Managing People
Challenge: A large and fast-growth manufacturing company experienced its first down-sizing in its history. Employee morale was low and there was recognition that their traditional financial motivators of increasing stock price and bonuses were no longer viable. Leadership recognized the need to adapt their human resource practices to provide other forms of employee motivation.
Solution: During their Aligning Culture with Business Session, leaders talked about how their company was a demanding place to work. They expected employees to drive for results, be self-motivated and not make mistakes. They named their organizational culture a “sink or swim” kind of place, and reported focusing primarily on those individuals who could develop themselves.
Leadership agreed to work toward striking an operational balance between performance and effectively managing and developing people. They brought in their change management specialists and initiated a Company Culture effort where the focus was on how to achieve results through people. They started with a management development program for directors and above, with members of senior management involved in all of the sessions. At the same time, they initiated a new program to help give employees more flexibility in their work schedules.
Results: Progress did not appear overnight, but employee survey results slowly improved. Employees were more positive about training opportunities, flex-time programs and recognition from managers. The company started tying managers’ salary increases and bonuses to improvements in their direct reports’ survey ratings. Most importantly, leadership recognized they were in the midst of a long-term change management effort, and continued to communicate their new Company Culture vision of achieving results through people at every opportunity.