I wouldn't ask any of my employees to do anything I wouldn't do. And I work as hard, if not harder than the rest of the staff, to set an example. I also believe in giving my employees a lot of room to be creative and to express themselves.
It's better to grow your employees, steer them into a place that they can learn and succeed, and want to work hard and be loyal, than to have a revolving door of employees. That's demoralizing.
I also think that employees these days expect less of a separation of work and personal life. That doesn't mean that work tasks should encroach upon our personal time, but it does mean that employees today expect more from the companies for whom they work. Why shouldn't your workplace reflect your values? Why is "giving back" not a part of our jobs? The answer for us is to integrate philanthropy with work.
Your employees come first. And if you treat your employees right, guess what? Your customers come back, and that makes your shareholders happy. Start with employees and the rest follows from that.
Defining, embedding, and living core beliefs set the stage for executives and employees to connect. Through actions that consistently convey who we are and how we act, executives can inspire employees to believe in the organization's values and buy in to its brand.
American business long ago gave up on demanding that prospective employees be honest and hardworking. It has even stopped hoping for employees who are educated enough that they can tell the difference between the men's room and the women's room without having little pictures on the doors.
Creative people have to believe in the value of their work. If you don’t have any belief then you can’t give anything—designing is an act of giving, and a belief in the value of the work fuels the desire to express something. It’s important to know what your values are and to take care of them.
If you were charged with fixing the U.S. auto industry, how would you do it?
The guys who run the auto companies are out of touch with their customers and their employees. They ride to work in their limousines. They go up in their elevators and lock themselves in their offices. They don't walk out into the plants. They wouldn't even drive in the neighborhoods where their employees live. They give themselves big bonuses when the company isn't making any money. I'd make them get involved with the people who are building the cars. They've got to become real people.
... but actually it sucks to have a lot of employees, and you should be proud of how few employees you have.
The worst leaders are the once that think they have to know as much or more than the people who work with them. The best leaders are the once who know that their employees know hell of a lot more than what they know and willing to admit it whilst expressing the value of their employees.
If you stumble about believability, what are you living for? Love is hard to believe, ask any lover. Life is hard to believe, ask any scientist. God is hard to believe, ask any believer. What is your problem with hard to believe?
In most cases, it's slight and often unintentional gaps in integrity that hold leaders, their employees, and their companies back. Despite their potential, these leaders harm their employees and themselves.
I regularly encourage employees to break rules. I also say to employees that leadership starts with complaining and dissatisfaction. But it doesn't stop there. It comes from saying you're dissatisfied with something and then fixing it and making it better for everybody.
People mistakenly believe that if you do nothing but train you can only get better. You've got to work hard, but the harder you work the harder you must rest and relax.
Our company wouldn't exist and wouldn't be around without our warehouse employees and our call center employees. And these employees - not just at Rent the Runway but at tens of thousands of other companies throughout the country - are treated unequally.
Wal-Mart is an amazing success story. What I particularly admire very much about the late Sam Walton was his policy of valuing his employees. Giving value to employees is very rare in the retail industry. I also admire the strategies Walton used to build up his discount store concept.
Obama is talking to voters as though he is their boss, or their principal, or their father. He is not any of those things. He is their employee. And employers don't like it when their employees yell at them - even if their employees have it right.