Are you giving employees what they really want -- Respect

It’s getting to be crunch time for the greenhouse industry -- trying to find enough qualified, dependable workers to make it through the seemingly nonstop spring shipping/selling season. Our industry is not alone in its efforts to find qualified employees. Robert Reynolds Jr., former chairman of the National Association of Wholesalers-Distributors (www.naw.org), spoke at the NAW Executive Summit in January about recruiting and retaining the best people. Reynolds, chairman, president and CEO of Graybar Electric Co. in St. Louis, told attendees that the wholesale distribution industry needs to do a “much better job of recruiting, engaging and retaining the best and brightest” workers. He said that the distribution industry isn’t generally regarded as the most glamorous profession. Do you think the production side of our industry can relate?

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Satisfying work force diversity

Changes in U.S. demographics over the next 10-15 years will impact entire industries and their supply chains, Reynolds said. He cites a Towers Perrin (www.towersperrin.com) report that indicates employees seek different things from their company during stages in their employment life cycle. Consider your own job. The factors that drew you to the job with your company are probably not the same things that have caused you to remain with the company.

The report, Reynolds said, found competitive base pay and health care benefits and work/life balance are the key factors in attracting workers to a job. However, when it comes to retaining employees, the main reasons for staying with a company are skills development, new learning opportunities and an exemplary company reputation.

Retaining quality people

Reynolds said it is critical for distribution companies to provide employees with training and continued development. Our industry should heed his warning. He said companies need to provide “continuous learning for all employees -- in all stages of their careers.” This training, Reynolds said, needs to be a part of each company’s business strategy and used to “achieve solid bottom-line results.”

We’re all familiar with co-workers who have suffered from job burnout. You may be surprised as to the major cause of this common phenomenon. Reynolds said the main reason for burnout is not long hours, repetitive tasks or job stress. The primary reason for burnout, according to officials at the Wharton School, is because employees feel their companies don’t respect and value them. “It’s not the job,” Reynolds said, “that burns them out.” It’s how they are treated by their company that causes them to feel burned out.

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Reynolds’ solution for retaining the best people and maximizing a company’s investment in its people is to “develop a pervasive corporate culture of respect for all employees.”

- David Kuack