Maybe the Greeks Had it Right

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sherrie suski pandora's boxIn the Greek myth of Pandora’s box, Pandora was given a box by the gods. The gods told her that the box contained special gifts from them but she was not allowed to open the box ever. Pandora was trying to tame her curiosity, but at the end she could not hold herself anymore; she opened the box and all the illnesses and hardships that gods had hidden in the box started coming out. Pandora was scared, because she saw all the evil spirits coming out and tried to close the box as fast as possible, closing Hope inside.  As she slowly re-opened the box, there was Hope, in the corner and it needed to be coaxed to enter the world and show all humankind that it existed.

Humans need Hope and as leaders, we manage humans.  It is up to us to set the stage for a hopeful environment, one in which when the going gets tough, we remind people it is temporary and that we will get through it together.  Some of the ways we can create a culture that is built on Hope as the foundation are to:

Get to personally know your team

It is hard for you to offer Hope in a way others can receive it if you don’t truly understand the people who work for you.  Spend time getting to know who they are outside of work, what hobbies they have, how old their children are. 

Allow you leaders to lead

Ensure that you hire the right people and then provide them with both challenges and choices on how they meet that challenge.  You get to define the what, but let your leaders define the how. 

Recruit help

Every organization has both formal and informal leaders.  Find those informal leaders. and enlist them to help you instill Hope throughout the organization.  When communication takes both a formal and an informal path, it is much more impactful and spreads much more quickly than depending on formal communication channels alone

Offer the right information at the right time

While honesty and transparency are admirable traits, when you are trying to create an environment of Hope, it makes sense to shield your team from some of the inconsequential negative information.  I am not suggesting that you withhold critical, negative information, only that you smooth the ups and downs and focus on the larger upward trend

Paint a picture of a hopeful future

Continually help your team to see how bright the future could be.  Choose to focus on the positive and show them the path to get there.  Share with them all the things that are going well and how you will help them to overcome what is not.  Happiness is a choice.  Choose wisely.

Internal Employee Communications

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sherrie-suski-officeDeveloping a comprehensive and intentional internal employee communications strategy and a plan to execute on that strategy is critical to the success of your business, no matter the size. The best internal communication strategies do more than simply manage and distribute information. They can foster an engaging environment and cultivate relationships that are built on trust. That trust, in turn, creates a strong company culture whereby your employees know you trust them to deliver and they trust you to have their best interest at heart.

An internal communications plan is a clear guide for consistently communicating with employees, so they feel informed about goals for your organization or a specific initiative. This ensures they take action and do their part in achieving those goals. It should clearly and specifically define what internal communications strategies are important to focus on, how, when, who’s implementing them, and how you’ll measure them to demonstrate value and impact.

An internal communications plan should facilitate important conversations and engagement with key leaders and partners about internal communication strategies that can best deliver on key business needs and opportunities throughout the company.  It should also focus keenly on behavioral change that you expect will result as an outcome of this communication.  Communication just for the sake of communication is nothing but noise in an already noisy world.  You must understand and help your audience to understand what the call to action is and be prepared to measure whether or not you have achieved your goals.

If you are not yet fully convinced that you need an internal employee communication plan, read on!

Your employees are your most dedicated brand advocates.

According to Gallup, less than 30% of employees believe in the brand they work for!

This is very concerning, considering employees are the ones charged with delivering on the promises a brand makes to its customers. So start to think of internal communications as a marketing/branding exercise.

And Forbes agrees, you need to approach your internal marketing the same way you would external marketing efforts—by knowing your audience, your goals, tailoring the message, and providing an exceptional experience. This will require involvement from a cross-functional team.

Internal communication builds employee engagement, culture, and trust.

Internal communication is a key driver for employee engagement. The vehicle for all employee engagement initiatives is communication, core values, and a commonly held purpose statement or why. When employees feel like they are communicated with, engagement and trust will flow, resulting in a strong corporate culture.

If you fail to plan, then you plan to fail

If your ideas for internal communication revolve around upcoming events and random requests, then you don’t have a strategy. You likely are reinventing the wheel each time and are confusing your internal customers. Internal communications need to be woven into the larger company strategy, with a funded and well understood plan for execution.

