In this holiday season, people love to receive gifts. In fact, people always love to receive gifts! Well, what gifts would your CEO love to receive from you? Here are seven you really need to go all out to give to your CEO. Then, as the saying goes, “What goes around, comes around.” So, give these gifts and your will have earned yourself the right to some magnificent gifts, also.
1st Gift = You Improve Profits & Productivity
When I was writing my second book, “Turning Your HR Department into a Profit Center™, I interviewed about 20 CEOs to find out how they use HR to measurably improve profits. One question I asked in my interview was “What is the most important thing for you to get employees to focus on in your company?”
Overwhelmingly, CEOs answered, “The most important thing for me, as CEO, to get employees to focus on is this: Improving profits and productivity.”
That says it all for you. Anything and everything you do to improve profits and productivity – what I call is highly valued. In contrast, any work you do that does not improve “the 2 P’s” might be viewed as ‘nice but not necessary.’
Remember: Everyone who is part of the profit-generating team in your company is ultra-important – a true VIP.
2nd Gift = You Hire Employees Who Improve Profits & Productivity
A key way to improve productivity and profits is to hire applicants who turn into productive and profitable employees.
In seminars based on my “Hire the Best – & Avoid the Rest™” book, I always conclude by asking the audience, “What’s the fastest, easiest and cheapest way to have employees who are productive, dependable, and honest?”
The answer: Hire human beings who are productive, dependable and honest human beings!
That means you need to gift your CEO by only putting employees on the payroll who improve ‘the 2 P’s.” And while you are at it, why don’t you give your CEO another sterling gift: “De-employ” employees who either do not contribute to, or who detract from, your company’s bottom line.
For example, many companies use three “Forecaster(tm) Tests” – pre-employment tests – that I created. Their goal always is to use the tests to help hire productive employees. Your CEO wants you to hire productive employees.
3rd Gift = You Train Employees to Be More Profitable & Productive
CEOs – including your CEO – craves for you to transform the good employees you hired (see 2nd Gift, above) into magnificent employees.
You do this by
a. finding out what your magnificent employees do on-the-job
b. get your good employees to do what your magnificent employees do
You can give this gift to your CEO in two steps. First, you can do a “Benchmarking Study” of your magnificent or superstar employees. Second, you make sure your employees do what your superstar employees do.
The most objective method of employee development is to (1) test your employees, (2) compare your superstars’ test scores to your other employees’ test scores, and (3) help your non-superstar employees become more like your superstars. For example, on the “Abilities & Behavior Forecaster™ Test,” you might find your superstar employees in a particular job score highly friendly, very teamwork-oriented, flexible-thinking, and ultra-optimistic. Then, you would focus your employee development on helping – and insisting – your other employees become similarly friendly, teamwork-oriented, flexible-thinking, and optimistic.
4th Gift = You Show Enthusiasm for Your CEO’s Vision for Your Company
A good CEO has an ultra-crucial vision for the company. Note: The vision is not a mushy “mission statement” adorning most company’s waiting rooms. Instead, the CEO’s vision is the big, exciting, compelling vision the CEO aims for the company to achieve.
In my book entitled, “Absolutely Fabulous Organizational Change™,” I exposed the strategies of executives who led $10-million - $1-billion dollars of profit improvement using my “3 Ingredient Method.” Here are some big, exciting, compelling vision statements from some of America’s best-run companies:
Intuit’s Vision: Our key goal is to revolutionize the way people do financial work.
Outback Steakhouse, Inc.: Out key goal is to create a world-class casual diningcompany that endures.
Robert Mondavi Corp.: Our key goal is to be the world’s preeminent fine wine producer.
Harley-Davidson: Our key goal is to fulfill dreams through the experiences of motorcycling.
Your job is to (1) find out what your CEO’s big, exciting, compelling vision is – and then (2) go out there and do everything you can to help your CEO reach they key goal of the company. Your CEO will cherish such a gift from you.
5th Gift = You Ooze the Key Benefits of Your Corporate Culture
Each company operates successfully (or unsuccessfully) within its unique corporate culture. From my consulting experience, I define it as follows: Corporate culture is how every employee knows he or she must act – even when no one is watching.
I discovered a quick way to uncover a company’s culture: Find out what stories every employee hears about the company within the first week on-the-job and also tells to new employees. Actually, hearing the company’s signature story is a right-of-passage for new employees. Hearing the story implicitly tells a new employee how to act on-the-job – even when no one is watching.
Here is the corporate culture story every Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company employee hears. It is taken from my book, Absolutely Fabulous Organizational Change™: Strategies for Success from America’s Best-Run Companies.
“Ladies & Gentlemen Serving Ladies & Gentlemen”
When he was 14 years old, Horst Schulze -- president of The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company -- worked in as an apprentice waiter in a very fine restaurant in his native Germany. Initially, he saw himself as a “servant.”
Then, he realized the fine restaurant was staffed by highly skilled professionals. For example, he looked in awe as he repeatedly saw the maître d' chat with and entertain the diners. In fact, the maître d' spoke many languages. So, he spoke German to the German diners, French to the French guests, and English to the English customers. He also expertly helped diners with their food and wine choices.
From this experience, it dawned on Horst Schulze that a luxury establishment is composed of ladies and gentlemen serving ladies and gentlemen. He instilled this insight into The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company where he now is president.
Company president Horst Schulze’s experience gives rise to The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company’s motto which beautifully expresses its corporate culture: “We Are Ladies and Gentlemen Serving Ladies and Gentlemen.”
So, a gift your CEO want from you is for you to uncover your company’s culture, put it into action in your work, and make sure other employees do the same.
6th Gift = You Use Fantastic Communications Skills
CEOs are like parents. Parents feel proud if their children make a good impression. CEOs feel proud when their employees make a good impression.
Your gift to your CEO is for you to make a fantastic impression on everyone who can make-or-break your company. This includes customers and other employees. It also includes people you run into outside of work who know where you work. (Beware: Few things make a CEO’s heart ache more than finding out you did or said something outside of work that reflected badly on your company!)
In my book and seminars on “How Winners Do It: High Impact People Skills for Your Career Success,” I explain the six people skills exuded by high-achievers:
1. Quickly Make a Great Impression
2. Expertly Persuade, Influence, & Negotiate
3. Act Diplomatic, Tactful, & Enthusiastic
4. Conduct Highly Productive Meetings
5. Deliver impressive presentations
6. Write clear, easy-to-use memos, letters, & reports
7th Gift = You Impress Your Boss & Your Boss’ Boss
It is important to impress your boss. It is even more important to impress your boss’ boss – and anyone else who has direct contact to the CEO.
You may ask, “Well, how do I impress those big-shots?” The answer is for your to give the six gifts listed above. By doing this, you implicitly give your CEO this seventh of the seven gifts your CEO wants from you.
When You Give Gifts, You Get Gifts
By giving your CEO these seven gifts, you put into action the age-old truism of ‘First you sow and then you reap.” The more your help your company increase profits and productivity, the more valuable you are to the company. And the more needed you are to your CEO.
By giving these seven gifts to your CEO you open doors to opportunities for your company – and, importantly, for yourself.
© Copyright 2010 Michael Mercer, http://www.DrMercer.com
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