How to SHOW the love ❤
One book that had a big impact on me was The Power of Moments by Chip and Dan Heath. It focuses on ensuring people have a positive impression of your organization. If you nail beginnings, endings and transitions the perception of your company goes through the roof.
There are obvious applications of this simple rule of engagement.
Take employee onboarding and week one experience to a new level. Caterpillar Asia has the day one experience down to a science (reach out for details).
My oldest daughter just started her first job after college with a Fortune 500 company. Their process for signing up for benefits and taxes was difficult and confusing. New employees went into their first day of work frustrated, rather than excited. They have recovered some ground since then with a strong onboarding program.
I have seen and experienced poor acclimation of acquisitions create problems on multiple occasions. Something as simple as a seamless benefits transition matters a lot.
Celebrate anniversaries, birthdays, milestones, and other accomplishments by your employees and customers.
Treat exiting employees and clients with respect, appreciation, and dignity. I recently led a strategic planning and organizational assessment process for a company. While interviewing key employees, I was told twice the same story of how the President had recently treated an employee rudely on the employee's last day with the organization. Remember, people are always watching and observing.
Last year I led another client through a strategic planning process that included extensive work introducing cross-departmental process improvement teams into the organization. With great fanfare, we launched a process targeting a stretch goal to push the company past a significant revenue milestone. Over a four-month period people rallied, got creative and succeeded. After an initial milestone was reached, they celebrated with a boat tour around New York City. After they achieved the goal, there was a huge party. I would be happy to share a great cross-departmental process-improvement template with anyone interested. Just email me.
So, this post can be summed up in one word – intentionality. Focus on great employee, client, and stakeholder experiences with intentionality. Do not assume it will just happen.
Training Tip: At Entrada, we started every meeting with a moment of celebration, both within the company and personally for meeting participants. It created energy. Since most meetings dive into problem-solving this was a good counterbalance. I will have a webinar coming up with additional tips on building a great team and culture.