An Attitude of Gratitude

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sherrie-suski-gratitudeGratitude is an intriguing concept.  It has very little to do with how much you have or what your position is in life and much more to do with the personal quality of being thankful, of the readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness. Actively practicing gratitude and pulling it toward you on a daily basis is important because it helps us to see a world that is bigger than ourselves.  When we have gratitude, we can help each other grow personally or in business. We can help those less fortunate because we see and appreciate how much we already have.

Some of the benefits of gratitude include:

It helps you to be in the present by noticing what you do have and stopping to acknowledge it 

Being grateful has the power to change your mood almost instantly from negative to positive

The simple act of gratitude has been scientifically shown to balance our heart rhythms and nervous system, leading to favorable changes in immunity and hormonal equilibrium, as well as increased production of the anti-aging compound DHEA.

Further benefits include a significant reduction in stress, anxiety, insomnia and depression.

Those in the gratitude condition reported fewer health complaints and even spent more time exercising than control participants did.

Improved emotions when someone who has a chronic illness focuses on an “attitude of gratitude” instead of feeling negative.

5 Ways Gratitude Changes our Brains

Gratitude Improves Mental Health 

Gratitude Improves Physical Health

Gratitude Improves Resiliency

Gratitude Activates the Brain Stem Region that Releases Dopamine and Serotonin

Gratitude Improves Sleep

Tips to Foster Gratitude 

Keep a journal of or in some way note big and little joys of daily life.

Write down “three good things”—identify three things that have gone well for you and identify the cause.

Write thank-you notes to others.

Think about people who have inspired you and what about them was most significant.

Engage in “mental subtraction.” Imagine what your life would be like if some positive event had not occurred.

How do you practice gratitude during Difficult Times? 

Just being around those you love can help you feel more grateful. Also, being more appreciative of life and feeling less cynical pushes you in a more thankful frame of mind. At other times, when you are facing a tough time, seeing it as a gift is useful.  Even in hard times comes the opportunity to learn, to improve, and, most importantly,  to give back. 

Living our Purpose

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sherrie-suski-wfhAs a purpose driven, value led company, Tricon understands how critical it is to embrace our humanity, and to be understanding and compassionate, especially during this pandemic. Our Purpose Statement and Guiding Principles take center stage at this time and we will do whatever we can to support the well-being of residents and employees. Our physical, social, emotional and financial benefit programs, that already existed, were well designed to help our employees through this crisis, and we further expanded our offerings to include additional services that are tailored to this specific situation. Everything we do is through the lens of care and support.

That’s the culture of Tricon. When you get culture right everything else falls into place and there is no better time to let that shine than right now.

Some of our employee benefits include:

  • Continued all employees on full pay whether or not we have full time work for them.
  • Continued employees who could not work at all due to childcare responsibilities on full -pay for
    6 weeks while they made alternate arrangements
  • Waived all member cost share (copays, deductibles and coinsurance) for the testing AND
    treatment of COVID-19
  • Made available a free 24-Hour Helpline, through Cigna Behavioral, that is available to all
    employees so they can talk about any stress or anxiety they are feeling during this time
  • Implemented immediate paid medical leave for any employee diagnosed with COVID-19
  • Offered paid caregiver leave for employees caring for a family member diagnosed with COVID-
    19
  • Assured employees with monthly or quarterly incentive plans that Tricon would account for
    COVID-19 impacts to operations and continue to pay them the average of what they had
    received for the last 3 months
  • Provided access to free mental health professionals, via phone or text, through the Employee
    Assistance Program
  • Offered free, live financial planning webinars
  • Provided 100% coverage for virtual doctor visits and online health care services for employees
    with chronic conditions or who are immune compromised
  • Presented well-being modules and challenges geared to staying physically and mentally healthy
    at home
  • Introduced contests to add some fun into the day- like Jellybean counting.
  • Conducted wellness checks- that included personal phone calls to each employee
  • Distributed Pulse survey that allow Tricon to tell if there is an area of employee concern that has
    not been adequately addressed or a specific geographical region that needs extra care

Tricon has really gone above and beyond to show incredible support to our employees and their families during this turbulent time.

Driven to Succeed

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sherrie-suski-motivationWhy do some push themselves to deliver the best and others are good with good enough?  What is it about the human psyche that pushes some to strive beyond good to excellent? Psychologists tell us that it is a convoluted web of past experiences, motivation and neurological make-ups that churn out individuals who constantly go above and beyond in every role they have in life, who are driven by achievement and being the best.  There are multiple reasons for this drive to excel and not all of them may be what you would initially think. 

