Create camaraderie
In the tight quarters of an airplane, you better hope that all of the flight attendants and pilots get along well so that your flight is an enjoyable and peaceful experience. In the same way, Sturm goes to great lengths to make sure he takes care of his 223 employees.
For example, when one woman, who was from overseas, lost her fiance to a heart attack, it left her with no family in the country, a long drive from Akron to Cleveland for work every day and feelings of suicide. It was in this time that Sturm and his team rallied together to help her. They bought a condominium closer to the office, moved her to Cleveland and gave her a rent rate for the condo that she could afford to help her get back on her feet. Beyond the financial support, employees emotionally supported her back to health.
In yet another situation, a couple had both parents die within six months of each other, and the family didn’t have enough money, so the company paid for the funerals to help the couple out.
“It’s stuff like that that Jack Welch at GE probably wouldn’t dig, but we do stuff like that,” Sturm says.
While Professional Travel has a lot of employees, they don’t go unrecognized on their birthdays. There’s always a cake,and everybody brings in food for lunch and decorates the birthday person’s office space.
“As you have happy employees, they’re happy in the way they treat our customers,” Sturm says. “It’s like the family that plays together stays together kind of thing.”
With so many people, it could be easy to lose track of someone’s birthday or overlook a personal struggle in someone’slife, but that’s where delegation can help. Sturm has a “funcommittee” of six nonexecutive employees.
“Have somebody that’s in charge of different activities,” he says.
When choosing someone to lead a culture committee, be mindful of whom you select.
“You need someone who’s outgoing and happy with themselves and happy with their lives and happy with the perform
an
ce of their job function,” Sturm says. “Not that we have any people who are shy, introverted and sullen, but that’s who you pick.”
Within the committee, the team members delegate the responsibilities of different events, such as the annual picnic, and, when necessary, they bring in more people to help with a specific event.
“What other CEOs can do is, with an eye to your own corporate culture, you can be sensitive to what they do collectively to work together and above the performance of our job function to build unity and camaraderie and have a little fun while we’re at it,” he says.
Sturm gives them a budget to work within, and employees also raise funds for activities by having 50-50 raffles throughout the year. The key to all of this is allowing them to do their thing and stay out of their way.
“To be effective, you have to maybe watch stuff from 35,000 feet, but you don’t have to be breathing down anybody’s neck,” Sturm says. “If you have created a company structure where the executive and department heads and committees are well chosen and well qualified, you have to put your trust in the fact that they’re going to operate with the best interest of the company in mind and treat the people who report to them fairly and that the job will get done and get done right.”
