Planning to Excel

You work hard for your business.

You have a great vision for your business future.
You are passionate about what you provide your customers.

Still, your staff just doesn't get it! You will need dedicated employees - employees that behave as if this is their business, too. In both Stomp the Elephant in the Office and Ownership Thinking , the theme runs strong that attitude is everything and attitudes can be changed both for the positive and negative.

Furthermore, you want your customers to be raving fans and dedicated to your success, too. 

I regularly say, you have to have a plan. . . but sometimes, you will find that a simple checklist can keep you and your staff on track. A checklist is based on a plan and is easiest to read each day before life starts getting crazy.

Tips to keep in mind while building your checklist:

1. Tell your Passion. With the passing of Steve Jobs, I am reminded daily that his story was not just Apple, his teams put tools in our hands that were elegant, useful and full of surprises.
2. Know and Share your Metrics. These go back to the plan and graphically say what we are going to do. Think graphs. Increase profit in 2012 is not a goal because $1 more of profit would make that true. Instead, management may want to see a monthly graph tracking actual profit. Or maybe each job is checked for gross profit.
3. Hire right - yes, this is hard, and taking an extra two weeks may seem like an eternity, but the resulting employee that fits and stays is a cost savings in so many ways.
4. Provide leadership - set the example, be humble, treat others they way you want to be treated.
5. Invest in what is needed. Have the right tools for the job.
6. Protect and Project your Standards. Standard Operating Procedures, Policies and Procedures, Employee Handbooks; these are words that you breathe life into each time your create new, enforce old and leave no room for variation.
7. Instill Discipline. Discipline leads to standard outcomes and efficient production. Discipline is a way of behaving in business internalized by your staff.
8. Meetings are action driven and action creating.
9. Ask often - will this waste time? money? energy?
10. Will what you do this day bring you energy?

"Have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary." --Steve Jobs

Linda Fayeweather

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Changing Lanes LLC

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Paying Your Employees What they are Worth Part 2
When you are replacing an employee, most businesses understand the role an employee played and will have a job description but they often don't understand the skill and knowledge that evolved over time for that employee. That is true for any job - jobs grow and change regardless of the description. Ask yourself:

*Am I actually paying my employees what they are worth?

*Are my employees worth what I'm paying them?

　

As a small business owner, it is tough to know what the cost will be if a long time employee leaves. You might find someone who is better for the position, you might not.

Questions to consider:

*Am I prepared if this employee leaves?

*What will it cost to find someone with the same skills?
*Will it cost more to hire someone new and train them versus matching the offer so my employee will stay?
*Does the employee actually want to stay?
*If I match the offer will the employee do more? Will they be worth what I am paying them?
*Is this person right for the position and my company?

When a employee comes and says "I have an offer," it is usually too late to keep them and sometimes, the employee has out-grown the job and you will not be able to keep them happy or employed at your firm. Regular job reviews and work reviews will help you know where your vulnerabilities are.

Jeff Mendelsohn

liquid@liquidmechanix.com  

Employees and Visions

Behavioral Metrics
You know when you have walked into a company that understands the importance of training employees because as a customer, you will feel heard, helped and valued even if you purchase nothing. Behavioral Metrics are measurements that help companies monitor the actions and attitudes of employees. Effective ways to measure the attitudes of those working for and with you may be project feedbacks, meeting evaluations, employee appraisals and peer evaluations.

When you do these evaluations or feedbacks, the categories you will monitor are:

1. Commitment - adherence to policies, level of participation, and efforts to provide training.

2. Communication - surveys of employees and customers; error elimination caused by ineffective communications; and recognition of outstanding communication of employees.

3. Cooperation - shared financial risks and regards; effective problem resolving and reporting efforts, formal recognition of cooperation.

Your business's long-term success is possible only when employees' behavior is aligned and everyone works for the benefit of the company as a whole. Even if you are a micro business with few employees, your attitude will shine through in the tone and tenor of your communications and your commitment to customer satisfaction.

Linda Fayeweather

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Changing Lanes LLC


Paying Your Employees What they are Worth

Recently, a friend of mine changed jobs. He worked for a great company, small but great and was treated well. He was able to express ideas and actually see those ideas come to light. His work was rewarding and he enjoyed what he did. But in the few short years he was there, he outpaced his position - his talent and skills grew but his position did not. After 6 years my friend was still being paid as a junior analyst. He had gotten some raises some years, and some years not.

On a whim, my friend interviewed for another job more in line with his skill level. The position turned out to be a low level analyst position. The salary started off at 1.5x his current salary. My friend stepped up his search and within a 6 months had found another job. It was a mid level analyst position, 1.7x his current salary with less overtime, better benefits, and at a similar sized company.

When he told his current employer that he was leaving, they were shocked. My friend kept in contact with a few old co-workers, who kept him appraised of the status of the company. After a month, the company hired someone new. The company couldn't afford someone with the same skills as my friend. Not even close. They ended up with another junior analyst.

The company suffered. Projects took much longer to complete. Work that my friend use to do, never got done. Work had to be redone. Work flow hit a bottleneck. Profits slowed.