Some psychologists tell us that these individuals are not so driven by the need to succeed, but by the need not to fail.

In fact, it is not the actual failure that they are so opposed to, but the shame that accompanies it.  These are individuals who usually care deeply about what others think of them. Certain messages are conveyed to the self when failure occurs, which motivate success in an attempt to avoid acknowledging them. Failure can lead one to have a sense of unworthiness and an expectation of abandonment or an unrealistic fear of complete ruin. In a paradoxical way, the desire to avoid a negative state or emotional experience is the impetus for achievement of your goals and great success.  

Neurologists provide us with explanations that are rooted in the brain.  When it comes specifically to motivation, one of the most important neurotransmitters is dopamine. Dopamine is one of the chemical signals that passes information from one neuron to the next. When dopamine is released from the first neuron, it floats between the synapses. Since dopamine is released before we ever receive a reward, its real job is to encourage us to act. It motivates us to achieve, while avoiding something negative. A team of Scientists at Vanderbilt found that the “go-getters” simply had higher levels of dopamine in the reward and motivation portions of the brain.

Those who do not hold advanced degrees with the letters Ph.D. or M.D. after their names suggest that the reasons for success are much simpler. People who are successful make decisions and choose to take action more quickly.  This increase their chances of success simply because they have tried more options.  They convince themselves to take on tasks they don’t want to do. Instead of avoiding them, they just power through them.  Inevitably this increases their odds of a successful outcomes. Just getting started in half the battle. Prioritization and focus also play a role.  Those individuals who are able to look down a list of to-do’s and quickly prioritize what is the most important, and then able to focus their attention on that task until completion, again increase their odds of success. Distraction is a key reason many people don’t succeed.  They choose to be a little bit accomplished in a number of different areas, but never follow through to the end on the one important goal.  Lastly, a big dose of positivity can go a long ways to accomplishing what you set out to do. People who are successful see themselves as successful at the beginning of the project.  They begin with the end in mind and have a good grasp on what success is going to look like.

Whether you believe success is driven by the fear of shame associated with failure, the amount of dopamine in certain centers of the brain or by the simple decisions you make on a daily basis, remember, if you are not willing to risk the usual, you will have to settle for the ordinary.  Jim Rohn

Measuring the Employee Experience

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There are many tools on the market that purport to accurately measure the customer experience.  They focus on such topics as action management, customer segmentation, feedback management, sentiment analysis and trend analysis, just to name a few.  Then there are whole CRM systems whose goal it is to manage a company’s interaction with current and future customers. The CRM approach tries to analyze data about customers’ history with a company, in order to better improve business relationships with customers, specifically focusing on retaining customers, in order to drive sales growth.  If we want to understand the employee experience, we have to pursue it with the same gusto and metrics that we do our customer experiences. In general, great experiences don’t just happen, they have to be consciously designed.

We need to start with the belief that a strong correlation exists between the quality of the employee experience and work productivity, which ultimately drives engagement and, hopefully, the delivery of more value to your end customer.  However, there are challenges around measuring workforce experience because no single person, department or function owns the whole experience. Organizations use many tools to understand the experiences, positive or negative, their employees are having — pulse surveys like Waggl, annual employee surveys, quarterly or annual performance reviews incorporating self-reviews, weekly management meetings, talent and succession planning, town hall meetings and so on. The issue is that these tools and the feedback received from them can offer a fragmented and often misleading view of how good the employee experience is.

Forrester has a Workforce Experience Model that is worth reviewing.  It is built around Engagement, Productivity and Impact.  The only issue I would take with their assumptions is that I believe productivity actually drives engagement and not the other way around.  

Productivity

Being able to measure productivity assumes that you have done studies to understand what acceptable levels of productivity are by function.  It isn’t the measuring piece that is difficult, it is understanding and creating the “what” to measure and the scale that makes it challenging. 

Engagement

An engaged workforce willingly invests time and energy in the success of the business and the degree of engagement will impact business results. Everyone has discretionary engagement that they may choose to deploy at their job or elsewhere. Your mission is to ensure that it is deployed at the job to the benefit of the customers.  To my point, Daniel Pink’s secret to high performance and satisfaction  – the deeply human need to direct our own lives (autonomy), the desire to get better at something that matters (mastery) and the yearning to do what we do in the service of something larger than ourselves (purpose).

