The Society for Human Resource Management’s (SHRM) had their 63rd Annual Conference & Exposition in Las Vegas at the end of June, and since this is exactly on-topic with what we do in our business, we were inspired to read about the conference in many news articles and blogs, including Kelly Long’s blog Thryving. From Kelly’s blog, we picked up a few pointers that were delivered by Sir Richard Branson’s speech. Here are a couple of ideas we’ve learned, and promote:
Sir Richard Branson, founder and president of the Virgin group gave one of the first opening speeches at the conference. His massive corporation is 300 companies in 30 countries, reaching various industries including travel and hospitality, telecommunications, health and wellness, and even clean energy. To us, he’s one successful businessman that gives great insight into running a business effectively through human resources.
Sir Branson spoke about how “a bad CEO or Manager can destroy the whole spirit of a company incredibly quickly. HR needs to push them out the door.” This makes sense to us. A company is built from a network of employees; the one in charge is not excused from being involved in the company culture. Actually, the bosses must set the tone and philosophy of the company, and if they don’t have a positive attitude or promote goodwill among personnel, they’ll single-handedly destroy the business.
He also believes in promoting from within. In regards to the Virgin hiring practices, Sir Branson says, “we don’t need the so-called experts from the outside. Think outside the box. Don’t think of the switchboard operator as always being the switchboard operator. Don’t think of the cleaning lady as always being the cleaning lady.” It’s clear that he believes in his employee’s abilities to take on complex positions that offer more responsibility. We agree! Don’t throw away someone’s years of dedicated hard work and experience within the company. Instead, train them, and make them experts; offer them better opportunities and you’ll see them flourish and work even harder to achieve more.
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