Past Five

The Best Places to Work Put Employees First

Last night, I attended the Daily Herald Business Ledger ceremony for the Best Places to Work in Illinois in 2012. LaSalle was honored in the small and medium size company category. It is a huge honor to be recognized and I am proud of every employee’s contribution to the award.

The keynote speaker, Thomas A. Klobucher, CEO of Thomas Interior Systems, explained why each company made the list using three words: putting employees first. Companies today that have the most unique culture and the most dedicated employees almost always put their staff first.

Happy employees treat customers better, subsequently improving customer service levels and sales at the organization.

Last night reinforced my belief that retaining and engaging staff is not all about monetary incentives. Almost every company that was honored offers training programs, uses recognition tools, provides regular feedback and spends quality time with employees.

They also do fun things as a company, like happy hours, baseball games, March madness parties, potlucks, sumo wrestling competitions and volunteering.

The ceremony attested to the fact that every company, regardless of its size, has the potential to be a great place to work.

Congratulations to all of my co-workers at LaSalle!

Increase Employee Moral: Move Their Desks!

Did you ever consider that your teachers were onto something when they had you change desk locations and seat partners every few months?

They knew that sometimes who you sit next to can be as important as the topic at hand. It’s as true in business as it is in education.

Think about it. If an employee sits next to a “chatty Kathy,” they get less work done because they are distracted. If they share space with a colleague who hates their job, that negativity rubs off.

Having staff rotate desks can bring a new spark to the workplace, boost energy and increase moral.

I’ve seen it happen. Employees who were underperforming improved substantially once they were removed from the distractions of their neighbor. Workers who appeared burnt out were revitalized after relocating next to a staff member with seemingly inexhaustible energy.

I’m not saying this will work every time, but it’s a simple concept that’s easy to implement and carries measurable results.

Four Ways to Retain Employees

First Business recently aired a segment about unhappiness at work. They stated that employees’ discontent with their positions stems from the fact that they are accepting opportunities they normally wouldn’t just to have job.

As a result, employees do not have loyalty to their organization and are willing to jump ship for a better opportunity. So how do companies retain their employees and increase staff satisfaction? There’s a few ways.

1. Involve staff in important decisions: Employees want to know that their thoughts and opinions matter. They want to know that they are more than just a number. Involving staff in important decisions demonstrates that you value their opinion. This can be done in a variety of ways; implement a staff council, meet one-on-one with team members or bring lower level employees into management meetings.
2. Schedule time with employees: Set aside time regularly to meet with staff in order to discuss what motivates them. For some it’s face time, for others it’s outward recognition. In order to best retain employees, it’s essential to know what keeps them happy and motivated.
3. Use awards and recognition tools: Everyone wants recognition for a job well done, but the medium of recognition, as I mentioned above, is different for every employee. A few recognition tools include public praise, an award or a private conversation.
4. Invest in them: Most employees want to continue to develop their skills while learning new ones. Offering training sessions and having employees attend webinars and conferences will feed their desire to learn while augmenting their skill sets. At the same time, push employees to achieve their potential. Trusting them with new and challenging tasks demonstrates confidence in their abilities and the new skills they have acquired.

Embrace the Madness

Companies that attempt to squash the fun and energy of March Madness are approaching the situation the wrong way. The games are an ideal opportunity to boost employee morale and thank clients.

Limiting an employee’s ability to watch or discuss the games is exactly the reason articles are predicting a decrease in worker productivity during this time period. The more a person is told they can’t do something, the more they want to.

So embrace it, encourage staff to wear their favorite college jersey or start companywide brackets. Maybe even consider bringing in a few T.Vs for employees to watch the games during lunch. Allowing staff a minor “indulgence” has been known to increase productivity and spur creativity. Not to mention it will do wonders for morale.

March Madness is also the ideal time to thank clients outside of the holiday season. We throw an annual March Madness open house, where we invite all of our clients and bring in hot dog vendors, a popcorn stand, beer and snacks. The open house allows us to show our appreciation for our clients and is also a more casual forum that facilitates relaxed dialogue and helps our staff and clients connect on a more personal level.

But it’s not necessary to spend a lot of money to thank clients. Companies could hold a bracket challenge with a small prize for the winner. Any other ideas?

Keys to Being a Successful Manager

I’ve always said that people join companies but they quit managers. If a company has ineffective or incompetent management, they threaten losing valuable employees. LaSalle Network’s most successful managers share a few traits.

First and foremost, they know their team on a personal level and enjoy spending time with them. Our manager’s invest a great deal of time getting to know their employees and understanding their strengths, weaknesses, passions and desires. This allows them to delegate tasks according to the team member’s abilities.

LaSalle’s most successful managers are also always available. I believe this “on-call” mentality originates from the top down, as I would never ask my managers to do what I wouldn’t. I’ve made it a staple of my career to always be available to my staff beyond working hours. This helps permeate the
organization as intelligent staff can differentiate genuineness from a hyperbole.

