The Problem:

Company ABC had a division of 82 employees, 19 of whom were in supervision and the other 63 were full-time workers. The morale and productivity of this company were at such an all time low that management was considering outsourcing the work.

This division was a union shop that held three directors in the past 20 years. The current director has been in place for two years with a primary goal of "straightening everything out." In the past ten years, this division had let go only one employee with more than six months with the organization. The Denniston Consulting Group was asked to come in and move this division from one with an entitlement culture to one based on accountability. We were asked to increase productivity to industry average and improve employee morale.

Early on, we assessed the organization's conflict styles. What we found was that over 95% of the mangers and employees had profiles of conflict avoiders. The organization had not addressed problem employees, they had not held employees accountable for results, and they had not gotten rid of poor performers. Rather, they continued to add more people to assist the poor performers with completing their work.

When we reviewed workflow, we found that many of the tasks that should be performed at a lower management level had been centralized because the manager would not confront the employees nor take responsibility of making decisions. The only person making any decisions were the new director and his boss. The managers were not supporting any decision at the unit level. The bargaining unit employees and the union leadership were upset because they couldn't get necessary decisions made to get their work done.

The Solution:

The organization eliminated all management positions and created five senior management positions. The centralized tasks were pushed back down into the workforce where they belonged. We developed a program to move the organization from one based on entitlement to one based on accountability.

The cornerstone of this program is accountability, which equates to clearly defined and UNDERSTOOD:

As part of this program, the people in the organization received extensive training in confronting and solving problems on a timely basis.

Lessons Learned :

• Failure to confront problems result in low morale and low productivity
• To significantly improve morale, people need to see how they contribute and how their contributions are being recognized
• Millions of dollars can be saved by eliminating duplicate staff hired to assist poor performers
• Increased productivity without the need to duplicate, protect, justify, etc.

For more information on The Denniston Consulting Group call (630) 719-1368