This week he shared specifics with me on exactly why he thinks business leaders should sign up for this free email (emphasis mine):

The Weekly Bottom Line-Improving People Practice email should benefit all business leaders.  The world has become commoditized.  The true marketplace differentiator is human capital.  I enjoy learning the Best Practices other companies use with their most valuable asset – their people.

An engaged workforce is typically harmonious, productive and profitable.  These Best Practices eliminate the need to manage.  We have replaced management with effective leaders armed with Best Practices, and the difference has been remarkable.

While Winning Workplaces surely plays only a small part in Tasty Catering’s success, you can’t argue that they’re not doing a lot of things right in their staff engagement that comprises their highly productive workplace culture: As we shared in the company’s award profile, in a very tough year broadly and certainly in their industry (2009), their employee leadership development and other strategies helped them earn above-average revenues.

Register now to start getting our weekly, bottom line-improving people practices email FREE in your inbox.

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I don’t yet have it in my hands, but I already know I’m going to like the latest book from workplace generational expert Neil Howe, Millennials in the Workplace.

According to StreetInsider.com, Howe "turns [the] downbeat message [from the media on Millennials, aka Generation Y] on its head."  Taking the position that Millennials are an asset and opportunity rather than a lazy (insert other adjectives here) liability, the website writes, Howe’s new book serves in part as a resource for employee engagement and team building strategies to find and keep them.

Providing a sample of the employee retention tips Howe shares in Millennials, StreetInsider.com links to this pdf from Howe’s company, LifeCourse.  At its core is the following list of recruiting and retention strategies tailored to this young generation that, some reports say, became the most pervasive one of all this year: 

1. Treat them like VIPs
2. Co-recuit the parents
3. Find them early
4. Look after them
5. Offer structure and teach them the basics
6. Provide tight cycles of feedback
7. Don’t offer a "McJob"
8. Make them part of the group
9. Be active in the community
10. Take an interest in their success

I really like that the pdf includes a section on "What To Do" under each of the above strategies to take them from the world of the ambiguous to the practical.

Given the Millennial workforce’s size and its stature as the dominant generation in the work world for years to come, it’s no surprise that our Top Small Company Workplaces are already using many of the above strategies to help them tackle pressing issues from process and supply chain improvement to sales lead cultivation and delivery.

Related: Read my 4 reasons why Millennials may be the ones to pull us out of our troubled economy.

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I enjoyed this post by Susan Fronk on the America’s Best Business Practices blog.  In it she argues that the one thing that can most positively impact your small business – over and above measures to grow revenue, cut costs, and deliver excellent customer service – is finding and keeping great employees.

She provides more value later in her article by sharing three ways small businesses can build a more productive workplace culture by attracting and retaining great employees:

• Do a good job of recruiting and hiring,
• Create a great working environment, and
• Build relationships with your employees and foster relationships among employees.

I thought I would expand upon Fronk’s informative post by sharing with you some specific ways that Winning Workplaces’ 2010 Top Small Company Workplace award winners find and keep great employees:

1. Hire slow.  It’s not uncommon for job candidates to go through as many as 8 interviews before a hiring decision is made.
2. Hire for cultural fit.  This includes not just when a position is open, but generally when someone looks like a good fit for the organization; a number of firms prefer to keep their feelers out and plug someone in when they come across that person.
3. Grab top talent from competing firms.  Top talent is top talent, and our winning small companies are unabashed about leveraging a bad economy that has forced competing firms to shed staff to their advantage.
4. Systematize the orientation/onboarding process.  Many companies do a good job during the middle period of an employee’s tenure, but few are exceptional at the beginning, a critical time for new hires.  Our Top Small Company Workplaces really excel here by doing things like mentoring and scheduling meetings with the CEO to ramp up the new employee’s understanding of and commitment to the organization.
5. Managers have frequent contact with their subordinates.  For many small companies, managers only interact one on one with employees, to review performance and also their top concerns/hurdles, every three months.  Our award-winning firms typically do this every two weeks to a month.  This helps better engage employees for greater commitment, and also helps firms react to emerging issues sooner.
6. Invest in employee leadership development.  The Top Small Company Workplaces share a belief that they are best served when their top talent stays to fill and create roles of increasing responsibility, and they have seen results from their action on it including process improvement, product innovation, and better customer service – not to mention mid- and top-level employees who stay longer, keeping recruiting and training costs down.  As far as their specific leadership development strategies, see this post.
7. Give employees a voice in the decision making.  Lots of companies have an open door policy, but this no longer cuts it if you want to foster two-way communication that results in greater employee engagement and productivity.  Our award winners give their employees a voice by holding daily huddles and frequent (at least once a month) all-hands meetings.  In addition, many of them open up their books and explain the company finances so people gain a crystal clear understanding of how their role affects the top and bottom line.
8. Do employee recognition.  I’ve blogged before about how recognizing your staff can be meaningful and still inexpensive.  Often times a simple, face-to-face thank you or small gift personalized to the employee can make a powerful impact.
9. Be generous in providing time off.  More employers need to come to the realization that being flexible around employees’ personal and family obligations makes for a more committed and productive worker.  Paid time off should be a primary consideration, but if that’s not in the budget, being flexible – especially for unanticipated obligations – through measures like cross training will help immensely with retention.
10. Empower workers down to the lowest levels to make good spot decisions.  This involves a lot of trust from leaders and some additional training, but when it works it makes a dramatic impact on business results.  Just think how much happier you’ve been when you’ve called a vendor and you didn’t need to be transferred up the phone/responsibility chain to have your issue resolved.  The same sense of satisfaction can mean the difference in whether your customers or clients come back to you and refer you to others.

