wide array of banking and insurance services, supplying members of the institution with a single relationship to manage, thereby avoiding hassles and saving time.

More importantly, by speaking the language of the military personnel they serve, USAA provides a sense of affiliation and belonging as well as familiarity, which reduces the anxiety common to banking and insurance relationships. By considering both the functional and emotional needs of their customers, USAA focuses in on providing high value that has resulted in a much deeper relationship with its customers.

Companies like clothier TOMS take it a step beyond the emotional and functional elements of value to further connect with their customers through benefiting others. Research by Bain & Co. and published in the Harvard Business Review in 2016 correlated the elements of value provided to customer groups with the six levels of human needs on psychologist Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs (physiological, safety, love and belonging, esteem, self-actualization).

The research found that more elements of value offered to customers resulted in higher levels of loyalty and higher levels of revenue growth. Emotional and functional elements of value typically address needs on the first three levels of critical human needs. Providing value elements that speak to higher level needs can create an even stronger connection with customers. By giving a pair of shoes away for every pair purchased, TOMS provides a sense of serving others that fulfills the upper levels in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs and attracts a specific, loyal and activated customer group.

Live the Purpose

Legendary companies are driven by an all-encompassing purpose. They nurture everyone involved with the company — both internally and externally — to adopt that purpose. Internally, legendary companies engage and emotionally connect their employees in their purpose, converting them into voluntary “spokespeople” for the company. Externally, customers become promoters for the business when they tell others of their positive experiences and personal connection to the company’s purpose.

As a toy company, Lego’s purpose and vision are about human possibility. The company wants to “inspire and develop the builders of tomorrow” and “invent the future of play.” Lego realizes that its success hinges on motivated employees that are inspired by the company purpose and feel engaged in the strategy. To understand how this motivation manifests internally, the company conducts an annual employee survey. This survey includes a question, measuring the degree employees are willing to recommend Lego as an employer. This question is called the Employee Net Promoter Score, or eNPS, and Lego uses this metric to benchmark employee engagement and satisfaction. With a stated goal of making Lego “the best place to work in the world,” the survey helps Lego determine the underlying drivers of employee engagement and satisfaction. Lego considers the voice of employees as important as the voice of customers.

Nordstrom is another example of a company’s purpose being both internally and externally embraced. Nordstrom’s purpose is “to deliver the best possible shopping experience, helping customers possess style — not just buy fashion.” The company provides “superior customer service and product quality” in the brick and mortar retail business as well as online. Personalized sales associates research their customers to better assist them. Customers, in turn, are quick to share those experiences in their communities.

Promoting Stakeholders

Legendary companies pay careful attention to how they are viewed by their customers and employees. They aim to have engaged employees and loyal customers. Engaged employees are likely to be active spokespeople for the company, and loyal customers will promote the business to others. Companies with one, but not the other, won’t attain legendary status.

The Net Promoter Score is the best quantitative measure of how customers perceive a company or brand. “Great” companies score above 55, which is recognized as a desirable rating, and companies that score above 70 are a rarity. Very few companies achieve this level of loyalty from their customers. To complicate matters, maintaining loyalty requires constant attention since the NPS — a measure of customers’ perception — can shift quickly. USAA had a NPS score of 75 in 2015, while the general financial industry averages around 35. Zappos’ recent scores have been in the 50s; the retailer was recently outranked in NPS by its parent company, Amazon. In 2016, Nordstrom scored the highest of all “officially measured” consumer brands with an amazing NPS of 80. They “beat” Costco, which scored 79 the prior year.

