On Thursday, August 18, the Minneapolis/St Paul Business Journal will be hosting its annual “Best Places to Work” luncheon. During the program, 55 local organizations will be highlighted for putting people on the same pedestal with profits. Sounds cool as an employer and an employee, right!
How do you get on the list? The easy part is to apply and the selection process is based on an anonymous employee survey conducted by an organization out of Omaha. The hard part is to get your employees to agree that you are one of the best places to work. There are many and varied reasons why employers are selected for the list. If you had to whittle it all away, I would speculate that the best workplaces are those with high trust. Trust isn’t just gained with glitzy desserts or leadership speeches. It takes time, one-to-one and group interactions that are compatible with one another and consistency.
There is no magic potion! I am planning to sit in on tomorrow’s Business Journal event to look for common threads from the winning organizations. It would be excellent to replicate their success in other organizations—ultimately, employees and employers win when making lists like these.
An international consulting organization that specializes in this topic has reported that the “Best Companies” have seen 3 times the return than other major indices like the Russell 3000 or S&P 500. In addition, they see a 50% reduction in voluntary turnover. In return, employees are very likely to say “they look forward” to coming to work each day.
The paradigm has changed. We can see it in popular culture through television programming. When we compare television shows for example, Donald Trump versus Undercover Boss, we begin to see some key cultural sentiments. Employees want to know they matter, they want to know that they have achieved excellence in their role and that the CEO is humble enough to sit in their desk/truck and fail! While Michael Scott has provided us with countless mistakes in The Office, we all secretly think some of the following—I am smarter, a harder worker and more capable at my job than the CEO. Here’s to the CEO willing to be vulnerable and to ask their employees what they think—whether its with a television camera or a survey.
Congrats to the 55 Winners!
http://www.bizjournals.com/twincities/news/2011/07/08/best-places-to-work.html
