Meet John Schaefer - America's Employee Recognition Expert
Get More Productivity, for Less Money and Prove it to Your CFO!
I began my working life as a paper boy at age 13. I got a busboy job at 16 and worked for eight years in the restaurant business as a waiter in several Scottsdale, Arizona restaurants to pay my way through school.
Upon graduating from Arizona State University in 1980 with an Industrial Engineering degree, I worked for two years in a large manufacturing company. Then, I spent two years with a small family owned manufacturing business before starting my own recognition award, incentive and gift business, Recognition Concepts, Inc.
While I can´t speak for everyone just entering the workforce, for me, fresh out of college, employment was a real eye-opener. I was prepared from a knowledge basis, and knew how to gather and process information. What took me by surprise, though, as I began my career in a turbine engine manufacturing facility, was the vast range of competency I saw among people who were supposedly at the same job levels, and the time-wasting survival habits of people who had been there longer than I.
What I had expected to be a group of inspired, like-minded professionals turned out to be a stress-filled pecking order with a disproportionate amount of time being spent covering up weaknesses, or perceived weaknesses, in every department. I had just completed college, graduating with an Industrial Engineering degree, and found myself working alongside people with the same title and job description as mine, but who had previously worked as a drill press operator. It was a shock, and immediately put a lot of strain on these new relationships. I was the new guy with the fancy degree and that made these other guys nervous. It wasn´t my fault, but there was always an underlying need for the old timers to show me what they could do and, by inference, what I couldn't.
On the shop floor, I got a quick lesson on how the machine operators could manipulate the process engineers into believing a certain machining operation took far longer than it really did. They thought managers were there to make them work harder, even though our job was actually to determine the true cost of making engine components. I got smart pretty quick, and figured out a way of talking to an operator about his job while I was actually timing the guy on the next machine. That way, I could see what was really going into each operation.
I saw people jealously hoard work space and office furniture that were not necessary to their job function. I saw numbers manipulated to make programs look more complete, or performances more successful, than they really were. None of these actions individually would constitute criminal fraud, insubordination, or necessarily lead to catastrophic engine failures, yet it amazed me how much time and energy was wasted covering up inefficiencies rather than addressing them. Actively cooperating with whomever or whatever was required to improve quality (especially when the solutions seemed pretty obvious to me) sure appeared to be a superior option. I came to realize that our universities do a great job of imparting book knowledge, but a poor one of preparing us to get along with other people, work as teams, and overcome the inherent politics that come with competitive work situations.
After more than 20 years of working with major corporations to improve their employee recognition, motivation and incentive programs, I've seen a lot when it comes to what makes employees tick. With knowledge and understanding, employees and employers can work together to optimize the employment experience.
Most of all, I believe that all people have the capacity to become far more than they think they can be, and that the resources required are freely available, if they simply choose to make use of them. Then "Ten Levels of Workplace Disillusionment" introduced in my book Get More Productivity for Less Money . . . Your Employees will Love You for It! may be a humorous take on things, but I hope it helps you take a serious look at the problem of low employee morale that still plagues so many companies in our country today.
If you´ve read this far, I hope you are intrigued to go back up and click on my Free Report or Program Evaluation offers. I have a great passion for what I do and my clients enjoy a number of benefits from working with an organization that not only truly understands people, but has the comprehensive set of programs available to custom tailor a recognition and performance improvement "Umbrella Recognition Solution" for your company's specific needs.
There's much more to be said and discussed, because morale is an ongoing issue, and I hope I'll have the chance to meet with you face-to-face at a future training seminar. I hope you can see how much I genuinely enjoy working with clients to offer management training, recognition and incentive programs in and to help organizations like yours optimize their most important asset - people!