In a “State of the American Workplace” report from 2013, Gallup pollsters concluded that 70 percent of the American workforce is disengaged from the company that employs them. Disengaged employees may passively, if not actively, speak negatively about the business and consequently take part in sabotaging its reputation. Instead of focusing on employee satisfaction, legendary companies concentrate on creating employee engagement by instilling a culture that is aligned with the company’s purpose. Employees in these companies are proud to represent the business, creating invaluable and positive ripple effects in the marketplace. Metrics to monitor the level of engagement are now frequently used, including surveys that ask questions such as, “How likely are you to recommend employment at the company to a friend?” Glassdoor allows current and former employees to review online the companies (and CEOs) for which they work or have worked. While skewed by reviews from former employees, the website’s scoring does provide an insight into company culture and how likely employees are to recommend the company to a friend. Scores above 60 indicate the company has a “great” workplace culture.

Legendary companies differentiate themselves in the marketplace and redefine, or at least reprioritize, market factors to transcend their industry. This is often at odds with industry best practices, which homogenize instead of differentiate. A best practices approach can prevent deep listening to the customer and hinder learning, which makes it vital to scrutinize the limitations that come with such an approach. Legendary companies take deliberate chances on investing in factors that differentiate them in the marketplace.

Costco’s refund policy and rewards programs are legendary. The company allows for returns of anything purchased (with a few exceptions) at any time for a full refund without a receipt as long as you have a membership. Costco calls it their “Risk-Free 100 Percent Satisfaction Guarantee.” This benefit combined with the cash back rewards from using the store’s branded credit card or being an executive member is seen by customers as an investment in service that surpasses the industry.

Likewise, Zappos was one of the first to introduce free shipping and free returns of their products. Despite the associated cost, this offer differentiated Zappos in the marketplace and cemented its legendary position among online retailers.

The Path from Great to Legendary

There is no linear path to follow to achieve legendary status as a company. Legendary companies break with the status quo to transcend their industry and receive societal recognition. They dare to ask questions that fundamentally change industry paradigms.

The path starts with a relentless obsession to bring utility, value and service to customers and employees. Legendary companies deliver quality products and go above and beyond what is typically required in terms of service and customer care. They make an emotional connection so the relationship with their customers goes beyond satisfaction to a real sense of affection. Employees in these companies are happy and engaged.

While the path to becoming a legendary business is neither linear nor easy, both the journey and the destination are well worth the effort.

Soren Eilertson is an executive consultant, adviser and an adjunct faculty professor of business strategy at Pepperdine University’s Graziado School of Business management. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com.

July 7, 2017June 29, 2023

Take it Easy on the Boss; There’s a World to Save

HR, I bet you’ve grown weary of people telling you how to do your job.

I’m not talking about your corporate executives, or IT geeks and their annoying heavy sighs or those eternally optimistic yet preachy internal communications people. No, I’m talking about the know-it-all thought leaders and consultants who have written the hundreds of books scattered around my office. You know, evolve or die, understanding EQ, and how much better off you’ll be building a team of teams (yeah, I don’t get that one either).

As I scroll through my 40,000-plus deleted emails there are strategies for networking success, tips on the “new” workplace-training model and dire warnings that your department will combust if you don’t beef up cybersecurity (OK, I made that up, sort of). If I had the patience to scroll past the first 5,000 or so I’d probably come across best practices in building better mousetraps.

And despite being a decade into it, there’s no shortage of millennial management tricks even though these generationally obsessed experts likely couldn’t get their own millennials to clean their bedrooms no matter how much they assure them they are more than just a cog in the housekeeping wheel. Chalk it up to the lack of a fun, employee-centric, team-like environment around the ol’ homestead.

You didn’t ask, HR; you seldom do. Nonetheless, there is more advice, assistance and admonishments available these days than you can shake a carrot and stick at.

So instead of badgering you with more truly meaningless generational cohort banter, let me offer one little sliver of perspective.

Be grateful you aren’t your boss.

Now I realize that bosses also are on the receiving end of a lot of unsolicited advice.

Unlike you in HR, who really must do it all, from stocking the supply room when Post-it notes run low to assessing the latest iteration of performance review forms (should 1 or 5 indicate strongly agree or strongly disagree?), bosses get an entirely different set of uninvited topics dished out for them.

