Commit to your employees
Stefanski once saw a bumper sticker that read, “Love is commitment.” With love as one of Third Federal’s values, Stefanski points out that love isn’t what most people think it is.
“Love can be a lot of things, but without commitment, you don’t have anything,” he says. “Ask anyone who’s been married along time.”
Stefanski’s commitment runs so deep that he doesn’t partake in extracurricular activities like sitting on boards, spending time on the golf course or belonging to a country club. Instead, he spends time with his family and encourages his employees to leave at5 o’clock so they can do the same.
“It’s total commitment to my family and this organization, in that order,” he says.
Even within his commitment to Third Federal, there’s also the rank and file to think about.
“You need to put people first, strategy second,” he says. “In this case, I’m even suggesting that you put your associate first, you put your customers first, and the shareholders follow after.”
While a lot of companies tend to focus on bringing results to their shareholders — whomever that may be, depending if it’s a public or private company — Stefanski recognizes the importance of focusing on his employees.
“I think we’ve seen many examples along the way where the companies and industries have put shareholders first and investment back into the company second,” he says. “Most of those companies are either out of business or currently have financial trouble or you name it — there are major, major issues.”
For example, he says to look at the American automakers. In the 1960s and’70s, they gave a lot of their money back to their shareholders and didn’t reinvest back in their plants.
“They didn’t reinvest back in their people,” Stefanski says. “The result today is that the Japanese are winning the war because they’re going to outsell GM.”
Instead of taking a short-term approach and padding his shareholders’ wallets, Stefanski looks toward the future.
“There’s not a shareholder that would agree with that, but again, if you don’t have a business, how can you give back to the shareholder?” he says. “If the shareholder is in it for the short term, this isn’t a good place to invest money because we’re in it for the long term.”
When it comes to how much stock and other bonuses employees receive, Stefanski rewards the most-tenured employees as opposed to the highest-ranking ones.
“All the consultants said, ‘You can’t do this,’ but we said, ‘Who has built this company?’” he says. “Who deserves those perks and deserves the recognition? These folks have a much more difficult job than I do.”
Rewarding tenure has kept Third Federal’s turnover around 7 percent in an industry where 20 percent or more is common and helps ensure employees will stick around for the long haul.
“We’re building a company to last,” Stefanski says. “In order to last, you have to develop this culture that’s almost cult-like in that it’s radically different than most organizations. It’s easy for Wall Street to
slice and dice up many organizations because they all look the same. A company like ours is a foreign object to them — the reason being we’re in it for the long term, not the quarter-to-quarter thing. We’re in it for 50 quarters down the road.”
