Encourage employee evolution
In her conversations with people, Howroyd realizes that not everyone at ACT 1 is growing the way they would like. Her solution to that goes to the heart of creating a culture where people can grow and be creative: She looks for new roles that can satiate their needs while growing her company.
“Organizations hire accountants into accounting roles, and they do really well,” she says. “Those same people may take an interest in technology through the use of your business system and find themselves somewhere along their career better tracked to design your internal business solutions.
“Why keep them in an accounting environment that they’ve grown beyond? People can perform well in one job for many years and get the commensurate raises and pats on the back that come with that and not be truly happy, but they might be people who have integrity to the job. Listen out loud to them in their regular performance reviews and find out where else they want to grow in your organization. By all means, if the opportunity exists, give them the chance or create the chance. There’s nothing better than having people who grow through your organization than to help them to grow your organization forward.”
That listening process comes at ACT 1 in the form of quarterly evaluations for each employee, but there is also a need to do that on a more ad hoc basis. Whenever you’re working closely with an employee on a project, take the opportunity to see if a portion of that work, which may be outside of the person’s normal realm, tickles his or her fancy.
“We also have the opportunity to do evaluations through projects and initiatives that we work on in the organization, and that’s where the real listening happens,” Howroyd says. “During those quarterly performance reviews, you should take full advantage to see where they are growing and how they can grow. You also should understand that for the employee this means the light is aimed at their face and so their conversation, while honest, can also be somewhat reserved. When you’re working with people in team initiatives or special projects, you have a splendid opportunity to find out where they might like to perform or grow differently in your organization, and it’s a much freer environment and conversation for them.”
Howroyd’s example about the accountant who might want to build out your internal business solutions hits close to home for her. Her company has grown through technology solutions, and the people who built that were existing employees with an interest in adapting the company.
“We would not have achieved the growth we’ve had, nor would we be on the track for growth we’re currently in, if we’d not engaged technology in a very basic way to how we function as an organization,” she says.
