Here’s a problematic question for entrepreneurs and managers: is it that people don’t want to work nowadays? Or is it that they don’t want to work for YOU?
Twenty years ago, I wrote that you must provide the “Ultimate Experience” for both customers and employees. Over the past two decades, we’ve observed significant strides in how organizations engage their customers. Frankly, we haven’t seen that level of progress across the board regarding employee engagement.
In the United States, we’ve heard many leaders talk about how today’s employees don’t want to work and are lazy. Many studies are confirming this is not true. The companies and managers who have had problems with employee engagement have failed to create an environment where their staff was happy or felt it was a place they wanted to work.
To have a successful business, you need happy and engaged employees. It’s not only the right thing to do, but it’s also good for business. Employees who are disengaged cost businesses billions of dollars every year in lost productivity. Gallup has even gone as far as saying that employee engagement is the key to success for any organization.
Here are a couple of questions for you:
Have you designed the employee experience with as much passion and precision as you plan customer acquisition?
Have you developed a specific list of WHY both current and prospective employees would recognize working for you as a superior option from their other opportunities?
For most, frankly, the answer will be, “No.”
That needs to change — and it needs to change now if you want to attract and retain a superior team.
So, what can you do to create an environment where your employees want to work? It’s not easy and takes time, but here are five tips:
Treat your employees with respect. This includes listening to them and considering their ideas.
As I wrote in “ICONIC,” respect is reciprocal. If you want your team to respect and value you and your organization, you must display how you value and respect them FIRST.
Make certain they feel appreciated. The best way to make your employees feel part of the company is by giving them ongoing recognition. In other words, leaders don’t recognize their work only when milestones are met or when achieving sales targets.
Recognition can be in many forms, including praise for doing a job well done, even if it’s not on the radar screen yet.
Offer them development opportunities. No one wants to feel like they’re stuck in a dead-end job.
Employees want to know that there is room for growth and that they are valued enough for the company to invest in their future.
Let them have some fun! Work can be stressful, so it’s essential to find ways for employees to let off some steam.
Whether through social activities, team-building exercises, or just taking a break for a little bit, employees need to know that they can have fun at work and not be all work and no play.
Finally, PAY MORE! My great pal, Randy Pennington, related a story on a recent live stream where we both were guests about a consulting client of his that dramatically increased the compensation of his team. Guess what? It SAVED him money!
How could this be the case?
He reduced his expenses of recruiting and onboarding new team members.
He drastically reduced turnover.
He kept his best employees and attracted top-level recruits.
He prevented massive overtime outlays because he now had a productive team that could get the work done during regular hours.
AND the fact that no one had to put in extra time meant happier employees and families.
The next time you think about how employees “just don’t want to work today,” remember it’s not because they’re lazy. It’s likely because they aren’t attracted to work for a company that they aren’t certain appreciates them or doesn’t have their best interests at heart.
Change your ways and see how your employees change their tune!
If you can successfully implement these tips, you’ll be well on your way to having an engaged and happy team!
To approach your business as “show business” is not to be confused with putting on an act, being overly dramatic, or being fake.
It’s about differentiating yourself from the competition by understanding your clients in the same way that show business understands their audience.
It’s about creating specific strategies based on your customer’s distinct preference in order to deliver experiences that are compelling and engaging.
It’s about taking what we can learn from the entertainment business and leverage that insight into building strong and lasting emotional connections with our clients and colleagues.
Your customer’s measuring stick for efficiency may be entirely different from yours, and if you’re not aligned with your customer’s expectations, then you’re never going to meet their needs. Customer service and customer
experience should not be confused.
Remembering that all business is show business…
You can be creative despite limited resources. “The power of ideas can often compensate for the lack of size.”
Consider the following:
The 1978 slasher flick Halloween had a $325,000 budget but went on to make $47 million at the box office.
2004’s Saw’s budget was only $1.2 million, and yet it earned $103 million.
Napoleon Dynamite’s budget was only $400,000, and it made an impressive $46 million.
Who could forget the phenomenon that was The Blair Witch Project that had a $60,000 budget but ultimately earned $140.5 million?
It doesn’t matter how large or well-funded your business is, adopting the show business philosophy can impact your future success in a major way.
You can go a long way with superior creativity when it’s matched with strategic execution.
What’s
your initial, gut-level reaction to this question: Are your employees primarily an asset…or an expense…to your business?
The
critically important aspect is this: If you see your people as primarily
an expense — then, that expenditure becomes something we need to minimize.
In other words, we’re taught in business that profit comes from, in part,
reducing expenses. The more we keep our expenses in check, this basic
theory of business goes, the greater the likelihood we will become more
profitable.
However, the more we think about it, that’s simply not the total
picture.
Assets are vital points in our business that we seek to amplify
and make more valuable. When you see your employees as assets to
be cultivated and enhanced — as opposed to expenses you need to reduce and
minimize — you discover those assets becoming more productive…and,
therefore, more profitable for your
business.
Treat
your colleagues like the assets they are, and they’ll provide Ultimate Customer
Experiences ® for your customers and prospects and maximize sales opportunities
that will help you create distinction and grow your business.