Impact

The positive business outcome of productive, engaged employees is a loyal customer. Customer-facing employees, customer service, for example, have the greatest potential direct impact on the customer experience and satisfaction. What about those employees that don’t usually engage with customers directly, like Accounting, Finance or HR, where the potential for positive impact on customer experience is harder to quantify? They know how the processes really work in your organization and may be the best ones to identify and rectify problems for customers quickly.

The conventional eNPS  (Employee Net Promoter Score)  is a standardized tool that you could benchmark your organization against year over year and,  benchmark your ratings against other companies of your size or in your industry. The issue is that it is one question and for most of us, does not really provide value when wanting to delve into the specifics.  There are also multiple surveys you can conduct through Fortune, OC Register or other organizations, but they are quite expensive and questions can be tailored so they do not provide an apples to apples comparison across organizations.  Eventually, it would be great to have an industry accepted employee engagement scale that could be used to drive the employee experience and, ultimately the customer experience.

Workplace Certifications

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We recently embarked on a fact-finding mission around workplace certifications.  I felt strongly that we had done an amazing job internally creating a world class work environment for our employees who are spread out over 10 states and 19 different locations, but few outside of the company were aware of that.  In today’s competitive global job market, being a well-known organization or having a famous consumer brand name is not enough to attract and retain top talent. Organizations need to build an agile and connected workplace, create amazing employee experiences, nurture feedback and dialogue, actively focus on innovation, and embed their businesses into the future.

Types of certifications

Great Place to Work

This is a certification connected to Fortune. The survey is actually conducted by their research partner, Great Place TO work.  The survey is made up of about 60 questions and an additional lengthy questionnaire needs to be completed by Human Resources.  They tell you 4 hours, but we easily spent 5-10X that. Should be fortune- ate (😊) enough to be certified, this opens up the door for you to participate throughout the year in a number of other certifications including:  Top 100 Companies, Best workplaces for Diversity, Best Workplaces for Parents, Small & Medium companies, People’s Companies that Care Best workplaces for Millennials, just to name a few.

Aon Best Employers

The program salutes the achievements made by organizations that create sustainable competitive advantage through their people. Aon Best Employers program looks into the health of your organization from the inside, using the most objective measure possible – your employees’ opinion. Backed by more than 18 years’ worth of data on employee experience, Aon Best Employers program measures and recognizes extraordinary employers. It differentiates on people factors which are the key to success: high employee engagement, profound agility, engaging leadership and maniacal talent focus. Aon looks at 4 key areas:  Engagement, Agility, Engaging Leadership, and Talent Focus. They offer both a ready to use on-line survey, as well as a tailored engagement survey that you can customize.

Glassdoor Best Places to Work

Although considered a necessary evil by many to whom I have spoken, there is no arguing that prospective employees turn to Glassdoor to see what others are saying on the inside.  Glassdoor automatically selects those employers that obtain the highest average number of stars given in the reviews by their own employees.  I am proud to say we are at a 4.6, but 1/10th lower than we needed to be to win a Best Small & Medium Places to Work for 2018.  

Next time we will talk about the reasons why, both internally and externally it makes sense to participate in Work Place certifications.

Defensiveness

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sherrie-suski-defensivenessDefensiveness is defined as the quality of being anxious to avoid criticism and/or the behavior intended to defend or protect.  Some have even defined it as reacting with a war mentality to a non-war issue. While none of us relishes criticism, it is a necessary part of growth.  To be able to see ourselves as others see us is a gift that allows us to leave old habits behind and adopt new, healthier ways of having relationships with others.  

An Open Heart

Changing defensive behavior stars with being able to listen with an open heart to what is being said.  Assume the person has your best interests in mind and is sharing something that you need to hear. Try and clear you mind so that you are truly listening and not rehearsing your next defensive statement in your mind while they are speaking.

Express Your Feelings

Being able to openly express your feelings is requisite to becoming less defensive.  Letting people know in a calm manner when they have upset you is not being defensive.  Lashing out with an inflammatory statement is. 

Building Trust

Working through conflict builds trust in any relationship.  It assures both partners that they can trust each other; they can be honest and acknowledge that any relationship is a work in progress, not fixed or defined on just one person’s terms or one moment in time.

Toxic Comments

Bottom line: if we don’t learn how to deal with our grievances head on, inevitably we deal with them indirectly, most often in more toxic forms: by teasing or making snide comments, holding grudges, or by growing more indifferent over time. 

