Accepting the “Challenge to Lead” in Your Company

By Tom Mazza

 

The biggest challenge facing every Business Owner reading this page is the challenge to LEAD AND INSPIRE the people that work for them. This challenge extends from the Owner of the company to any managers or “team leaders”, you employ.

 

Service businesses require close interaction between customers and service providers. Driving home a passion to serve the customer and to deliver a “world class service experience” takes an uncommon degree of skill. Motivating, and encouraging your staff to deliver those high levels of service every day is a challenge.

 

In the same month that you are reading this article (August 2005), I brought 60 plus managers of 31 different limousine companies doing more than $2 million in annual sales to Philadelphia for 2 days of training. This specific topic (Leadership) was the first presentation of the program. Here is part of what I presented on August 3rd.

 

 

Leadership Technique’s:

 

1. Know Your People: From the first day you meet them, pronounce their name correctly! If this requires a quick foreign language lesson or writing the name phonetically on a little card, do it. Know the names of their children and spouse. Know their birthday and their “anniversary date” with your company. Impossible you say, how anyone can have the time to know all that and act on it is a deep mystery. Let me tell you about someone who supervises many more people than all of us.

 

Colleen Barrett is the President of Southwest Airlines, the most successful airline in aviation history. In her 30 plus years with Southwest Colleen has been known best for her incredible ability to know and acknowledge ALL of the airlines 30,000 plus employees. In the best selling book Nuts! By Kevin and Jackie Freiberg, a Southwest employee described what Colleen and her team meant when she became seriously ill:

 

“ I had been with Southwest for 2 years and I had cancer. The first time I was out for three months, when they removed a kidney. After about 6 weeks, we received a big package from Colleen. It was a big cheesecake, a short, personal note from Colleen and some small gifts. It was the first major representation that in this company nobody is forgotten… When I was out a second time I was out for 9 months, the same thing happened, different package. We know that this is a business and chances are the gifts were a part of a bigger system. But the point is, the company cared enough to put in place all the expense and the resources to make it happen.” page 163

 

If Colleen Barrett can write a note or send a package to one of her 30,000 employees to say “Get well” you can do the same thing.

 

Familiarity is a form of respect. When you “know” the person you are supervising you are sending them a simple but important message. “We think you are important. We think of you as more than a commodity rather we think of you as part of our family.”

 

2. Understand their religion and culture: Do you know when Ramadan is? If you operate a “For Hire” vehicle service in the New York metropolitan area, you better know what this holiest of Muslim holidays is all about.

 

Ramadan is the ninth month of the Muslim calendar. It is during this month that Muslims observe the Fast of Ramadan. Lasting for the entire month, Muslims fast during the daylight hours and in the evening eat small meals and visit with friends and family. It is a time of worship and contemplation. It is also a time when the large numbers of Muslim chauffeurs in the New York metropolitan area (and throughout the world) must receive logistical help and support from their employers. A great New York operator told me, “If I schedule one of our Muslim chauffeurs to work from say 6 AM to 5 PM during this month, he may pass out from lack of food. It is a very big problem but we solve it every year by juggling schedules and communicating as much as possible with our chauffeurs. We also make sure that as soon as the sun goes down, our Muslim chauffeurs are able to sit and eat.

 

They solve the problem because they care about their employees. Does it sound phony to say that YOUR limousine company is a “family”? Do the math please. There are 168 hours in a week. A typical New York chauffeur working full time for a corporate sedan type business works between 5 and a half and 6 days per week. I cringe to type this but he/she probably works on average, 65 hours per week. Factor in another 5 hours for commuting, give the person 50 hours a week to sleep and that leaves only 48 hours a week for the man/woman’s personal family time. Since kids go to school, camp, and have a life, and spouses are often working also, there is precious little “family time.” It is important that you make your employees feel valued and feel respected every day to soften the blow of there somewhat abbreviated “family time.”

 

3. Practice the Technique of “Management by walking around.” Get out from behind your desk or your counter and walk around a few times a day. Go to your chauffeur’s lounge or even your parking lot and talk to your chauffeurs as they come and go. Take a trip to the airport holding lot and talk to your chauffeurs on the job. Talk to the car wash person, your reservation person, dispatcher, everyone. Ask them the 3 questions that the Freiberg’s suggest in their recent best seller Guts! (The follow up to Nuts!)
   
   • What do you like about your job?
   • What do you NOT like about your job?
   • What would you do differently if you were in charge?
   
   Quick story, I was visiting a new client last week when I walked around asking those 3 questions. I asked the mechanic question number 3? His answer was instantaneous. “What I would do differently if I were in charge, the mechanic said, is that I would ask for input from my mechanic and my best chauffeur when I am deciding what type of vehicles to add to our fleet. We could tell them what vehicles are more durable, which one’s break down, and what vehicles ride better on a day by day basis.” SIMPLE idea, which my client promised he would implement.
   
   
4. Show them you understand their job by DOING their job or by assisting them. How powerful is it when the owner of the Company or the Company GM takes an afternoon off, puts his “grubby clothes” on and washes cars all afternoon with the “just arrived in America” car wash guy? You think the message cuts across language and culture and the employee feels what he/she does is important? I believe it does, powerfully.
   
   
5. When their sick, assume that they really are sick and express genuine concern to them about their health. Why should ANYONE feel guilty about getting sick and missing work? Better yet, what value do sick employees have when they insist on working and make everyone in the office sick? ZERO! Call your employees who are out sick and give them your support.
   
   
6. Thank them and praise them sincerely as often as is warranted. It does not matter how much money your employee makes, acknowledging them and praising their performance is incredibly important. QUESTION: When one of YOUR key clients has a problem with a particular chauffeur getting lost on a charter, how many people in your company hear about it? ANSWER: They all hear about it! By the same token when something goes right, let everyone hear about it! Send out a company wide e-mail and pass out the story of your employees extraordinary care of a customer every chance you get. Bob Nelson is the author of the book 1001 Ways to Reward Employees. Nelson tells a simple story that illustrates this point. For “National Secretaries Week”, Catherine Meek, president of a large consulting firm took a survey of her client’s administrative assistants. The survey asked what gift they would particularly enjoy to celebrate that week. More than half said, “A simple note from their boss saying that they appreciated the good work they are doing.”
   
   
7. Tell Your Employees: “I want you to be successful in your job.” It is so simple yet so powerful; tell each of your employees that you want them to be successful at their job. And then ask them “What can I do to help you?” It is simple, powerful, and very effective. I WANT YOU TO SUCCEED! Try it, please.

 

No one ever said accepting “the challenge to lead” in your company is an easy proposition. The rewards are incredible. Give your employees a taste of the passion and purpose that drives you and your company every day and you will be rewarded.  

 

Tom Mazza is the writer and star of The Ultimate Chauffeur Training Program. He is the Facilitator of 3 Peer Review Groups focused on the luxury limousine industry.