Is there a measure you think should be in this list?  If so, I welcome your comment on it below.

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In a new post on the Small Business CEO blog, What Works for Business blogger Daniel Kehrer shares 13 mistakes that can jinx your business.  The #8 mistake on Kehrer’s list is taking good employees for granted.  He explains that,

High turnover and the departure of valued employees can accelerate troubles.  Rewards and recognition – even small gestures – go a long way to keeping your best people around.  Treat new hires with care.  Provide a mentor, if possible.

These are wise words that have been borne out in the case of the small businesses Winning Workplaces has honored over the last 8 years for their ability to realize a substantial payoff of employee engagement and team building activities.  Based on what we’ve learned from these high-performing organizations, I wrote the following two posts that should help you when it comes to, respectively, recognizing employees effectively, and cost-effectively; and implementing mentoring initiatives that help both the employee and the company:

Employee Recognition on the Cheap

Two Approaches to Mentoring Employees

If you find the information in these links helpful, I invite you to retweet this post on Twitter using the link at the top of this post, or to share it using the button below.  Thanks!

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In March 2009 I referenced Stan Lee’s quote from Spider-Man – With great power comes great responsibility – in warning small business owners not to take advantage of employees’ willingness to do more in a tough jobs environment.  (Although, as I wrote about last week, in the year since then the hiring picture has improved somewhat, leading some workers – especially top performers – to be more willing to leave if they see this dynamic at play.)

Yet, this new article on Management-Issues by Mitch McCrimmon makes me think Lee’s quote should be reversed when the discussion shifts from the perspective of employees, to leaders and managers and how they keep employees engaged and empowered to put forth their best effort.  In prefacing three techniques to help managers engage their people more effectively, McCrimmon says, "Delegate more – not just more work, but greater responsibility."

Giving workers down to the lowest levels more authority and autonomy to better serve customers, and thus the company, is something Winning Workplaces’ small business award honorees over the past eight years not only do, but are highly intentional about.  For proof, check out these Success Stories we’ve written on some of them:

• Alaska Wildland Adventures
• Pro Motion, Inc
• Red Peg Marketing
• Stellar Solutions, Inc.

So, with respect to Mr. Lee, I submit that when it comes to the ROI of your human capital strategies, "With great responsibility comes great power."

Related: One of our most popular, related webinars is this one on growing leaders from within, featuring CEOs from thriving small firms in two diverse industries.

Photo credit: Blog@Newsarama

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Despite this disadvantage, however, on Small Business Trends today, Case Western Reserve University Entrepreneurial Studies Professor Scott Shane shares research from ADP which finds that while the number of people employed in organizations with 50 or more employees has fallen compared to the percentage in December 2000, that percentage is over 100% for firms with 1-49 employees.  In other words, as Shane writes, the jobs trend is better at very small establishments.

This is why groups such as the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation have been urging policymakers to put more support mechanisms in place for very young businesses.  Based on past recessions, it’s a fact that many people who have been laid off, and/or who elect to leave their employers in a "Who’s next?" workplace culture, will form new businesses to strike out on their own.  Right now we’re also in a climate in which, spurred by parental support and advances in technology translating to low overhead, an unprecedented number of young people are forming small ventures.

When you combine ADP’s research with the SBA’s findings that over the last 15 years, small businesses have generated almost two-thirds of the net new jobs, it seems imperative to support the formation of startups, as well as their growth.  Winning Workplaces is focused on the latter as it pertains to activities for employee engagement and employee retention tips for leaders and managers.

Related: In February, when the economy was looking a lot more sluggish on the jobs front, I reported that over 50% of our Top Small Workplaces were hiring. See which ones here.

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Have you ever been at a big-box retailer where after the obligatory greeter you’re pretty much forgotten?  I must have had hundreds of experiences by now where I was disinclined toward the sale because either an employee couldn’t lead me to the product I was looking for; or even if they did in rare cases, they couldn’t tell me what I wanted to know about it.

