1: Question one: “How can we build a real, honest, human foundation for an enterprise—one that is so trustworthy that people will give just about anything to be part of it?” writes Fred Kofman in The Meaning Revolution: The Power of Transcendent Leadership.
Question two: “Then, when everyone is committed, how do we work together effectively to win as a team?”
Who is a real-life leader who not only asked these questions but then answered them with an exclamation mark?
Doug Conant. When Doug was hired as CEO of the Campbell Soup Company in 2001, the company was in deep trouble.
“It was the poorest-performing food company in the world,” Fred notes. “Core businesses, even the famous ‘mm-mmm-good’ tomato and chicken noodle soups, were suffering.”
According to a Gallup survey, 62 percent of the company’s managers were not actively engaged in their jobs, and another 12 percent felt actively disengaged.
“Those numbers were the worst Gallup had ever seen for any Fortune 500 firm,” Fred writes.
Just eight years later, under Doug’s leadership, Campbell Soup was a very different company.
“Nearly all the old managers had been replaced; half the new leaders were promoted from inside the company, a move that increased morale tremendously,” Fred observes. “The most crucial criterion for new managers was to inspire trust in the people around them.”
What else had changed? Workplace engagement.
“Sixty-eight percent of all Campbell employees said they were actively engaged, and just 3 percent were actively disengaged,” he notes. “That’s an engagement ratio of 23 to 1, and Gallup considers 12 to 1 to be world class.”
As trust improved, so did earnings per share, putting the company near the top of the food industry. “By 2009, Campbell was outperforming both the S&P 500 and the S&P food group,” Fred writes.
“It was a turnaround story beyond imagination,” he observes.
2: How did Doug engineer this corporate transformation?
Simple. He put people first.
“One of the first things I did,” Doug told Forbes magazine, “was make it clear I understood that Campbell…needed to demonstrate its commitment to its people before they could be expected to demonstrate their own extraordinary commitment to it and its success.”
Doug prioritized caring for Campbell team members and demanded that all leaders do the same. His philosophy was straight-forward: “To win in the marketplace you must first win in the workplace.”
He led by example. He asked how people were doing. He ate lunch with Campbell’s associates in the company cafeteria.
Doug “asked how the cooks were doing, how their kids were,” Fred writes. “He shook hands. He put an arm around people.”
He made it a priority to learn the names of thousands of Campbell’s team members. He wrote twenty thank-you notes every day. Which added up to more than thirty thousand notes during his tenure as CEO.
Doug mentored hundreds of people. “Every six weeks,” he recounts, “I had lunch with a group of a dozen of so employees, to get their perspective on the business, to address problems and to get feedback.”
Telling inspiring stories about the company and its team members is great.
And it’s not enough.
“They have to breathe them, feel them, live them,” Fred writes. “Doug Conant was an authentically caring leader at Campbell. That’s what made him an engaging one.”
3: There are three important drivers of workplace engagement, according to a 2012 white paper published by the Dale Carnegie organization and MSW Research:
1: Relationship with one’s immediate supervisor
2: Belief in senior leadership
3: Pride in working for one’s company.
“The behavior of the immediate supervisor is the most fundamental determinant of employees’ engagement,” Fred writes, “but beyond that, it’s senior leadership’s willingness to take their input, lead the company in the right direction, and openly communicate the state of the organization.”
Workplace engagement and loyalty occur when workers feel cared for and respected and believe the organization reflects their values. “And when people feel engaged and loyal, they don’t leave—saving the company the costs of recruitment and training,” Fred notes.
Hundreds of studies show that people want their bosses to care about their personal lives. About how they feel. They want their leader to take an interest. To support their health and well-being.
“A manager’s ability to build strong relationships with employees, build strong team interaction, and lead in a person-centered way,” Fred notes, “creates an environment in which employees perform at their best.”
More tomorrow.
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Reflection: Which of Doug’s strategies to drive workplace engagement could I try out?
Action: Experiment. Take note of what happens.
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