By Jason Richmond, CEO & Chief Culture Officer at Ideal Outcomes, Inc.
There’s a quote that I love attributed to Mary Kay Ash, founder of the Mary Kay Cosmetics empire: “A company is only as good as the people it keeps.” In some form, this statement has been made many times and in many different ways. Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, Inc., has a perspective that also rings true. “A company is a group organized to create a product or service, and it is only as good as its people and how excited they are about creating.”
Fundamentally, any company is dependent on the team of individuals who comprise its workforce. You can have the best product in the world, the most buzz-worthy service, and a groundbreaking, earth-shattering service offering. But it will all be for naught if you don’t have the people who can implement, people who share your mission and values, people who take pride in what they do and enthusiastically come to work every day.
Having an investment in people is especially important if a company’s growth has slowed, revenues have fallen off, and profits are down—when a company that has been increasingly successful year after year hits a growth plateau.
Alan Tecktiel, Global Human Resources Director at Baker McKenzie, puts it like this: “People want to have a feeling of moving forward rather than being stagnant.” And the companies that understand that fact, he says, “will invest their time and energy on maximizing the potential of their employees, bringing everyone to the table, providing experiences and training that benefit not only the company, but the employees as well.”
Unfortunately, most organizations cut that training budget as soon as their business hits a plateau. The adage, “Training is the first to go,” is too often true once revenue growth slows.
That’s a big mistake, says Richard Branson, the flamboyant founder and CEO of the Virgin Group. He points out that many organizations resist investing in employee training and development because they fear that if they do so, people will leave, lured by competitors. He believes that this thinking is convoluted. “What they should fear is not training them and then they stay,” he says, “Train people well enough so they can leave; treat them well enough so they don’t want to.”
Fundamentally, any company is dependent on the team of individuals who comprise its workforce. You can have the best product in the world, the most buzz-worthy service, and a groundbreaking, earth-shattering service offering. But it will all be for naught if you don’t have the people who can implement, people who share your mission and values, people who take pride in what they do and enthusiastically come to work every day.
Having an investment in people is especially important if a company’s growth has slowed, revenues have fallen off, and profits are down—when a company that has been increasingly successful year after year hits a growth plateau.
Alan Tecktiel, Global Human Resources Director at Baker McKenzie, puts it like this: “People want to have a feeling of moving forward rather than being stagnant.” And the companies that understand that fact, he says, “will invest their time and energy on maximizing the potential of their employees, bringing everyone to the table, providing experiences and training that benefit not only the company, but the employees as well.”
Unfortunately, most organizations cut that training budget as soon as their business hits a plateau. The adage, “Training is the first to go,” is too often true once revenue growth slows.
That’s a big mistake, says Richard Branson, the flamboyant founder and CEO of the Virgin Group. He points out that many organizations resist investing in employee training and development because they fear that if they do so, people will leave, lured by competitors. He believes that this thinking is convoluted. “What they should fear is not training them and then they stay,” he says, “Train people well enough so they can leave; treat them well enough so they don’t want to.”