At LaSalle, we stress the art of over communicating. Our managers are constantly talking with their teams, troubleshooting problems and answering questions. Each business unit meets with their manager formally twice a day and informally multiple times.

LaSalle’s managers also set ambitious goals for themselves and their team. They have a vision of the product they want to achieve and a plan for how they are going to accomplish it. At LaSalle, we use metric-driven goals to constantly evaluate our performance. Our managers are continually pushing their teams to achieve these goals, while challenging their objections and engaging them in new ways of thinking.

I strongly believe that a great manager can be crafted, and that all of these skills can be honed to perfection. It just takes time, persistence and a strong work ethic.

Going Back to Basics

Last month I had the opportunity to see Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz speak at an Entrepreneurs' Organization event. Schultz spoke about his 2008 decision to shut down every U.S. Starbucks for a few hours in order to re-energize and re-educate his employees on how to make the perfect espresso. The goal of the closure was to revisit their standards of quality and improve the "Starbucks Experience."

I thought this was brilliant. And I decided to do the same.

Last Wednesday, LaSalle had a four hour hands-on meeting to re-gain our focus and re-educate ourselves on LaSalle's basic principles, values, and core competencies. 

We went over the basics of our business: recruiting, interviewing, and selling, but most importantly, I wanted to emphasize the importance of empathy, LaSalle's primary core competency. Whether it's client, candidate, or employee relationships, understanding what the other person is going through is key to success.

As I told all our staff in Wednesday's meeting, I have had their jobs. I audited time sheets, processed invoices, made collection calls, stuff envelopes, licked envelopes, did reference calls, recruited permanent candidates, cold-called companies for five hours straight, the whole nine yards. I did it all. I empathize.

Whether you're a new salesperson, a longtime manager or an office assistant, the key to success is putting yourself in the other person's shoes. Your livelihood depends on others success and theirs on you. While it's easy to get caught up in your day or your duties, your individual successes will come from having empathy for your co-workers, clients, customers, and in our industry, candidates.

Though 2011 is shaping out to be one of LaSalle's best years, as a CEO it's important to continually motivate and re-engage your staff. Whether it's re-teaching the basics, empowering employees to make a difference or instilling the value of empathy, as a leader it's important to take the time to re-instill these values. And if it takes shutting down the business for a few hours then so be it. The long-term gain is worth the short-term loss.

Are Women Better Bosses?

Are women better managers, bosses, leaders? Well, since four fifths of my executive team are women, I would say err toward the side of yes.

Throughout the past few years, I’ve been overly impressed by the performance of LaSalle’s female leaders. They successfully build consensus to reach decisions, openly communicate, and inspire their team for continuous achievement and accomplishment.

While some people say that women bring emotion into the workplace, I say “Of course they do!” but that’s a good thing. Give me passion or give me death!

The stereotype is that women experience more emotional extremes than men, but emotion, if positive, will create a constructive and supportive environment that is good for the workplace and critical for business success.

Throughout the day, regardless if an employee accomplishes a large goal or a small task, I hear these women cheering and outwardly congratulating their team. I see the Director of Human Resources become infinitely more excited for an employee’s birthday than her own. And I’ll see our Vice President of Sales jump up and down when a business development manager receives an order.

These women worked hard for their successes and have pushed through barriers to get there. Not one of these four women were handed opportunities on a golden platter; they worked hard and earned to be where they are today. Because of their perseverance, they equally push and elicit this out of their team.

Not only are these women great bosses, but they are role models. Without the women of LaSalle, our company would never be where we are today.

The Future of Staffing: IT

In a recent SI Review article entitled the “The Future of Staffing,” many staffing experts predicted that more staffing companies will be going global, that outsourcing will be on the rise, and that baby boomers will be heading back to work. But as I mentioned in the same article, I think the most immediate change in staffing will be the exponential growth in the technology sector.

Small, medium, and large sized companies are consistently trying to integrate new technologies into their businesses in order to increase productivity and revenue. With the expansion in technological opportunities undoubtedly leads to the demand for employees with specific technological skill sets.

For example, according to Staffing Industry Analysts, “demand for Java/Java 2 Platform enterprise edition (J2EE) is up 60% from last year; Javascript is up 74%; HTML is up 104%.  Across all skills the median increase is 49%.” More specifically, “employment of computer and information systems managers is expected to grow between 18 to 26 percent for all occupations through the year 2014,” Career Guide to Industries 2006-07.

At LaSalle Network we have seen a dramatic increase in our technology business within the past year. From 2009 to 2010, our technology unit experienced an outstanding 80% increase in revenue. Similar to the SI Analysts blog, we have also seen employers ask for very specific skill sets. The latest trends have also been in .NET developments, data management, and online security, as well as, employees who’ve worked with Java and Oracle. 

