Engage employees
Soon after Richardson arrived at Arcadia in early 2007, the decision was made to revise the company’s mission, vision and values.
The core of the new company mantra was to constantly focus on
finding new ways to help patients both stay at home and stay healthier for longer periods of time.
Richardson could have drawn up a new mission statement and
code of values and unilaterally made them policy at Arcadia without any input from others. Instead, he sought to engage employees
in the effort, because developing leaders from within your company means giving them opportunities to be a part of important initiatives and decisions.
“You’ll never get them there if you’re telling them what to do,
because sooner or later, they stop thinking on their own,”
Richardson says.
“You lose creativity, and you lose your ability to problem solve
because everybody is waiting on you to make a decision about what you are going to do rather than them making a decision
based on the information they have gathered. You’ll become a lot
less effective as a company because you’ll grind to a halt while
everybody is waiting on the CEO to make a decision.”
Meetings were held throughout the company to gather feedback
from employees and hear about what mattered to them at Arcadia.
Information was dispensed through company newsletters and
through the Web.
“We get out and see people and talk to people and we’re in front of
people talking about where the company is going and how we’re
going to get there,” Richardson says. “The key is making sure that
the people around you, your management team, is communicating
effectively with the group.”
The key is taking the responses you get and incorporating them
into the project for which you are seeking input. That’s what
engages employees and that’s what gets them on the path to personal growth and advancement.
The result of this effort at Arcadia was an employee base that felt
more a part of the team.
“I got a lot of feedback and notes from people saying, ‘I get it. It’s
nice to know where the company is going. I understand clearly
what I need to do. I need to understand my role in the company,’”
Richardson says.
“That’s the critical step because you do that and people want to
stand up and line up around a vision. The company makes sense
and they want to succeed and move forward and be promoted and
do those kinds of things.”
It’s these types of projects that will open your eyes to employees
with leadership potential.
“You’ve got an employee that becomes more confident in the job
they are doing because they are making decisions and those decisions are building confidence for them,” Richardson says. “You get
somebody who can make decisions on their own and ultimately
you want somebody that is going to develop over time who can
take on more responsibility.”