Generally speaking, this is big businesses’ loss and small business’ gain.  What really makes this work for small firms, though, is having in place employee leadership development practices that result in each and every person knowing all there is to know about pretty much every product in the store (or service, if that’s what you offer).

On the Fast Company blog last week, Simma Lieberman described how these practices play out at a Canadian retailer called Everything Wine.  Its Founder and CEO Paul Clinton explained that,

Every employee goes through wine education.  We want our employees to have a good time, and look forward to coming to work, and we want our customers to have a good time, and enjoy doing business with us.

Because of the increased sales potential of this employee engagement model, many of our Top Small Workplaces rely on it.  Bill Loskutoff, President and CEO of California-based Jackson’s Hardware, gives his take on what this looks like and the results it brings his store in the video below.  Watch especially starting at 1:39 (click here if you can’t see the video in your blog feed):

To what extent are all of your employees knowledgeable about your product/service offerings?

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Incoming search terms for the article:

• paul clinton everything wine
• business articles on Simma Lieberman team building

Here are two new sources that support this argument, for your reading and learning pleasure:

1. A review of multiple studies by The Cochrane Collaboration found that giving employees control over their work schedule improves their stress levels, quality of sleep, mental health, and alertness.  (HR Morning)
2. "HR Bartender" Sharlyn Lauby defines 7 types of power in a workplace culture and uses these traits as the basis for an exercise to help you pinpoint how you influence action from others.  (Human Capital League)

Related: Need more proof of the impact of this leadership practice?  Read this firsthand account by an employee of a 2008 Top Small Workplace (identified as a finalist in the post based on the timing of that year’s winners announcement) on how it’s changed his impression of a productive workplace.

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In my last post I mentioned the employee satisfaction level (45%) recently reported by The Conference Board and concluded by asking "whose fault is this anyway?"

When I’ve asked similar questions, I get a range of answers.  Some are adamant that it is the leader’s fault.  Some say the employee should switch jobs if they are so dissatisfied.  Others can’t come up with an answer.

Here’s the answer: It is the leader’s fault and the employee’s fault.  In organizations with an effective workplace culture, all parties have a sense of ownership. 

In creating a culture of ownership and in turn a productive workplace, we often write about what leaders should do.  I’m going to look at the flip side of the coin and point out what leaders shouldn’t do if they want to contribute to a culture of trust, employee engagement, or team building.

1. As your organization’s leader, DON’T be so intensely focused on results that you forget people are your most important means of getting to those results.  A quick story: Years ago, during the first six months of becoming a CEO, I learned this the hard way.   I overused the phrase "I expect" and the majority of my interactions with my team were about what they were doing to deliver the numbers.  Thank goodness a combination of my own experience, an executive coach, and feedback from a couple people on my team helped me realize that the intense focus on results was backfiring.  Clearly, a productive workforce requires building engaged employees. 
2. DON’T ask for input and then ignore it.  This approach squashes open communication in the workplace.  This approach says "I don’t care about your ideas or expertise."  Without communication and caring, building trust is unlikely. Guess what?  Poor communication + minimal trust = less than optimal results.
3. DON’T decide that you are going to launch an initiative (large or small) to improve employee engagement unless you plan to follow through.  Not surprisingly, this reinforces a perception that you as the leader really don’t care about employees and you can’t be counted upon to do what you say you will do.  And that goes back to one of my beginning points: In a great workplace, the culture of ownership contributes to results. 

This list of "don’ts" is endless.  Have you been on the receiving end of a don’t?  As a leader, have you learned a valuable lesson from a don’t?  Those of us at Winning Workplaces would love to hear your story.

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The four experts Inc. brings on in its article are split – two for the idea, two against.  While I’m not of the caliber of these four folks, I can still help break the tie: it’s not a good idea.

Why?  Because it goes against one of Winning Workplaces’ six building blocks, or characteristics – based on leading workplace research, not just what we think – of a high-performance organization: Rewards & Recognition.  We define this building block as follows:

Employees are sufficiently rewarded and recognized, in monetary and non-monetary ways, for their contributions and accomplishments.

I also think it goes against another building block: treating employees with Trust, Respect & Fairness.  Is it respectful or fair, after all, for a promotion to go to an employee who hasn’t demonstrated the skills, training, or just plain nose-to-the-grindstone hootspa sought by leaders or managers as ideal to spurring even greater company growth?

Two other factors worth mentioning under this promotion model:

• Potential for increased turnover and recruiting/training costs if the randomly promoted employee doesn’t work out.
• Potential for increased tension of employees who work under the randomly promoted employee if they don’t feel he or she rose to the new position through merit.

What’s your take on promoting employees randomly as part of your overall workplace team building activities?

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