Putting People Before Numbers

Over the course of my career I have had the opportunity to both meet and work with executives and business owners from a wide range of business genres and classifications. When I first sit down with them, I always pose the exact same question of them… “Why are you or your organization in business?”

 

With rare exception, their responses are always the same… “To make money”.

The answer is also much the same for nonprofit organizations, municipalities and government agencies. While the responses may be on the order of “To raise funds” or “To increase operating revenue”, the essence of the “why” remains basically the same, to make money.  Nonprofits still need to cover their general operating costs and the cost of the services that they provide. Municipalities in like fashion need to cover their operating costs and the multitude of services which they provide to their citizens and visitors.

In our age of cutting edge technology and the ability to micromanage virtually every facet of our business operations, there is a higher degree of focus on crunching the numbers and managing the organization’s bottom-line than at any other time in history.

Yet, despite all of the enhanced tools that organizations have at their disposal to run their business operations, employee engagement is at an all-time low and employee turnover continues to be astronomically high.

Contrary to this general business trend, there are a select group of highly successful organizations from business, industry and government that have mastered the invaluable lesson of putting people before numbers.

What these organizations have learned firsthand over time is that if they continue to simply hire people to work for their organization’s money, their organization is going to continue to experience employee mediocrity, low engagement and turnover.  

However, when they started hiring people who “believe” in what the organization believes in, their people willingly invested their blood, sweat and tears in a shared belief of the organization’s mission, purpose and goal objectives. These organizations subsequently experienced substantial increases in engagement, productivity, employee job satisfaction and improved customer servicing.

These organizations developed leaders who believe and practice the unselfish act of risking their own interests so that others may excel. With the acute awareness that people are naturally trusting and cooperative, these leaders purposefully chose to provide their people with a trifecta set of successors:

● An environment of safety in which to work freely and creatively.

● Devote their leadership abilities to the purpose of helping others to succeed.

● Provide a tangible vision and pathway to a shared belief of the future.

When people feel that their leaders have their interests at heart, the lookout for each other, work harder, collaborate openly, bring forth their best talents and innovate.

What you need to comprehend is that the peculiar outcome of this unselfish approach to doing business together is that these organizations ultimately “made more money”.

The questions that your organization needs to come to grip with sooner rather than later are:

How much longer are your organization’s leaders going to view leadership in the context of positions and titles, rather than a responsibility to the organization and the people who comprise it?

How much longer is your leadership going to fixate its primary focus on revenue generation?

And lastly… “why”?

Copyright © 2015 Developing Forward | Thomas H. Swank, CBC

When Talent Walks Out The Door

Have you ever lost an employee that you didn’t want to lose or possibly couldn’t afford to lose?

For most organizations, the material costs of employee turnover are more than evident. According to the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), its cost estimate for replacing a salaried employee is between six and nine months of that employee’s salary on average.

The SHRM cost estimate may actually fall at the lower end of loss scale, as other industry experts and economists state that replacing a talented employee can cost as much as two times their annual salary.

Regardless of where you exactly peg it, the replacement cost that occurs when talent walks out the door is huge. Moreover, the important caveat here is that this is only the “replacement” cost. While the material/financial costs of employee turnover are clearly substantial, there should be an equal and commensurate focus on the intangible cost to your organization from the ripple effect that talent loss permeates throughout the organization.

The ripple effect ever so subtlety makes it way to the shores that stretch from the boardroom to the boiler room. Executives begin asking… “What is causing our organization to keep losing such talented people, especially after the substantial investment that we have made in them.”  All the while, front line employees throughout the organization are asking “Why did John Smith suddenly decide to leave the organization?”

These are upfront questions that could be considered normal, reasonable and to some degree predictable. Of course, every organization has its culture and its internal grapevine. So before long, reasonable questions turn into rumors and speculation that ultimately lack substance.

Let’s be honest here… It’s no secret that employees in mass recognize the talents and abilities of their fellow peers. And when a talented individual chooses to jump ship, it is most assuredly going to raise the question “why”. However, the questioning process doesn’t stop there. Rather, it serves as the beginning of a series of questions, such as… “Did John Smith know something that we don’t know?” “Did John Smith get off a sinking ship before it actually sinks?” “Is our company in financial trouble and we don’t know it.” And… the beat goes on.

These are the kind of ripples that travel much more like a tsunami and their effect is just as destructive. For when attitudes become “infected”, many detrimental things can occur beginning with poor moral and declining productivity.

Given that human nature and human behavior are often quite predictable, the act of a hardworking and talented individual like John Smith suddenly leaving the company and catching his peers off guard is certainly bound to raise some red flags.

Unfortunately, it is also bound to create a very real sense of job insecurity, worry and anxiety. As I recently cited a few weeks back, 70% of American workers don’t feel secure in their job and with their company/organization.

In many cases with diligent-hardworking-talented people… organizations just like yours, don’t see the warning signs until the employee is sitting there smack in front of you informing you that they are leaving and there is nothing more that you or the organization can do to change their mind.

The reality of this scenario which plays out every business day is that all of the compliments, pats on the back, awards, raises and even promotions don’t in the end provide the true measure of what the employee has been longing for all along.

They don’t merely want to be appreciated for their talents, abilities and technical skills… because in the age of robotics, they perceive themselves to simply be one and nothing more in the eye of your organization. As stated earlier, human nature is highly predictable. Ever since their early childhood when these individuals were endlessly trying to gain their parent’s approval, the thing that they wanted most in life was to be “valued” as an “individual”.

Once your organization has been afforded an ample opportunity to measure up and subsequently failed to meet the employee’s litmus test of being truly valued… talent will walk straight out the door and never look back.

It’s important to remember that your organization’s culture and practices are a vivid reflection of your organizations leadership and its attitudes toward employees… And that your people are staring into that mirror 24/7.

As your valued resource partner, we can readily assist your organization, its leadership and your people to… Learn more… Do more… Become more.

Copyright © 2015 Developing Forward | Thomas H. Swank, CBC