This wasn't because my friend was irreplaceable. Everyone is replaceable. The problem is he grew the job and often in small business, as long as people do their job and don't rock the boat, they keep working regardless of their value to the company.

Yearly reviews and occasional job analysis will sometimes save you from replacing employees. The average cost to replace an employee is $17,000 unless they are making over $60,000 in which case it starts at about $30,000. Keeping your employees coming to work is more than just having a desk at the office.

 Jeff Mendelsohn

liquid@liquidmechanix.com  

Leadership

The Month of October is dedicated to Stomping the Elephant in the Office. Now is the time for Small Business owners, managers and workers to take the economy in their own hands and become the businesses that make a difference. Businesses that maintain profitability and have low employee turnover usually are doing many things right. This starts at the top with leadership that is in tune with reality.

I recently saw a CEO of a local company leaving one of his retail facilities. He did several things:

1. He stopped and chatted with the store greeter,

2. He picked up some litter as he walked out the door, and
3. He helped a customer break loose a shopping cart from the corral.

Even if I had not known who this person was, I would have smiled and enjoyed watching this engaged individual. The customer likely did not know who he was, but several employees that were nearby did and will remember. Simple acts of respect to the world around us are hard to ignore and often cause others to respond similarly. Not all people will follow our good examples, but the more we try, the harder it will be to ignore out leadership.

An engaged leader leads to engaged employees who will work with passion and connection to their company. They drive innovation and move an organization forward.

Linda Fayeweather

 

The Toxic Employee. I'm sure you have worked with a few coworkers or had a few employees that could be considered "Negative", "Not a Team Player", or somebody you just avoid. They cause drama, or feed drama. They are employees that don't promote a healthy work environment and usually the ones that complain the most. Whatever they are, they are toxic. They drain other employees desire to work, they hurt the company, and generally sabotage their own work.

The most common types of Toxic Employees are the:

         Office Gossip or Tattletale - passing rumors around or informing to your superiors
        Pessimist - everything is doom and gloom
        Social Butterfly - social beyond "I really like to work here", often have very long stories
        Corporate Climber - the one that casts moral scruples aside for personal gain
        Not my Job - person who believes just the job description and nothing but the job description
         Bad Boss - Career Builder survey shows that 26% of managers are unsure of their own abilities as a leader.

Being a leader is a choice, not something selected for you. You know you are a leader if people are following your lead. The toxic employees can become leaders if allowed to live in your organization - not the leadership you want.

Jeff Mendelsohn

liquid@liquidmechanix.com

Shifting Focus and Budgeting WHYs

Shifting Focus and Driving a New DirectionIf you ask anyone if they want to succeed in life, I bet every single person will say "Yes" but more than 75% of those people will focus on failing or why they aren't succeeding and in turn fail. Sounds strange, they all said they wanted to succeed, why didn't they?  

Because of their focus.

Negativity is common place and usually has a more emotional impact on us and what we are doing versus succeeding.  I've been reading "Stomp the Elephant in the Office" by Steven W. Vannoy and Craig W. Ross. It is one of the best books I've read to date about leadership and business culture.

Take this example about Negativity begets Negativity.  Often we get caught up in what isn't working versus what is working.
 
It is Monday Morning, 8:40AM and you are late driving to the office. Traffic is heavy. You go to take a sip of coffee. Brake lights ahead of you. You slam on the brakes, coffee goes everywhere. Your day ruined before it even starts.

If that sounds like a morning you have had, we all would shout "I should have gotten up earlier".  Right, but at every turn of this story, the driver could have changed one thing and had a different outcome.  Shiffiting the focus at each action can result in a better outcome.  We don't get "Do Overs" but we can always change the next action.

Jeff Mendelsohn

liquid@liquidmechanix.com  

Budgeting for WHY This is the last week of September, the last days of the third quarter, fall is officially here, and plans for 2012 are in the making! During this month, we have talked about budgeting - mostly about how to budget and the feelings around budgeting. Now we will bookend these conversations between WHY and ACCOUNTABILITY. The reasons WHY to budget for a business are: 1. Plan for the future (grow, sell, retire) 2. Provide a financial game plan to match your business plan 3. Know where the money is going and why 4. Stop reckless, random or duplicate spending 5. Reduce surprises that cause stress - you know that quarterly bill you always forget? I could go on about WHY budget, but in the end, you either will or you won't and those that don't often wonder WHY there are more days at the end of the month than there is money. Now, on the Accountability end of a budget, I have a coffee mug that says "How can I be out of money, I still have checks?" a saying I've heard at the end of many a joke and I think eventually it will be an antique as fewer and fewer paper checks are really written. The point is simple. . . . . .Being accountable means comparing the actual to the expected.  Accountability can be accelerated by finding an accountability partner - someone in your firm, maybe your accountant, or your board of advisors that you regularly say  "This is what we said we were going to do and this is what we did." The discipline of budgeting often leads to the freedom from stress and more money in your bank account - not bad for something most people say they don't like to do.  Here is hoping that your business will have a working budget next quarter. Linda Fayeweather Like us on Facebook   Tweet us at Twitter      Changing Lanes LLC PS.  October will be all about employees Stay tuned!