For
more information on employee training and development options designed for
custom outcomes, contact our office at 800-838-6980 x2, or email shelley@scottmckain.com.
As I’m writing this on my flight to Sydney for a series of
meetings there and in Tasmania, this is also preparation time for a new program
I’m launching at a large event for financial service professionals next month.
After talking with them about some of my past experiences, they asked, “Would
you do a program to teach us how to be better storytellers?”
When I launched my speeches on
the concept I created — “ALL Business is Show Business” — a significant
aspect of my work was teaching the power that a compelling story had to connect
you with your audience/customer.
It has shocked me a bit to recall that this was in 1982!
As I was building my speaking business, I was also working
as a movie critic and entertainment reporter with my commentaries syndicated to
about 100 television stations around the world. As I would review the movies, I
would study why some worked — and many others failed. The vast majority of the
time, it was because of the script.
I was also afforded the tremendous opportunity to meet and
interview some of the great storytellers of our time: James Cameron to the
Farrelly Brothers, from Tom Hanks to Arnold Schwarzenegger, from Meryl Streep
to Faye Dunaway.
What I learned was striking: most of the organizations and
professionals with whom I was working needed to learn the lessons of the
entertainment industry.
For example, show business is — in the final analysis —
about only one thing: making a compelling emotional connection with the
intended audience. The deeper the connection, the greater the success.
It became my viewpoint that
business should be — in the final analysis — about only one thing: profitably
making a compelling emotional connection with your target customers. The deeper the connection, the greater the
success.
Any business that can create these strong bonds with their
customers — in a manner that is fiscally responsible for the organization,
naturally — is going to succeed. When we accomplish this task, we have
customers that want to repeat their purchases and refer our products and
services.
Is it that simple? Well, it bears repeating here something I
wrote many years ago: just because something is simple does not mean that it is
easy to do. In fact, one of the points I consistently make is this: “Perhaps
the hardest thing in the world to do is to make something look easy.”
Put your fingers on a keyboard and press the keys — that’s
what you have to do to play a piano. That’s simple. But, try sounding like a
distinguished concert pianist, who undoubtably seeks quite at ease on the stage,
and you’ll see what I’m talking about.
One of the challenges is that we adopt excuses such as, “I’m
not a natural storyteller.” Here’s a clue: neither are most of the great
storytellers. On a recent episode of “Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee” with
Jerry Seinfeld, the great Eddie Murphy relates a story of bombing so badly on
the stage, the owner of the club refused to pay him. This meant Murphy didn’t
have enough money to get cab fare home. He had to call his father to come pick
him up (at 2AM!). Murphy’s dad demanded that he quit comedy and get a “real
job.”
At this point, Eddie Murphy could’ve said, “I guess I’m not
a natural comedian or storyteller.” Instead, he worked harder at his craft. He
has put in thousands of hours to make his performances seem effortless.
Most professionals won’t make a similar commitment — even as
we know that the ability to relate stories to our team members and customers is
one of the most important aspects of leadership and professionalism.
YOUR business is, in fact, “show
business.” And, if you want to be relevant in today — and tomorrow’s —
marketplace, it’s both an attitude and a skill that you must be willing to work
on.
As I write this, I’m on an airplane flying from Sydney to Hong Kong. And, as I follow our journey, I see from the map from the screen in front of my seat that we are about to cross the Equator.
When I was a kid in Crothersville, Indiana in our grade school geography class, the Equator seemed about as far away to me as the moon. In our small classroom, we studied tropical climates, the Equator’s global positioning, the countries above and below it, and the differences in weather and seasons between the Northern and Southern Hemispheres.
Yet, I have to admit, it never occurred to me there in my wonderful rural hometown, and with the circumstances that surrounded me, that I would ever actually cross the Equator in person, as I have now done many times.
The first time was when I was invited to be a part of the Indiana Trade Mission to Brazil. I had just left office as the State President of the Indiana FFA (then the Future Farmers of America), and our Lt. Governor Robert Orr thought that the trade mission he was leading to Indiana’s sister state in the southernmost region of Brazil would be well served to have a student representing young Hoosiers. And, thankfully, he selected me. It was a life-changing experience — not in the least because I was the only teenager as a part of an adult group of businessmen.
I grew up on that trip in many ways. It was my first experience in being a part of serious business meetings. It gave me the opportunity to see how economic leaders and governmental authorities conducted business. I even had a short conversation with the President of Brazil.
Many years later, I’ve lost count of how many times that I’ve crossed the Equator for business —and even a small number of times for pleasure and vacation.
The main point is this: what seemed so unreachable for me at one point in my life later became achievable…then, somewhat normal.
What’s YOUR version of the Equator? What seems unattainable for you in life right now, given your current circumstances?
My message to you is that what seems so far away now truly is possible to achieve. It might take a while — it was a decade between the young dream of travel and the crossing into a new hemisphere for me.
However, I would be willing to wager that if you take the dream…and add hard work, planning, and execution…you, too, will find the reality is superior to the fantasy. I truly hope you do.
