Let your people take charge
Once Mancini and her leadership team kick-started the EAC, they did something many companies would struggle with: They completely let go.
To really engage employees, Mancini says you need to let them take over everything — the agenda, the planning and the budget.
“That’s why we have a waiting list for the EAC, because there’s such opportunity to help people, and it makes people feel better about their jobs because some folks sit on the phone or they type contracts in the computer and they think, ‘What am I doing to help our population?’ Well this gives them an avenue to do that,” Mancini says.
That empowerment also means giving aspects of your vision over to the committee’s creative license. Whenever Molina wants to celebrate anything, the company lets the committee take the reins. When the Ohio plan hit 100,000 members in 2007, the committee went around and passed out 100 Grand candy bars.
“It’s stuff like that, little things,” Mancini says. “They did a customer service week this past year. They did the theme of one world, one goal — one team, one goal — so they made a passport for each of the staff, and they went to different suites, which were each a different country, and they sampled food or played some games and really focused on service, the staff really enjoyed that.”
Those little things motivate employees with a social reward comparable to a raise.
“They get a lot of recognition for being on this committee, the staff sends kudos and thank-yous,” Mancini says.
And while that empowerment is a fantastic thing for Mancini to see, she also notes a very executive-friendly portion you can build in to an employee program — and you’ll like this part.
“The best thing is it costs absolutely nothing,” she says. “They’re driving toward a purpose, and a lot of times in business, people focus on ‘people just want their paycheck, it’s all about their paycheck,’ and it really isn’t. It’s about where people feel valued, appreciated and engaged, and that’s what this helps with.”
Creating a program that costs nothing was a simple step for Molina: They let the EAC figure it out. While the corporate entity still gives money for holiday parties and the like, Mancini told the group it could do other events if it could afford them.
The funding comes from things like a post-holiday white elephant sale, an annual book sale and a chili cook-off where people volunteer to make and sell food.
“It’s what they can earn during the year, and they make magnificent things happen, and really it’s because of the creativity and the engagement they have,” she says.
Those engaged employees have been pivotal in helping Molina push forward. Beyond markers Mancini likes to celebrate, like more than 16,000 school items collected during a drive for underprivileged kids, Molina also surpassed 175,000 members in 2008. That growth sparked it to $602.8 million in premium revenue in 2008, a jump of better than 38 percent from 2007. Mancini can’t overestimate the role the EAC has played in that success, from retention and employee engagement to the overall company culture.
“It helps greatly,” she says. “Every day it reinforces the culture. We’re the kind of company where we let you go work on these community events or employee events that help everyone and spend a little bit of time away from your work to do that. It reinforces that we care about our staff, that we care about those we serve, and it also helps them to go back to loading hundreds of contracts into the computer because they feel like they’re making a difference in other ways, too.”
How to reach: Molina Healthcare of Ohio, (800) 642-4168 or www.molinahealthcare.com
