Scott MacStravic, PhD
One of the unavoidable issues related to employee health and benefits management is the value that employees, as individuals and as workforces, contribute to their employers. Since health/benefits management is moving toward being an investment with ROI, and that ROI depends on the value contributions that employees make, the connection has to be examined and understood.
Two stories I recently read underline at least the potential value of employees, though only one suggested a way of measuring it. The first recounted the experience of ICI Films, a manufacturer of polyester film for industry. It has just completed a major improvement in its operations and financial performance, when it learned that a Japanese competitor could produce the same film for only $1.00 per pound, well below what ICI charged. In the polyester film market, such a price could easily mean the demise of firms unable to match or beat it.
The CEO gathered the firm’s employees in a “boot camp” effort to discover if there were ways to overcome this threat. Work groups presented ideas for cutting costs while maintaining or improving quality to the CEO for review, approval and implementation. The combined effort of all involved found a way to produce film at a cost of $0.94 per pound, and ICI had its most profitable year ever, instead of being kicked out of the market. [“The Mystery of Performance – The Secrets of Contribution” Tor Dahl & Associates Newsletter Apr 24, 2007 (www.tordahl.com)]
The second story was about a “bag boy” at a supermarket. He had been a participant in a workshop devoted to motivating employees to “leave their fingerprint” on their work, in order to make their customers’ shopping experiences worth bragging about and repeating. As a mere 19-year old bag stuffer, and challenged by Down’s Syndrome at that, “Johnny” took the idea to heart, though he wondered what he could do to make experiences memorable.
On his own, though with the help of his father when it came to implementation, Johnny came up with the idea of gathering or making up “Thoughts for the Day,” upbeat bon mots that he could put in the bags of customers for them to discover and enjoy once they got home and emptied them.
He began adding these small slips of paper to each customer’s order as they checked out, and proudly wrote to the speaker at the workshop who had inspired him. A month later, the manager of the store shared with that same speaker the fact that lines at Johnny’s check-out station were now three times as long as those at other stations. Shoppers were reporting that they were coming in more often just to get more of Johnny’s thoughts for the day.
The spirit that Johnny demonstrated began to catch on. Workers in the flower shop at the supermarket began keeping broken flowers and unclaimed orders, then finding an older woman or young girl and pinning flowers to their dresses to make their experiences memorable. Clearly the speaker who created the original spark, plus the manager who arranged for the workshop, deserve some credit, but if this is the difference a 19-year-old bag boy can produce, it suggests at least that individual employees can make a big difference and contribute significant added value.
Given the enormous and growing challenges that healthcare organizations are faced with, there is surely a good reason to measure or at least estimate the value of employees in general, and of individuals who can contribute as much as Johnny did. It seems likely that the HCOs that can galvanize their workforces as partners in addressing the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, and optimizing the contributions they can make to the organization’s performance, will do much better.
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