It’s not only on them to change the workplace, bosses are being told that it’s their duty to reshape the world as well. That’s one heavy load to shoulder.

Take health care, for instance. I have no doubt the vast majority of bosses want to provide a plan that takes care of their workers and their families. It’s a big cost — possibly their largest expense, next to that constantly dwindling supply of Post-its. But we’re far enough down this well-traveled roller-coaster ride that is the government-sponsored health care debate to know that healthy employees make better workers.

And that’s precisely why your boss is being tabbed to enter the fray. Time was, health care was your domain. And in many ways it still is.

But consider that it’s the bosses, not you, who provide nearly 170 million people with their health care insurance. That’s half the U.S. population! And there are plenty of people harping on your boss to step up and dictate how health care is funded and delivered.

In addition to calls to fix racial tensions, widen organizational diversity and implement pay equality there’s also a groundswell of support for bosses to be the planet’s caretakers. In the wake of President Trump’s eye-rolling move to join such progressive-minded nations as Nicaragua and Syria in rebuffing the Paris Climate Accord, the chorus of “employers must protect the planet!” has escalated from a whisper to a lung-burning scream.

Your boss is no voice in the wilderness, either. Plenty of corporate captains are tackling that task already. Tesla’s Elon Musk, GE’s outgoing chief Jeff Immelt and Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein are committed to, as Apple’s Tim Cook wrote in a memo to his employees, “protect the environment.”

I mean, this is heady stuff. We’re not talking about disrupted supply chains and building organizational agility and resilience here. Solve the nation’s health care woes AND be the earth’s savior at the same time? That’ll have your boss pining for the days when busting unions and skirting ethics laws were their biggest challenges.

Look HR, I know you have a lot on your plate. But take it from someone who’s made a living out of telling people that “you should do fill-in-the-blank:” Go easy on your boss. There’s an ailing health care system to cure and a mighty messy environment that needs saving.

And if you want to hand off a less taxing responsibility, let them select whether 5 or 1 means strongly agree. The diversion will do them good.

Rick Bell is Workforce’s editorial director. Comment below or email him at rbell@workforce.com

July 5, 2017June 29, 2023

Smart Lockers Open Options for Workplace Wellness and Safety

Employees at Hull & Knarr have no excuses to not pedal around on a bike. The Indianapolis-based financial services firm has opened the door to new wellness and team-building initiatives for its employees in an eco-friendly and accessible manner.

A brightly lit orange locker room with company-owned bikes, showers and personal lockers with bike equipment and accessories line the workout room for the firm’s workers to use at their leisure. Commuting to work and rides during lunch are the most common times the equipment is used, said Brad Ferrell, director at Hull & Knarr.

“Anything we can do to remove reasons not to participate [in biking] — we really try to remove all those obstacles,” Ferrell said.

Of the company’s 13 employees, Ferrell said five or six use the bikes daily. He said having all of the biking equipment easily accessible has created happier and healthier workers, which in turn has positively affected the workplace.

“We are creating a culture where people want to be a part of something, but it also gives them a cause and something to root for,” said Ferrell, who tries to bike at least twice a week. “It creates teamwork outside of the office.”

Hull & Knarr use IM lockers for personal bike and workout equipment. *Photo courtesy Brad Ferrell*

In the three years Hull & Knarr has used the smart lockers — which can track employee use and well-being by how many times lockers are opened and offer data for rewards and incentives — they have evolved to become more user-friendly and personal for anyone looking to balance work and wellness. While these locker trends are not new to corporate wellness, they are beginning to reshape workplace culture to give employees a healthy dose of activity and social engagement with others in their office and the larger community.

Much of this has stemmed from IVM Inc., the creators of the lockers and one of Hull & Knarr’s clients. The lockers can be used numerous ways — from IT help, snacks and medical supplies to fire extinguishers, according to IVM President Mike Pitts, who has seen the product’s growth since the company was founded in 1991.

