Nov. 2007

This e-newsletter is dedicated to supporting High-Performing Contractors and all contractors working to become one. Written by Dennis Sowards

Leadership & the Environment

Want to have engaged employees? One way may be to focus more on environmental issues. A recent study summarized by Adrienne Selko found that employees who are satisfied with their employer's concern for the environment are more likely to take pride in their jobs. Adrienne cited research by Sirota Survey Intelligence that found:
“The level of employees' satisfaction with their employers' environmental policies decreases further down the organizational ladder, with senior-level executives the most satisfied, hourly employees the least favorable and middle managers' views falling in between
82% of employees who are satisfied with their organization's concern for the environment said they are proud to work for their employers.
Only 55% of employees who view their employer's environmental positions unfavorably express pride in working for their organizations.
93% of senior-level executives are satisfied with their employers' environmental concern, while 85% of middle managers and 70% of hourly workers look favorably toward their employers' environmental policies”

“Environmentally-friendly policies are considered a key component of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Other research by Sirota Survey Intelligence showed that employees who are satisfied with their company's commitment to social responsibility have high levels of employee engagement, and positive views about their employer's competitiveness, integrity, and interest in their well-being.

“Of those who are satisfied with their employer's CSR commitment:

• 86% have high levels of engagement
• 82% feel their organization is highly competitive in the marketplace
• 75% feel their employer is interested in their well-being
• 71% rate senior management as having high integrity” *

High-performing contractors demonstrate leadership in how they deal with environmental issues including hazard waste disposal and in how they are involved in local and nation social issues. They do not confine their efforts to just making a profit, bit take an active part in shaping how the community and industry deals with these social challenges.

* Source: “A Company's Environmental Policy Is a Key Factor in Employee Engagement”, By Adrienne Selko, IndustryWeek Daily Headlines, Sept. 10, 2007

Customer Focused

Here is a menu of ideas to use to keep your loyal customers by showing that you care about them. Like any menu, choose those that fit your needs and current situation. Don’t get stuck ordering the same thing every time, try some new ideas.
First, last and always keep your promises.
Be informed of their project status.
Call them first any time there is a change or delay to the job.
Be open and honest in sharing job progress information.
Work for a zero item punch list.
Help them improve their sales by providing leads to customer.
Recommend their services/product.
Display their promotional brochures at your offices.
Talk them up at association meetings.
Offer to do joint marketing mailings .
Take them to lunch or golfing when there are no pending job or business sales opportunity and don’t try to sell to them, just talk about their business.
List/link them on your website.
Display pictures of their facilities at your offices (the facilities you helped build/maintain).
Send them a picture of them at your offices, the job site or their finished facility.
Ask for their feedback or suggestions for how to better serve them and then just listen and respond, not dispute.
Send handwritten thank you notes or special occasion cards.
Hold annual customer appreciation breakfast/lunch sessions at the job site and/or office. Invite them to speak to your employees about their company’s success (not about the construction job, but about their markets & challenges).
Know their company’s anniversary date and send something each year to recognize their efforts.
Cite them in a positive light in any magazine articles about your company.
Instead of a calendar or box of candy at the end of the year, give them a dinner for two certificate or a unique gift. Don’t forget to do something for the receptionist, admin support and project PM.
Know their first names
The first thing to say when they call with a complaint is “That’s Terrible!” and thank them for calling. Respond quickly to resolve it.
Have someone periodically weekly scan the news media for positive articles about your customers, send a note with a copy of the article to congratulate them

What makes a great work environment?

Jeffrey Gitomer suggests these elements of a great internal environment, regardless of your business:
"1. Positive people.
2. People who smile and mean it.
3. Proactive greeting to customers AND each other.
4. People who engage to build rapport.
5. People who understand that friendly leads to loyal customers.
5.5 A boss that encourages friendly service and trains it.”
Source: Jeffrey Gitomer Sales Caffeine Issue 294

I feel that these elements apply to how we treat fellow workers as well as customers. How is your company doing? How do you know? If you did a blind survey of your customers and employees would they feel the same way?

Process Management

James Harrington, a well-known quality consultant once suggested that internal departments within a company should do as many customers do. When there is a quality problem with the product or service received, they write a Request for corrective action (RCA). He suggested that if departments started writing up RCA every time they received poor quality or a service error from an in-house support function that several things would happen:
The company would be flooded with RCA’s
Management might have to face up to the fact that they need to manage the support functions better *
I can see it going even further if the support functions were also able to write RCA when they received a defective material request, spool drawing, or incorrect time sheet. This would greatly increase the number of RCA being written. It may also be seen as telling on each other and could cause everyone to agree (wink – wink) to not write each other up.

The truth is, there are too many errors going on in most companies and for the most part management and the employees just accept it as a way of life. Our customers don’t accept this many errors, or won’t for very long, so why do we accept it internally?

The Walt Disney Company has a service model they teach their managers. It goes like this:

Profits come from having Loyal Customers
Customer Loyalty comes from consistently having Satisfied Customers
Consistent Satisfied Customers comes from providing External Service Quality
External Service Quality comes from having Loyal Employees
Loyal Employees comes from having Consistently Satisfied Employees
Consistent Satisfied Employees comes by providing excellent Internal Service Quality

In other words to serve the customers best, employees need great internal service. A rule of thumb is that your customers will never be treated better than your employees are treated. I usually use that in reference to trust and respect of employees but trust and respect is best demonstrated by having processes that work right. If you want to improve how you serve your customers improve how your internal functions serve each other. Maybe filling out a RCA would be seen as pointing fingers in most companies and would not go over well, a mature company would want to identify where it is failing. It would work to do it right the first time and to continuously improve. That takes information on how often one is doing it wrong now.

* Source: “Quality Rules Also apply to Support Area” By H. James Harrington, Quality Digest, August 2007, page 16.

Learning Opportunities

You may be interested in attending one of these training seminars by Dennis Sowards:

November 6-9, 2007 - Traditional Lean Tools - Ninth Annual Lean Construction Congress, San Francisco, CA, Contact Johna Clark at jgclark@leanconstruction.org for additional information.
Jan. 15-17, 2008 – How to Make Meetings Work (For You) - Phoenix, AZ – Sponsor: PIPE & 469 JAC, contact Cathy at pipetrust@qwest.net
Feb. 21, 2008 – Lean works in Construction Too - Phoenix, AZ – Sponsor: PIPE & 469 JAC, contact Cathy at pipetrust@qwest.net
March 20, 2008 - 5S’s Any CEO would Love - Phoenix, AZ – Sponsor: PIPE & 469 JAC, contact Cathy at pipetrust@qwest.net
April 17, 2008 – Job Planning that Works – The Last Planner System - Phoenix, AZ – Sponsor: PIPE & 469 JAC, contact Cathy at pipetrust@qwest.net
May 6, 2008 – 5S’s in Construction – ASQ National Conference, Houston, TX
May 15, 2008 – Problem Solving Lite: Root Cause Analysis - Phoenix, AZ – Sponsor: PIPE & 469 JAC, contact Cathy at pipetrust@qwest.net

Thought for the day

"You can dream, create, design and build the most wonderful place in the world...but it requires people to make the dream a reality.
-Walt Disney

For more information about the High-Performing Contractor assessment process contact Dennis Sowards at 480-835-1185 or at dennis@YourQSS.com (see www.YourQSS.com)