Of course, it’s difficult to give and receive healthy criticism if we’re clinging to a defensive attitude. If you feel yourself become defensive, try to see if you can simply acknowledge it, and work through the conflict as honestly and generously as possible.

Self- esteem

Temperament, history, and, most importantly self-esteem can impact how we respond to criticism.  Some people have so much negative self talk occurring in their heads that they feel they just can’t accept any more from someone else.  Realizing that just because someone is criticizing one issue, does not mean you are a bad person overall is key to building better relationships

People who are more prone to defensiveness may perceive an attack in certain situations in which people with resilient and calm temperaments would perceive none. Experiment with viewing the situation from different vantage points.

Overall, defensiveness in life will hold you back from building better relationships and from growing as an individual

On-Brand Behavior

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sherrie-suski-officePotential candidates are interested not only in what they may bring to a future employer, but in what that future employer may bring to them.  With the majority of millennials believing its management’s responsibility to offer development opportunities, this demographic is looking for employers that will invest in their future. But they’re not alone; training is a top priority for all workers, particularly those who will need to enhance their skills in light of digital disruption. While many companies have training or Learning and Development programs, not enough have specific training that is meant to drive on- brand behavior.

Programs that address this topic are a win-win.  Effectively communicating a brand requires multiple touchpoints and Learning & Development programs are the perfect opportunity to drive this behavior. Learning and development is the clear internal expression of an organization’s external employer brand. These programs should be representative of and demonstrate the company’s value system.

According to Paul Hagen, senior principal at West Monroe Partners San Francisco, customer facing employees represent the company brand with every interaction they have. Yet, most receive little or no training or development to help them understand the actions and mindset that will have the most positive impact on customers’ perceptions of the brand. Good companies understand the drivers of customer and employee experiences and ensure L&D initiatives include guidance on how employees can help deliver on the promises made by an employer’s branding, he explained; “Great companies take it a step further. They understand that happy employees make happy customers.”

Ultimately, it is about connecting your internal culture to your external brand in a way that is meaningful to both your employees and your customers alike.  It should be the natural progression of doing what is right for your employees and having them understand and do what it right for your customers.

Human Resources Strategy

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Once you have assessed your Organizational Culture and understand where you stand, you can move on to HR Strategy in support of that strategy.

The journey toward assessing and implementing your HR strategy may follow the same below five stages.

Functional

Minimal overarching strategies direct the HR team’s efforts. The HR team is largely reactive to the business stakeholders with respect to independent processes (talent acquisition, training, succession, compliance, compensation, etc.) The scope of HR’s roles and structure hold the function back from understanding the business and the employees. Several HR systems may still be manual. The team is focused on the day to day activities without understanding their impact on the organization.

Cross- functional

Strategies regarding critical HR functions (talent acquisition, management development and performance management) are project managed and process-driven, but they are not integrated. There may also be differing degrees of maturity. All functions within HR begin to engage more proactively with the business to ensure alignment, but efforts are not consistent, and change tends to happen slowly.  There are no launch plans and programs introduced, while valuable, may seem disjointed.

Building

Key HR processes start to become integrated as the organization recognizes the need for greater adaptability. Better alignment between the HR strategies and the business strategies is starting to take place. The cascading of organizational goals as a way to guide individual and team objectives and development begins to become pervasive.  Employees start to see the alignment between HR programs from various functions.

Enhancing

HR Programs such as talent acquisition, management development, succession, engagement and incentives are connected to one another in order to heighten the output of the organization. The business strategies are routinely translated into HR strategies, so the HR team remains in-step with the company.  There is a path that HR is capable of walking the organization down. An understanding of how each program introduced flows into and builds upon the one before.

Optimized

Sophisticated and integrated near and long-term HR strategies exist, usually in the 3-year range. Strategic objectives, which are typically cross-organizational, require HR leaders to collaborate cross functionally, creating shared goals and actions. Collectively these behaviors drive successful business outcomes. The strategy is continually reviewed to ensure it is on track with the business and averting unnecessary risk. When necessary, the strategy is rapidly altered based on data-driven inputs to stay on course.  Automation and data based decision making are key at this advanced stage.

Not every organization will achieve the optimized state, but it is, nevertheless, a worthy goal.  HR gains their seat at the table by being able to positively impact the business and align their processes to business outcomes.