IVM produces not only smart lockers but smart vending machines too, which thrive among big tech companies such as Hewlett-Packard, Intel and Facebook, and are made to improve accessibility of needed items in the workplace. By scanning an employee badge, those looking for headphones, a temporary computer or a new keyboard can get them immediately without using cash or coins.

Facebook, whose headquarter offices in Menlo Park, California, use IVM’s vending machines to sell bike parts to employees and promote corporate wellness. The machines replace the need for a campus repair shop and promote cycling across the board, giving employees instant gratification through IVM’s technology, Pitts affirmed.

Facebook’s office headquarters sell bike parts to employees and promote corporate wellness.

The newest tool to the vending machine community are the fire extinguishers from WESCO Distribution, a longtime IVM customer. The company is getting ready to roll out the fire extinguisher application with a major electric utility. WESCO places IVM’s vending machines and lockers in utility and nuclear plants to distribute safety tools such as goggles, safety suits and gloves for employees to grab before starting their shift.

“That all came about from this culture of watching out for employees,” Pitts said of the upcoming deal. “[It’s] not just giving them the tools they need to do their job but the things that make their jobs safer and better to this far extreme of even the well-being of their employees.”

This kind of technology use in the workplace brings up the question of future technological assistance and how smart lockers are influencing the workplace. Pitts said he does not foresee any negatives as technology will positively affect productivity, accessibility and job security and will not eliminate jobs — similar to the continued growth of robotic technology.

“What you are going to see over the coming years is that these vending systems are going to be prevalent throughout all industries,” he said. “They are going to be used for so many different things that it staggers the imagination.”

Ariel Parrella-Aureli is a Workforce intern. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com.

June 26, 2017August 3, 2023

2017 Game Changer: Florine van Everdingen

Florine van Everdingen has tapped her entrepreneurial spirit to launch an initiative aimed at inspiring and empowering young female talent. MyWinspiration was founded in 2015 with the mission of attracting women to enter the workforce. With a group of 12 young women, she created a magazine focused on this goal. It’s available for free internationally.

That’s on top of her full-time gig at consultancy KPMG, where she’s considered a steady, strong, reliable rock that her colleagues can rely on. As the leader of MyWinspiration, van Everdingen, 28, is a familiar face as a keynote speaker and has built a global community that continues to grow.

“Ultimately my goal is to provide women with the opportunity to empower one another and learn from each other; enabling them to actively participate in the workforce to the best of their abilities and ambitions,” said van Everdingen in an email interview.

It’s at speaking events where she engages and connects most with her audience. This gave her the idea to develop a Young Female Talent Program, which allows her to coach young talent trying to build their careers. Meanwhile, it’s also given her the idea to bring all these ideas together in a book.

“Both are ambitious works in progress and will, I am sure, take us some time to realize,” she said. “But I do believe that if you can dream it, you can do it. And I have to say, the dream I have for MyWinspiration is only getting better.”

Her colleagues are impressed with what van Everdingen has accomplished. “We’re amazed by her ability to not only be an excellent consultant at one of the largest organizations in the world, but also be an inspiration and driving force for gender equality,” wrote Juliette Cleton, sales and operations planner at cosmetics company Rituals and part of the MyWinspiration team, in van Everdingen’s Game Changer application.

MyWinspiration has not hampered her ability to be a great leader at KPMG. As a manager, she develops and gets the best out of her team, said Lizzie Garland, junior consultant at KPMG. Van Everdingen proactively listens to her team and gives them the opportunity to grow but also provides, strong, steady, calm leadership when needed.

Her success in people management comes from an appreciation for people, which was fostered early on in her university years when she came across this Henry Ford quote: “You can take my factories, burn my buildings, but give me my people and I’ll build the business right back again.”

“I believe that quote is still very much relevant today and that people are the single most valuable asset an organization will ever possess,” she said.

[To read about our other 2017 Game Changers, click here.]