workplace 2.0 (employee, product, customer)
July 19th, 2007
So, to be fair, I’ve never attended business school. 
To take my full disclosure of how unqualified I am to be yammering on about business theory further, I’ve only owned a couple of small businesses and I’ve never been an upper or middle manager of anything at a larger organization. Even so, I want to throw my little theory of business out to the world to be trampled, chewed up, and spit out. Or maybe you should trample it last since you’re going to be chewing on it…
Summing it up is easy: Employee, Product, Customer. (or Employee, Service, Client)
Explaining it will probably be easier. Essentially, that’s the exact order that your priorities should fall into as a business owner or manager. You’ll notice, Perceptive One, that it’s pretty much exactly the opposite direction that the vast majority of businesses go. Generally, it’s “put the customer first”, so they would list their priorities as Customers, Products, Employees. (or if you’re a non-profit, it’s Customers, Vendors, Your Great Aunt Martha, The Weather, Religious Doctrine, Candy Bars, Products…Employees) I’m here to suggest that this is backwards and wrong. Put the customer last. There…I said it. And since I’m a business owner, I’ll probably pay dearly for it later…or…will I? Mwa hahahahahaaa!
You see, I believe that this theory is actually good for the end user. And here’s why:
If I, as a business owner, focus my energies on ensuring that my employees have the best possible working environment, the best possible compensation, and the best possible experience while at work, then they in turn will give the same attention to our products and/or services, which in the end, benefits the people we’re doing it all for in the first place: our customers.
When I was but a young buck, wet behind the ears and fresh out of college, there were two or three places in my city that created a buzz of excitement about working there. Everyone was talking about the perks and how they treated you and health benefits this, personal spa allowance that. These companies had reputations for treating the people who worked for them like, well, they were valuable. And as a result, the best of the best from the colleges in town fought for open positions at these companies. And once they were in…they stayed in. Because why would they give that up?
A great case study (if you’re into that sort of thing…nerd) is Longaberger in Dresden, OH. To make a long story short, they make baskets by hand and sell them through direct marketing via independent distributors (think Avon ladies) at upwards of a hundred bucks a pop. The company was founded by the late Dave Longaberger, and grew to a basket empire complete with a giant basket for corporate offices in a relatively short amount of time. Dave paid his employees higher than anyone in the area, provided benefits and perks like you wouldn’t believe, and was even known to walk around the factory and just hang with the people working there. EVERYONE knew Dave and EVERYONE loved him. Why? Because he treated the people who worked for him like kings and queens. And they in turn made an amazing product that made Dave a very rich man.
After Dave passed away, some family members took over the biz and in what felt like overnight, nearly bankrupted it. How did they do this, you ask? Did they spend money on pop tarts and pork rinds? Did they shut down the assembly line for 6 months to have the biggest rave in history? Nope. They did one thing and one thing alone that nearly destroyed the company. They focused on the bottom line. They did what they thought put the customer first.
They noticed that many of the basket weavers would work for 4 to 6 hours a day, easily making not only their quota, but super-quota (um, which is basically more than your quota), and were banking more than $50K a year. Well a reasonable person would think “why in the world would we pay that much for a guy/gal to work 20 to 30 hours a week in the-middle-of-nowhere Ohio?” So, they immediately cut the weaving staff down and raised the quota. They then lowered the per-basket rate that they paid for completed baskets. What do you think happened next?
First, the quality of the baskets dramatically declined. And dammit, if a person is paying more than a hundred smackaroons for a friggin basket, it better be the best damn basket they’ve ever seen. Second, the weavers who remained started disappearing right and left because carpal tunnel spread like the bubonic plague. And who do you think filled those seats when they left? Skilled craftsman? No. Because of the lower wages and the poor working conditions, Longaberger could now only fill weaver positions with people who couldn’t find better work elsewhere. Not sure if you’re up on HR theory, but these types of people aren’t the most motivated in the world.
And that’s just one way in which they were trying to put customers ahead of their employees. They cut many benefits and perks like company picnics and heavy discounts on Longaberger products for friends and family. All stuff that seemed to have an immediate, positive effect on their profits, but the long-term effects have proved disastrous. They went from being a nearly billion dollar company to a nearly bankrupt company faster than you can say “holy freaking cow, $180 for a laundry basket???“
Kathy Sierra wrote an amazing post about Managers 2.0 that is right up this alley. I’ve referenced the article before, and I’ve even used her nifty graphic table in one of my own articles, so for context, feel free to read them again. But here, I’d like to present Workplace 2.0*, a blatant rip-off of Kathy’s original table:
(*not to be confused with the blog or the IBM product)
These are just some examples of ways to implement the “backwards” Employee-Product-Customer theory. And since I’m incredibly into hearing feedback, I’d love to open up the comments to rants, raves, and maybe some new ideas about how this might work in the real world. Any takers?