A Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read allIf the Shoe Fits posts here.
From the start of my career, especially as a headhunter, AKA, recruiter, I have done my best to drum the following mantra into the heads of both hiring managers and candidates.
Life is LARGE; career is but a small part of the whole. A major problem is created when the adjectives (and, therefore, the attitudes) are reversed.
My greeter walked me to one of the complex’s main arteries from Hacker Way toward Main Street. “The campus was designed to be a cross between Disneyland and downtown Palo Alto.”
If everything is at work why leave?
Maybe to have a life?
Of course, before you can leave you need to get your work done and it’s hard to be productive with all the distractions.
“It’s no wonder people are working longer, earlier, later, on weekends, and whenever they have a spare moment,” Jason Fried writes in the new book It Doesn’t Have to be Crazy at Work, which hits the shelves in the US today (Oct. 2). “People can’t get work done at work anymore.”
Forbes recently published a Quora response to the question What People Won’t Tell You About Working At A Top Tech Company that presents both the pros and cons of working for a company with the main goal of arranging its perks and compensation so people won’t leave.
Not just won’t leave, but can’t leave.
It’s not just the perks, but the compensation. Even those willing to take a reduced package will find other companies hesitant to hire them. And when the downturn comes, as it always does, they will be in an even worse position.
A couple of weeks ago Ryan accepted a new position and I wrote his new company, Spatial Networks, up as a role model.
It’s proof companies don’t have to turn themselves into a field of poppies to attract and retain great talent. We’ll look at more examples next week.
If you follow Ryan’s Journal on Thursday you know that he’s been interviewing for a new position. (If you aren’t familiar with Ryan you can learn more about him here.) Last week he wrote about red flags and deciding factors.
As a Millennial and former Marine Ryan, is extremely sensitive to culture and that’s been number one on his list of wants, including challenge, learning, growing, making a difference, respect, team, etc., and all the normal stuff, such as compensation and benefits.
He has been interviewing for more than a year, both local and remote positions, and finally found it all in a local company called Spatial Networks.
The company builds geospatial intelligence products. Founded in 2000, it has survived the dot com bust and the 2008 financial meltdown, which says a lot about its management.
When Ryan called he was so excited about the company he was practically bouncing. He raved about the people, the culture and said the perks were unbelievable.
What constitutes “unbelievable” to a young married 30-something with 3.5 kids and a mortgage?
Spatial Networks, Inc. continually invests in its employees, and nowhere is this investment more evident than in our employee benefits, development and enrichment program offerings.
Financial security
In addition to competitive pay and performance-based incentives, you’ll receive 100% company 401(k) match up to the IRS maximum (and are fully vested at eligibility), company stock options, and robust life insurance coverage (3x your annual salary).
Complete health
Spatial Networks covers 100% of medical, dental, and vision plan premiums for you and your family. We also offer short- and long-term disability, an Employee Assistance Program (EAP), 24/7 nurse line with care coordination and mental health programs, and on-site gym membership.
Life balance
We love what we do, but work isn’t everything. With flexible work hours, maternity/parental leave, and generous, tiered paid time off (PTO) and flex-time, you can devote time to the things (and people) you cherish most.
Continuous growth
At Spatial Networks, you’ll learn from some of the most talented, passionate software developers and geographers around and receive professional development and training (plus internal career growth/acceleration).
Happy workdays
Enjoy a fast-paced, fun and collaborative environment, a visible and responsive HR department, company-paid parking in downtown St. Petersburg, and all the fresh-ground coffee you can drink!
This is from a follow-up email Ryan sent.
Very profitable and they are growing. Plus the benefits are insane. I receive 4 weeks vacation to start. 100% payout of all medical premiums for me and my family (I was paying 20K annually before) and I also receive 100% match on my 401K up to the max which is $18,500 per year.
(Note Ryan’s compensation jumped $20K just based on the medical premiums he no longer pays.)
I call these adult perks, plenty of coffee, but no food. Unlike so many perks at companies such as Google and Facebook, none of these are designed to encourage people to stay at the office or build their lives around work.
Poking through 11+ years of posts I find information that’s as useful now as when it was written.
Golden Oldies is a collection of the most relevant and timeless posts during that time.
Today’s Oldie is a lead-in to tomorrow’s post, which will consider the difference between respect and nice on culture, creativity, innovation, and success.
Why is common sense often treated like rocket science?
If you want to increase your overall retention rate start by respecting your people.
There are too many managers who only respect their ‘stars’ and then wonder why turnover is rampant in the rest of the organization.
