Richard Branson has been in town this week… and I was interested to learn his insights into the importance he places on the people working for the Virgin brands. This was the first question asked at the Business Chicks breakfast on Monday. Q: Virgin has such a strong brand – what role do your people play in this? “Our people need to be 100% proud of where they work, to believe what they do every day. He or she must…
Tag Archives: Employee Engagement
What to wear.
I was reading an article recently in HR Daily about dress codes for work. Kind of interesting that it is a topic of discussion in an HR publication. My first job when I graduated from university, as a naive young graduate (1984) was with IBM (in New York). On our first day as part of our induction each of the graduate intake was scrutinized to determine if we were suitably attired to be an IBMer. I was wearing a black…
Pitch it
Finding the perfect match in the employment dating game is a challenge for both parties. It is made so much easier when you really get to know a candidate – when they take time to woo the potential employer. At RedBalloon we often receive amazing applications. From a balloon in a box, a rubber hand in a box with a note ‘I’d give my right hand to work at RedBalloon’ (a bit macabre), mock up of a CV in html…
Grow!
Each trimester at RedBalloon we galvanize the plan by announcing a theme. The theme is always based on what is the most critical thing for the business to achieve right now! Last trimester the whole company got behind a ‘Red Dawn’ theme. Everyone chipped in as we launched the new version of the website. Some wrote copy, others proofread, some tested or took photographs. It was the biggest project we have ever undertaken since our launch. It went smoothly –…
Who is Australia’s Dream (and Worst) Employer?
I’ve often blogged about how people talk about the business they work for – this century anyone and everyone can be a publisher – using twitter and facebook to talk about their work place. An employer brand is part of the powerful marketing mix in creating customer experience. If we think of company X favourably but then hear how poorly company X treats it’s people we think less of them. (I am not going to buy into the David Jones…
Communication about Bad Apples
Bad Apples can still do damage even after they have left the organization. Cleaning up the damage and rebuilding culture will take consistent and considered effort. My previous post ‘Bad Apples’ raised the question of authentic communication to the rest of the business – to ensure that culture is not impacted. At RedBalloon being completely transparent with the team has worked for us. They expect that of the leadership team – it is one of our values. We lead by…
Bad Apple
In the last few posts I have been talking about what it takes to be a Great Place to Work. It’s all about trust and purpose. One of the questions I had recently at a speaking engagement is very relevant ‘What if you have a rotten apple inside your organization– someone who is not just disengaged but subversive….’ We are pretty close to our people at RedBalloon – as a leadership team we are all committed to the team and…
Have Faith
I have trawled through online articles featuring best employers and companies with high engagement scores (I’m curious as to what others do of course) and I can’t help but notice the negative comments some attract along the lines of “it’s easy for you” from people all over the world. The truth is any organisation no matter the number of people or the size of the budget can be a great place to work if they accept that what they need…
Thoughts from a RedBalloon veteran
On Friday it was time to farewell an original RedBallooner – Sarah was with us in the very early days – and has seen the business grow from 9 people to its present 50. She has caught the entrepreneurial bug and started her own show a named ‘Lady Bug’ as a fully fledged interior designer. As I listened to Sarah’s farewell words, I felt so very very fortunate, knowing that every person at RedBalloon is what makes our culture. We…
Balancing Balance..
Nigel Marsh has a simple story to tell – which vividly illustrates – “if it’s meant to be it’s up to me”. We are the architects of our own future – responsible for our own happiness. One question that keeps bothering me during these discussions about paid parental leave… is this the right question we should be asking as a community. Raising children is not an 18 week journey – it is 18 years (my mother would say that it…
Imagine running a business based on fun - that's what I decided to try when I left a very serious corporate career in marketing to set up RedBalloon...
