Think of Your Employees as an Investment

Through the prime cost-cutting and downsizing years of the late '80s and early '90s, corporate executives would draw a cynical reaction whenever they mouthed the words, "people are our most important asset." Now, when they say it, we are more likely to believe they really mean it. Why? Because if they don't, their very survival is threatened.So what changed? For one thing, the bottom started dropping off the work force pool in the mid '90s and the economy just kept on creating more jobs.
Now, the labour shortage is expected to only get worse through the year 2020, at which time we will look back and wistfully recall how easy it was to find and keep good people at the turn of the millennium. Taking care of employees in this way results in the employees taking better care of the customers, and the business takes care of itself. Companies with turnover rates of less than 10 percent have 10 percent higher customer retention than companies with turnover rates of 15 percent or more. Many of these companies are operating by "the law of reciprocity," which says that if a company demonstrates commitment to an employee, the employee is more likely to want to give something in return.
"Giving before getting" is still a hard concept for many older managers and executives to accept because it is not the brand of philosophy by which there were managed on their way up. They grew up professionally when the labour supply was plentiful and employers did not have to be so nice. And many resent the "sense of entitlement" and the need for immediate gratification among generations X and Y.
If you manage people or run a company, the question you might want think about is this: When you see your workers coming, what do you see? Do you see labor costs to be reduced or eliminated? Or do you see valued investments in your company's continued success? In a recent sampling of 75 human resource management professionals in the Kansas City area, Right Management Consultants asked them this question: "if asked, would most employees in your company say they are viewed by management more as costs to be reduced or as assets to be developed?" More than half said they thought management viewed employees as costs to be reduced.