Then there are the legions of managers who believe that if they can’t demonstrate their respect with perks because their budget was cut there is no way to prove they value their people.
Ahem! Respect isn’t a matter of perks.
You’re people aren’t stupid, they know the score, so tell them the truth and build trust.
Provide what tangible proof you can to show that you value your workers, from health care to chocolate, but don’t insult them by saying the company can’t afford something when it obviously can.
Respect isn’t about benefits and benefits, no matter how exotic, don’t give you the right to disrespect them.
Nor will benefits underwrite bad management—you don’t get to micromanage, insult, play favorites, or bully your people just because the company offers health insurance.
The bottom line is simple—if you treat your people as replaceable don’t be surprised when you have the opportunity to do so.
I was on LinkedIn today reading a post by an employee of a company that I was unfamiliar with.
In the post this guy wrote about how great his company is. They allow you to work remotely, pay for all insurance premiums for the entire family and also give a $150 credit towards a monthly gym membership. I’ll be honest I was a bit jealous at the perks and thought about the possibilities there. At the same time, I thought about how companies have come to exert great influence as well.
Governments are designed to keep us safe, build roads, ensure proper regulations and so on. Depending on who you ask and what generation you are speaking with there is also an expectation for access to proper education, low cost or free healthcare, and perhaps a living wage. Government has not really lived up to those dreams, though, and companies have stepped in.
Is this a bad thing? From a free market perspective it is the natural next step. As economies mature the workforce demands greater amenities. Of course a lot of these higher end perks are limited to one industry, tech.
So maybe the free market isn’t responding at all, this is merely a bubble. And if we take it one step further these companies we hear about with great perks are the outliers. Even most run of the mill tech companies do not offer unlimited vacation and in-house yoga classes.
As I ponder all this I think it can go a few different directions, because I really do not see government stepping up to the plate anytime soon. Companies that are offering these great perks are on the cutting edge and leading a sea change.
The next generation will take these amenities for granted and time will march on. The flip side is we determine these amenities are unsustainable and companies wind them down. As a result greater pressure is put on government to reform.
Without stepping into the hell called politics today, I will say this.
I like a path where we can chart our own course. We can choose the company that we want to work for based on our value system.
That way, as we mature as a society, we can learn to accept different beliefs of value and realize it is the differences that can make us good.
After every seven years of service, employees become eligible for a six-to-eight week paid sabbatical, which they can use to spend time with their families, travel, and accomplish longstanding personal goals — no strings attached.
Aarstol believes that a shortened workday could motivate employees to work more efficiently. And he is proving to be right through his own company, Tower Paddle Boards, which continues to expand, even after a year of rolling out the five-hour workday. Last year, it was named the fastest-growing private company in San Diego. Aarstol even published a book titled “The Five Hour Workday” this month.
REI, for example, gives its employees two paid days off a year, called “Yay Days,” to enjoy their favorite outside activity. The World Wildlife Foundation (WWF) takes every other Friday off, coining those “Panda Fridays.” We also give our employees every other Friday off — and we pay them for it. We call it the “18-Day Work Month,” and we truly believe it’s the key to a more productive workforce.
Gusto, a startup with 300 employees in San Francisco and Denver, just became the first midsize company in the US to cover fertility treatments in a way that will help single women and same-sex couples, according to Cigna.
However, some of the best perks cost the company nothing.
SEI made Forbes’ 2016 Best Small Companies list earlier this year, in part because of its unusual employee goal-setting policy. Twice a year managers meet with reports who lay out goals, including compensation, and SEI pledges to support employees’ wishes.
The main point: this is not a high-profile kind of job at Facebook, not a developer building a feature that will be used by millions, nor an engineer working on some of Facebook’s moonshot projects like its solar-powered drone or Internet.org.
“At Facebook we believe that ‘Nothing at Facebook is somebody else’s problem’ — it’s yours,” she writes. “I’m tasked with finding creative, innovative and realistic solutions for my clients, even if it has never been done before.”
In other words, she feels a sense of empowerment.
In fact, academic research shows that there’s a strong correlation between job satisfaction and employee empowerment. People who are given the freedom to solve problems in their own creative ways simply like their jobs and their companies better.
In fact, it’s the willingness of management to help their people function at their highest level, grow and succeed, i.e., a manager who cares, that is worth more than most tangible perks.
More recently, RMT (Riva-Melissa Tez,CEO @ Permutation AI and an active investor) wrote a superb post on Medium noting that Silicon Valley has lost its perspective on the difference between a ‘problem’ and an ‘obstacle’
— any obstacle that restricts our standard of living — is now framed as a problem. (…) Recognizing these obstacles or inconveniences and being able to avoid them are privileges — a special right enjoyed as a result of one’s socioeconomic position. They are perks…
Most of SV has made its success from vertical approaches to issues with little complexity. The few SV approaches to humanitarian causes are failing badly for repeating that simplicity.
