Steven Nero had more confidence in his employees than they had in themselves, and that had to change.
“The biggest challenge was to get people to understand and believe that we could not only compete, but win against competitors two, three or even 10 times our size,” says Nero, the president and chief operating officer of Star Trac.
The fitness equipment company would compete by outexecuting, outthinking and outmaneuvering the other companies in the industry.
“Bigger companies may have more resources, but they aren’t as flexible and dynamic,” Nero says.
The trick was to turn the pep talk into reality in the form of a motivated work force that could grow the business.
“There’s a whole confidence piece to this,” Nero says. “When you start believing you can win, you win more, and if you string enough of those together, you start believing you can’t lose.”
Nero’s plan worked at 550-employee Star Trac as it took in $190 million in 2008 sales.
Smart Business spoke with Nero about how to build confidence in your employees.
Talk to your people. You have to create a shared vision together. Take them out of the daily work framework and move them into a more strategic framework. Ask, ‘What do our customers really need? How are we serving their needs? How are our competitors serving their needs? What needs are not being served well, and how could we do it better?’
Talk about what are our strengths and our core competencies that we can leverage to better meet those needs. When you can get people in that framework and thinking and getting them out of that box and into the abstract space, it opens them up and there is a lot more understanding and growth that happens.