Within the next few years, there will be a large increase in healthcare technology. With the HIPAA Privacy and Security Rules, which protect the privacy of individually identifiable health information and set national standards for the security of electronic protected health information, this sector will need an abundance of IT specialists to protect and safeguard information. Already a number of LaSalle Network healthcare clients are discussing staffing and recruiting strategies to take effect in the next twelve to twenty-four months. 

With technology among the economy's largest and fastest sources of employment growth, especially in the healthcare sector, there’s no doubt technology staffing will increase even more in the next few years. If you are a technology and engineering professional, your future is looking bright.

Breed Success: Leverage Strengths and Be Resilient

If you haven’t read Jay Goltz’s blog in the small business section of the New York Times, you should. Not only is he a successful small business owner, but he provides great insights for the budding entrepreneur.

One of his latest postings “Top 10 Reasons for Entrepreneurial Success,” caught my eye.

The first factor, “Look for opportunities to do something better than just about everyone else,” is dead on. I dabbled in a variety of industries after college: hospitality, logistics, and sales. Even though I didn’t know the route I wanted to go, I did know that I was good at talking and connecting with people.

I leveraged this strength and became the director of sales and marketing for a Chicago staffing and recruiting company. I learned the ins and outs of sales and recruiting, and realized this is an industry all about people. I knew that I could, and would, succeed in this.

Today, my business, LaSalle Network, is still based on personal connections. Although I am no longer involved in the day-to-day sales activities, I make it a point to know our clients both personally and professionally. I still go on sales meetings and happy hours; I call them on their birthdays and anniversaries. As Goltz says, “do something better than everyone else,” and this is what I aim to do with personal connections. If you have a strength, use it.

I also like tip #9: “There are going to be difficult times and you need to be resilient; whining is a waste of time.” No matter your career, and especially if you are an entrepreneur there will be hard times, and those hard times should and will affect you directly.

I always say that building your own business is like having a child. You love your child unconditionally and you are proud for all their accomplishments and successes, but you know along the way there will be hardships. You don’t stop loving your child because of their mistakes or faults, instead you help them to grow and support them no matter what.

This is how you should run a business. As Goltz says “be resilient.” If something goes wrong, do something about it. If your child has been acting depressed or got involved in the wrong crowd, you don’t whine to your partner: you do something.

This past year, we lost our #1 client. This client contributed to 10% of our revenue, and to make matters worse, was leaving in the middle of the recession. We had to do something.

We did what we do best and worked with our sales team to earn more business. Most companies would look for new business, but I had built relationships with even the smallest of our clients and fostered this relationship to create more business. Because of the relationships I had created throughout the past decade, our company wasn’t hurt by this loss and even grew 5% in 2009.

As Goltz points out, the “work hard and follow your passion” mantra is a good go-to, but leveraging your strength and being resilient is what will take you from good to great.

Second Impressions, More Important than the First

Richard Branson’s article “For Online Customers, It’s the Second Impression That Counts,” in OPEN Forum discusses the importance of the customer’s second impression with the brand, and how many companies loose sight of this importance in world where so many transactions take place online.

But what about off-line?

The second impression with your client, customer, vendor, etc. matters just as much or in my opinion, even more than the first impression. A positive first impression will bring your customer back, but only if you sustain this positive impression will your customer become a regular.

Many companies will stop following-up after the first two weeks, but by calling on a regular and routine basis, you are continually fostering relationships and positive impressions. In my company, we implement a follow-up calling schedule for both temporary and permanent positions, called a QC (Quality Control) call. We call both the candidate and client on the first day of the candidate’s job, the last day of the first week, and then every two weeks after that.

Equally, the second impression and third, fourth, fifth impressions are just as important for the sales team. Yes, initial impressions in sales are very important, but think how many sales people make great impressions. That is their job. It is very common for a sales rep to get caught up in phone calls and emails, but continuous face to face contact is key.

At LaSalle, our sales team delivers presents when it is a client’s birthday, a plant if a client has moved into a new home, a wedding or baby gift, and even a care package if a client is sick. These acts may seem small, but they foster positive associations with your company that go way past the first impression.

Additionally, Branson alludes to the continuous annoyance of machine representatives instead of real people. Again, this irritation can apply to any business, not just customer-service industries.

Voicemail is almost non-existent in my company. If a candidate or client calls and their point of contact is unavailable, the call will be transferred to someone else on the same team. Only as the very last resort, if the whole team or business unit is unavailable, will the call go to voicemail.

Ultimately, as Branson points out, we must learn to balance technology with human interaction. By simply sending emails and making the occasional phone call, your impressions will begin to align with every other company in your industry. The real value comes from positive and continuous relationships. Remember, the first impression will either open the door or close it, but continuous positive impressions will leave it wide open.