We all have our favorite Thanksgiving traditions. It could be eating turkey and pumpkin pie, spending quality time with family, watching the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, cheering on your favorite football team, preparing for Black Friday shopping, or perhaps you’re someone who loves to start the day by running in a local turkey trot race. This week is a time to gather with friends & family, and to give thanks for our blessings.

About seven years ago we were putting the finishing touches on a new vision for Gibson. Like everyone else, we were emerging from the fog of the Great Recession. Even before the economic downturn we had misfired on a major multi-year plan. To say we were a little gun-shy about verbalizing some new grandiose plan would be an understatement.

Yet aiming for something that seemed out of reach to most of us was exactly what we needed. It pushed us to be better, to be more. We had a financial target in mind that would have us more than doubling in size over the next decade. From a math standpoint, while not a given, it was certainly achievable. We needed to average about 7 to 8% net growth per year. But after years of economic fear, this goal caused much angst among our management team. We wondered if we could really afford to fail again in the eyes of our employees. To our fragile team, to double in size seemed unthinkable.

Today we’re sharing insight from guest blogger Nick Smarrelli, CEO of GadellNet. We hope you enjoy Nick’s wisdom and perspective.

When I joined the team at GadellNet, one of the first things I noticed was what it felt like to work at GadellNet. We were small then, less than five people, and it truly felt like family. The culture was naturally customer-centric, helpful, transparent, and flexible. What I saw was a company about to explode, and I didn’t want to lose the awesome culture that was already in place.

We spent 9 exhausting months of trial-and-error to identify our core values. What made us different? How can we use this to weed out those that don’t fit our culture? Was it clear enough to help make hiring/firing decisions? Was it inspiring? How did it play into our commitment to the community, our employees and our clients? Was it memorable? We didn’t want to have core values that were trite, rather, something that served as the foundation for every decision made as a company.

Looking for ways to educate and engage your employees on safety & health topics throughout the year? Check out our 2019 Safety & Health Calendar.

Workplace safety and wellbeing should be a top priority for leadership and employees. But how can you keep your employees engaged all year long? For every organization the approach is different – you could have a safety committee, newsletters, monthly training sessions, and more. The 2019 Safety & Health Calendar is a valuable tool you can utilize to make your efforts more effective.

Today we’re sharing insight from guest blogger Chris Kennedy, President, CEO of Hartson-Kennedy Cabinet Top Co., Inc. We hope you enjoy Chris’s wisdom and perspective.

In thinking about some of the experiences I’ve encountered running a manufacturing business for 30+ years, there is one recurring theme that jumps out at me. It is something I think has not only been beneficial to our company, but enjoyable and rewarding to me personally as well, and that is CARING.

How do we make sure we retain our employees over the long haul? What a great question. After all, we spend a great deal of time making sure we hire the best and brightest talent available – we sure don’t want to lose them down the road. It gets you thinking…what can we do to improve our chances of keeping that talent on our team?

The first thing we believe we do well at Gibson is simply treat people right. It’s somewhat of a cliché, but we really do the right thing with our team members. It starts with paying them a competitive, market wage. We back it up with workplace amenities like flexible work schedules, unlimited Gibson Time Off (GTO), and casual dress. We also provide a great wellness program and really walk the talk with healthy food options and provide a quality benefits package.

Today we’re sharing insight from guest blogger Dean Breyley, Certified EOS Implementer, entrepreneur, and speaker. We hope you enjoy Dean’s wisdom and perspective.

Bottlenecked, gridlocked, congested – there are lots of ways to describe how it feels when a business gets stuck. We’ve all been there at some point in our work, and once you realize you are there, you immediately start searching for ways to get ‘un-stuck.’

Finding an effective solution that truly gets the business back flowing and growing can feel like looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack. All the while, the issues caused by the bottleneck continue to pile up and snowball. Results slow down, growth starts to halt, errors increase, and people get frustrated. What got you where you are today no longer seems to work.

At Gibson, we hold our culture near and dear to our heart. It’s one of the most important aspects of our work environment. We care about it and work on it constantly. It’s also something we look for in prospective teammates – will they be a good cultural fit? We are focused on having the right people onto the Gibson bus and in the right seat.

Today we’re sharing insight from guest blogger Barbara Khozam, internationally recognized customer service speaker and trainer. We hope you enjoy Barbara’s wisdom and perspective.

Negativity has always been easier to pass along than positivity. This is largely due to our antiquated human nature of day-to-day survival against the world around us. Our existence depended, historically, on knowing where dangers could be found. So passing on this negative knowledge was essential to our lives. However, we no longer live in such an era. But, as human citizens of a modern world, why not make the conscious decision to make positivity contagious?

Anyone trying to run a company today knows it can be complex, difficult, and full of change. The one thing that seems to be a constant in a world of change, is the need for top talent. Whoever has the best talent typically wins. Securing that talent is challenging on a good day, and depending on your specific situation, can be darn near impossible on others.

Of course, to acquire and keep the best talent, you have to offer a competitive total compensation package, including salary and benefits. There are standard employee benefits such as medical, dental, retirement accounts, etc. And then there are differentiators – benefits some offer but most do not - that set you apart from your competitors.