By Pete Davison^*

Creating a Positive Culture and Employee Loyalty

Introduction

It is commonly recognized that creating a positive culture at a facility leads to energized and productive employees, a high level of loyalty, and low turnover. Of course, with highly motivated and satisfied employees, the chances of creating an excellent customer experience and a successful operation are much greater.

Goal

To enable you to establish a positive work culture with your employees without resorting to cash incentives.

Key Points

1. Individual "rifle shot" approaches to postive culture are likely to be seen as gimmicks. Use a comprehensive approach.
2. Successful efforts to institute a positive culture depend on a clear management commitment to the approach in good times and in bad, over the short haul and over the long haul.

Elements of a Positive Work Culture

To create a positive work culture, several elements must be operating simultaneously -- and must be driven by the philosophy of the facility leadership. These elements include the following:

1. Commitment to Employees

• There must be an ongoing commitment from the facility’s leadership to the employees and an underlying understanding and belief that the facility’s “team” of employees are the most important element in the success of the facility.

• This commitment and emphasis from the leadership, along with a highly caring attitude and approach, will create the foundation for a positive culture with high productivity and improved employee loyalty.

2. Commitment to Quality Hiring

• The quality of the people added to the team is extremely important in building a winning team. Therefore, an emphasis on recruiting and hiring the right person for a job is extremely important.

• There should be an emphasis on hiring people with high integrity, good interpersonal skills, the necessary job skills, and a strong work ethic. Lacking those qualities in combination, hiring a person with a positive attitude and then providing the required job skills through training is a common alternative. However, it's necessary to have good training programs.

• The development of job profiles for each position and the use of pre-hire testing to minimize hiring mistakes and to put employees in the proper position to be successful are very important. The pre-hiring testing could include the following: drug, honesty, attitude, personality profile and intelligence.

3. Commitment to Quality Training and Staff Development

• Once the members of the “team” are hired, an ongoing effort to train and develop them to their fullest potential is extremely important.

• Develop a thorough orientation program for each employee.

• Emphasis should be placed on individual and team alignment to facility objectives.

• Leadership, management training and “how to train” programs should be created for all management team members and supervisors.

• Detailed skill training programs should be developed and implemented for all positions.

• Customer service training programs should be developed and implemented for all club positions.

• Safety training programs should be developed and implemented in all departments. This will not only minimize potential accidents and lower Worker’s Compensation insurance rates, but will create a safer working environment for all employees.

• Medical emergency training programs should be implemented for all employees. CPR, Defibulator and other training that could help the employees not only at the Club, but in their personal lives as well, is an extremely important element in the overall training and development program.

4. Commitment to High Morale and Employee Productivity

• There should be an ongoing effort from all management and supervisory personnel to create a positive working environment and to focus on creating a caring approach to managing the employees with an emphasis on maintaining high morale and high productivity.

• Training programs should be implemented for the department heads and supervisors in team building and motivational techniques.

• An emphasis should be placed on employee retention and minimizing turnover.

• Employee recognition programs for longevity and performance should be created. Examples could include a Service Pin program and an Employee of the Month/Year program.

• Employee communication programs should be developed and implemented. These could include employee newsletters, intranet communication program, weekly department staff meetings, creation of employee safety committees, employee parties and club-wide staff meetings.

• Annual employee surveys should be created with follow-up communication on the results and plans for improvements.

• There should be an ongoing emphasis on individual development and growth within the work environment, e.g., job ladders.

Summary

If the elements listed above can be brought to bear and maintained, there is a strong possibility that a positive culture will be created and a team of highly motivated employees will know that the facility’s leadership cares about them. They will respond by being extremely loyal and by doing their job with a positive attitude and with high productivity, which will greatly assist the leadership in achieving the facility's goals.

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Credits

Originally posted by PeteDavison on 05 Aug 2008.
All contributors: ClifKussmaul, LynnwoodBrown, MarleneStone, MichaelBrezin, PeteDavison,

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