Starting a company that is a solid, sustainable, revenue-producing business, even one that won’t change the world, but that rewards its investors, will always be funded.
So, if that is what your startup is, then say so.
Not just to your investors, but also to your team.
A Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read allIf the Shoe Fits posts here
Back in the early 1980s when there were no cellphones, no email, no WWW and Apple was the hot young company with the great perks a friend of mine interviewed with them.
She was a very talented programmer and Apple wanted her badly.
When I asked her how it went she said it was the dumbest interview she had ever had.
All the manager talked about was how “cool it was to work there” and “the great perks, like the group’s own foosball table” and how much money she would make her and on and on about the stock.
While all that was true, what the manager didn’t spend much time on was the work itself, what she would do, what she could learn, what value she brought and what her career path might look like.
In other words, she was looking for substance and the manager spent almost the entire interview on fluff.
She said he was very surprised when she turned down the offer.
I know it wasn’t that she was female, because I knew many guys who had similar interviews.
And it wasn’t just that manager.
It happened over and over because the perks and stock were constantly spotlighted in the media, like Google and Facebook today, although Apple is the granddaddy of cool perks culture, and the people who worked there couldn’t believe anyone would turn down a chance to join.
The lesson here is that focusing an interview on what the media (real and social) finds noteworthy is not necessarily what attracts people and may cost you real talent.
Looking for a perk or bonus for your people that won’t break the bank?
Consider paying for them to take a course that interests them at sites such as Pluralsight or Universal Class, whether career oriented or just of personal interest.
Because it’s a perk/bonus, it’s similar to providing movie tickets, i.e., while you choose the theater you don’t pick the movie.
It doesn’t matter if they want to learn a new programming language or how to make wine.
The point is it’s a reward, beyond normal compensation, for their hard work.
Yes, the classes provide them with new skills they may choose to apply elsewhere, but if they don’t have the opportunity to learn new skills, face new challenges or get bored they will leave anyway.
Providing learning opportunities won’t hasten the process; what it will do is give them reason to sing your praises as a great boss/company to work for in the event they do leave.
Why is common sense often treated like rocket science?
If you want to increase your overall retention rate start by respecting your people.
There are too many managers who only respect their ‘stars’ and then wonder why turnover is rampant in the rest of the organization.
Then there are the legions of managers who believe that if they can’t demonstrate their respect with perks because their budget was cut there is no way to prove they value their people.
Ahem! Respect isn’t a matter of perks.
You’re people aren’t stupid, they know the score, so tell them the truth and build trust.
Provide what tangible proof you can to show that you value your workers, from health care to chocolate, but don’t insult them by saying the company can’t afford something when it obviously can.
Respect isn’t about benefits and benefits, no matter how exotic, don’t give you the right to disrespect them.
Nor will benefits underwrite bad management—you don’t get to micromanage, insult, play favorites, or bully your people just because the company offers health insurance.
The bottom line is simple—if you treat your people as replaceable don’t be surprised when you have the opportunity to do so.
It’s funny how things work. I received this email the same day I read about a solution.
Hi Miki, I have a small company and would like to add some fun for my people. They tell me they love the culture and there is very little turnover, so I tend to believe that I’m accomplishing. I read about the extra perks companies offer like foosball, ping pong, massages and other stuff, but there are neither dollars nor space. Do you have a suggestion for something I can add that is affordable and fun? –Jim
Here is my reply.
Hi Jim, I do have a suggestion. I think they are fairly new, will cost you less than $100 and batteries are the only ongoing cost. They are called airswimmers and there are many ways to incorporate them in your workplace. For example, controlling the remote can be used as a reward for exceptional customer service or closing a difficult sale. I’m sure your people can think of some great uses once you have them. If you do get them please let me know what they think and how you use them. –Miki
There are actually many inexpensive items that can lower stress and lighten the workday; you just have to look for them.
Entrepreneurs face difficulties that are hard for most people to imagine, let alone understand. You can find anonymous help and connections that do understand at 7 cups of tea.
Crises never end.
$10 really does make a difference and you’ll never miss it,
Back in the early 1980s when there were no cellphones, no email, no WWW and Apple was the hot young company with the great perks a friend of mine interviewed with them.
Why is common sense often treated like rocket science?
It’s funny how things work. I received this email the same day I read about a solution.
