Multi-Unit Franchisee Magazine Issue IV, 2013 | Page 72

CustomersCount BY JACK MACKEY

Creating a Great
Employee Experience
(Hint: it flows from the top)

W

here do remarkable
customer experiences
come from? From your
employees!
If you have designs on long-term sustainable growth, think about how you
can create a great employee experience.
Why? Because it is your employees, not
you, who create your highly satisfied and
loyal customers. Your locations with the
best performance and highest customer
loyalty scores very likely have the highest
levels of employee engagement.
So what is engagement, and why does
it matter? Simply put, engaged employees
are passionate and enthusiastic about their
work. They will further your organization’s
interests by giving their full discretionary
effort; in plain English, they are loyal and
they work hard. Their loyalty comes primarily from how they are treated. Your
organization must earn employee loyalty, just as it must earn customer loyalty.
Two decades of SMG research proves
that highly engaged unit managers are
the most powerful force in creating high
morale and team member loyalty at the
individual location level.
How do you create these highly engaged unit managers? Contrary to the
old saying, you can never “raise morale.”
It percolates from the top… from you and
the team you assemble to support the field.
Back up and think about this: When
your team members who are supporting
the field are fully engaged, that will have
direct, positive impact on the loyalty of
unit managers. Because when you have
unit managers raving about the support
from “corporate,” you have a tremendous
lever to increase manager loyalty—which
drives both front-line employee and customer loyalty. You have great potential to
make your performance support center a
great place to work.

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Multi-Unit Franchisee Is s ue IV, 2013

Let me share my own “employee experience” as a manager. From SMG’s office we support dozens of managers who
travel extensively or who work in our international locations. Here are two of the
benefits we hear from our employee survey that correlate with high engagement:
• Great co-workers. Winners like to
work with winners. That comes from a
very rigorous employee selection process.
All prospective employees are interviewed
by, and must win the support of, multiple
employees—not just HR. At SMG, we
use the same talent selection company as
the Ritz-Carlton: we seek people who are
customer-focused and high performers.

It is your
employees, not you,
who create your
highly satisfied and
loyal customers.
Whatever employee selection system you
use, take extra care with who you bring
into your company support center. Your
people are your company.
• Great culture. Culture is simply
the “way we do things around here.” Our
folks think it’s cool that my desk looks the
same as that of a brand new entry-level
team member. Fridays are “bring your
dog to work day.” When it comes to mental health, dogs rule! Also, you would be
amazed at how much people appreciate
healthy food snacks and fresh fruit at the
office, instead of vending machines. And
almost all employees participate in Corporate Challenge, a team athletic competition. Work hard. Play hard.
Remember that I said it was feedback
from our employee survey that gives us
confidence that the elements of the em-

ployee experience I’ve described really do
correlate with employee loyalty. That’s why
I believe in employee surveys. If you don’t
measure your employees’ experience, you
should. How else are you going to find out
how to become a great place to work? And
have no doubt, the only way to consistently create a loyalty-inspiring customer
experience is with loyal employees who
are willing to give discretionary effort.
Plus, a great employee experience leads
to lower turnover. Not only does lower
turnover save you money in recruiting,
onboarding, and training—which increases
your profitability year after year—you
also get the positive benefits that come
from longer-tenured employees. Loyal
employees become more valuable and
productive over time.
Next, when they have a great employee
experience, your current and former employees will recommend your company as
a great place to work! They will usually
recommend people like themselves. Don’t
just wait for this to happen. Give your employees incentives to recommend people
they believe in—with a bonus when the
new hire reaches six months on the job.
You will ultimately spend less on recruiting… and get better results.
Finally, loyal employees who like their
jobs and care about doing things right become ambassadors for your organization.
When measuring employee engagement,
ask, “How likely are you to recommend
[your company] as a place to [dine, shop,
do business]?” Loyal and engaged employees are far more likely to recommend you
to friends and family, and even strangers,
when the subject of your business comes up.
To sum up the Service Profit Chain:
Engaged employees create loyal customers, which creates profitable sales growth.
For consistent year-over-year sales growth,
multi-unit franchisees need to dedicate as
much energy to creating a great employee
exp \