Showing posts with label employees. Show all posts
Showing posts with label employees. Show all posts

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Little Things Mean a Lot

How do you care for your customers and employees?

"Just as the accumulation of small improvements can make a dramatic, lasting change in the organization’s products or services, the repeated, numerous small occasions of taking note of the contributions of individuals and teams of individuals can create a different company." (The Quality Process: Little Things Mean a Lot)

Showing appreciation to both clients and team members (formerly employees) is an integral part of a successful business. Too often we overlook it. It’s easy to take existing clients for granted while making special efforts to attract new ones. Many of us are guilty of assuming we take care of our team by simply giving them a pay cheque.

Respect Your Team Members (Employees)

"In environments in which human needs are acknowledged and talent and creativity are allowed to flourish, employees give their all." (Creating Successful Partnerships with Employees)
The most valuable asset in an organization is the people. Mark Twain once said, "I can go two months on one compliment!" When was the last time you said "well done" to anyone in your business? Appreciation is the number one thing people want from their jobs, even before money and promotions, according to a Robert Half survey.

If you think you don’t have the time or the budget to start an appreciation program in your workplace, think again. There are dozens of easy, inexpensive ways to generate spirit and appreciation.

· Companies often focus on single goals (such as annual sales quotas) and forget to celebrate the little successes that add up to the main goal. Recognize the little victories along the way and keep everyone motivated for the ultimate goal. How about treating everyone to an ice cream break or a hot dog lunch?
· Foster an environment that encourages creativity and mutual respect. Be generous in small ways. Keep a large candy jar in your reception area filled with fun, kid-style candies, suckers, or bubble gum. Or, fill it with slips of paper with jokes or motivational sayings on them. Put a small treat in employees’ mail/message boxes. On a hot day, bring in Popsicles. Encourage everyone in your organization to take their work seriously but themselves lightly.
· Treat your team members as individuals, not just part of your organization. Recognize special times in their lives such as marriages and births.
· Keep a well-stocked refreshment area for both team members and clients. Fill it with coffee, teas, bottled water, juices, and maybe a big cookie or candy jar!
· Let your people know you care about their work environment. Do you think those walls that need painting or the torn and dirty carpet doesn’t affect them, or that dirty washrooms and lunchrooms are acceptable? These all say a lot about your attitude towards them. Show pride and respect for yourself, your business, your team, and your clients by keeping a well-maintained place of business.
· Celebrate together and show you care about morale. Hold Christmas parties, summer picnics, or golf tournaments. Ask your suppliers to donate prizes.

Appreciate Your Customers

Most people like to do business with people they like and who appreciate them.
How much money do you spend trying to attract new customers, and how much do you spend showing your existing customers that you care about them? It costs much less to keep a customer than to find a new one. Make customer appreciation a part of your everyday activities.
· Keep a stack of thank-you cards at your desk. Get in the habit at the end of each day to think about those who gave you their time or their business. In this age of electronic communications, we all appreciate an old-fashioned handwritten note. Don’t just pick up the phone to say thanks - put it in writing. The cost is small, but the impact is large. You’ll be noticed for your thoughtfulness.
· Recognize your client’s special events and milestones such as business anniversaries, promotions, and moves. Work with a gift basket company or florist to create a signature gift that you can send whenever the need arises.
· Hold an annual customer appreciation day.
· Insist that everyone in your organization show respect and appreciation to every customer - big or small. After all, if we didn’t have customers, we wouldn’t be in business. Starting right now, find ways to show your team and clients that you care! Customers don’t deal with companies - they deal with people. So, if you want first-class customers you must have first-class team members to attract them.

Friday, June 15, 2007

Why do talented employees leave companies??

The answer lies in one of the largest studies undertaken by the Gallup Organization. The study surveyed over a million employees and 80,000 Managers and was published in a book called "First Break All The Rules".

It came up with this surprising finding: If you're losing good people, look to their immediate supervisor. More than any other single reason, he is the reason people stay and thrive in an organization. And he's the reason why they quit, taking their knowledge, experience and contacts with them. Often, straight to the competition.

"People leave managers not companies", write the authors Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman. "So much money has been thrown at the challenge of keeping good people - in the form of better pay, better perks and better training - when, in the end, turnover is mostly manager issue."

If you have a turnover problem, look first to your managers. Are they driving people away?

Beyond a point, an employee's primary need has less to do with money, and more to do with how he’s treated and how valued he feels. Much of this depends directly on the immediate manager. And yet, bad bosses seem to happen to good people everywhere. A Fortune magazine survey some years ago found that nearly 75 per cent of employees have suffered at the hands of difficult superiors. You can leave one job to find - you guessed it, another wolf in a pin-stripe suit in the next one.

Of all the workplace stressors, a bad boss is possibly the worst, directly impacting the emotional health and productivity of employees.

HR experts say that of all the abuses, employees find public humiliation the most intolerable. The first time, an employee may not leave, but a thought has been planted. The second time that thought gets strengthened. The third time, he starts looking for another job.

When people cannot retort openly in anger, they do so by passive aggression. By digging their heels in and slowing down. By doing only what they are told to do and no more. By omitting to give the boss crucial information.

Dev says: "If you work for a jerk, you basically want to get him into trouble. You don't have your heart and soul in the job." Different managers can stress out employees in different ways - by being too controlling, too suspicious, too pushy, too critical, but they forget that workers are not fixed assets they are free agents. When this goes on too long, an employee will quit - often over seemingly trivial issue.

It isn't the 100th blow that knocks a good man down. It's the 99 that went before.

And while it's true that people leave jobs for all kinds of reasons - for better opportunities or for circumstantial reasons, many who leave would have stayed - had it not been for one man constantly telling them, as Arun’s boss did: "You are dispensable. I can find dozens like you." While it seems like there are plenty of other fish especially in today's waters, consider for a moment the cost of losing a talented employee.

There's the cost of finding a replacement. The cost of training the replacement. The cost of not having someone to do the job in the meantime.

The loss of clients and contacts the person had with the industry. The loss of morale in co-workers. The loss of trade secrets this person may now share with others. Plus, of course, the loss of the company's reputation. Every person who leaves a corporation then becomes its ambassador, for better or for worse.

We all know of large IT companies that people would love to join and large television companies few want to go near. In both cases, former employees have left to tell their tales. "Any company trying to compete must figure out a way to engage the mind of every employee,” Jack Welch of GE once said.......Much of a company's value lies "between the ears of its employees". If it’s bleeding talent, it's bleeding value.

Unfortunately, many senior executives busy travelling the world, signing new deals and developing a vision for the company, have little idea of what may be going on at home.

That deep within an organization that otherwise does all the right things, one man could be driving its best people away.