Don’t micromanage
You can’t have a free and open culture if you are constantly watching over everyone who works for you. Yes, you don’t want to completely ignore what is going on, but watching when employees come and go can be stifling to their motivation and work ethic.
“My thoughts on this have always been to hire strong people and give them the tools to be successful and give them the freedom to go,” he says. “I don’t want to know when people are coming and going. I don’t want them to punch a clock in and out. I want to hire people and give them the tools to be successful and watch them blossom.”
And watching them blossom is the key in managing System One’s type of culture.
“With us, it’s all based on performance,” he says. “If you are getting your job done and you’re doing your job in a good way and the results are there, I have no problem. I always say to my people, ‘Hey, if you are going to be that successful and you’re going to do your job, I’d rather have someone like you for 20 hours a week than someone that can’t do it for 60 hours.’ So, it’s about the quality of the work. It’s about our clients being happy, our internal people being happy, and it’s about creating a very unique environment.”
You may not be able to pay the most on the block or hand out the best bonuses, but if you are giving employees freedom, you know that no one can compete with the quality of life at your company.
“If I have 150 internal employees and I had to watch each one and see what they are doing, it’s not the environment we want,” he says. “We are not about cracking the whip.”
Some bosses may think employees will get more work done if they are in the office all of the time. Gregory disagrees with that assessment. If you give your employees the freedom of having flexible hours, chances are they are working at home or outside of the typical 9-to-5 workday.
“We’re always working,” he says. “So it doesn’t mean that I need you in this office sitting next to me at all times.”
