_________________________________

Franchises and corporate culture – Miki Saxon, CEO, RampedUp Solutions

These days you’re bombarded by articles about corporate culture. Culture as the corporate savior; culture as the company’s downfall; culture as a retention tool, culture as an almost silver bullet.
That said, why is it that articles about changing culture in major corporations employing mostly skilled, well-paid workers, e.g., Ford, are met with serious discussion, but changing it in major corporations, with mostly minimum wage earners, e.g., McDonalds, is marked down as hype?

Why is a cultural change at Ford seen as key to the company’s survival, but instilling pride in the workers at McDonalds, Taco Bell and KFC is viewed as hype, “Raising spirits is cheaper than raising salaries.”

Personally I get really sick of this attitude.

“David A. Brandon, CEO of Domino’s Pizza says, ’You can’t overcome a bad culture by paying people a few bucks more.’ He believes the way to attack turnover is by focusing on store managers—hiring more selectively, coaching them on how to create better workplaces and motivating them with the promise of stock options and promotions.” (Wall Street Journal, 2.17.05)

Hooray for David!

Think about it

- Why do we expect young people to take pride in their first “real” job, or care about the customer, when they were laughed at for the same attitudes/actions in their minimum wage job?
- Why does our society denigrate those who work low-paying jobs, when they’re honest, hardworking, pay taxes and even manage to raise families?

In the same vein, why is the four-year grad, with a degree paid for by mom and dad, considered a better candidate than the one who took longer working “non-professional” jobs to pay for the same degree from the same school?

Maybe companies need to wake up. I haven’t seen the same high sense of entitlement in kids who spent their summers working in minimum wage jobs as I have in the ones who worked frequently overpaid jobs for their parents or didn’t work at all.

And I, for one, am thrilled that companies such as YUM! Brands, Domino’s and McDonalds are finally building their people up and, hopefully, offsetting the normal teardown that goes with these jobs.

_________________________________

Miki Saxon, CEO, 25 years as a successful recruiter gave Miki Saxon an in-depth understanding of the bottom-line impact of employees who are turned on—and off. With input from cofounder and retired executive Al Negrin, she developed the MAP (mindset, attitude, philosophy)™ framework which she uses to help startup executives build attractive and strong yet flexible cultures, strengthen communications, reduce burnout and improve retention.

In 1993, she wrote The Swamp and the Alligators: a (slightly irreverent) guide to career planning and the search process and was named Author-in-Residence at San Francisco State University Career Center

Miki now writes Leadership Turn for b5Media and MAPping Company Success for RampUp, as well as numerous articles on management and culture.

For more information, see Miki’s LinkedIn profile.

Post from: EveryJoe

MIKI SAXON: Franchises and Corporate Culture