Published CommPro.biz 2014.01.28

Surprise Surprise

The Great Place to Work® Institute has been creating Fortune magazine’s 100 Best Places to Work list for nearly twenty years. The new list is just out and it’s interesting to note that the 100 companies that make the list share another trait: they make more money than most other companies. Having happy, engaged workers propelled these 100 companies into a growth rate close to five times that of businesses in general over the last two years. Those are the Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics figures. The companies that make their revenue figures public jumped more than 20% in the last two years. 

That may come as a surprise to some; it’s no surprise to us. Happy workers are those who are treated better than their peers in similar jobs. Workers who feel valued are more productive. They stay in their jobs long term. Cut turnover and you build an experienced workforce. It’s a pillar of the ethical business model that marks the firms that stand out even further, firms focused on all the stakeholders that can make or break a company. 

Firms focused on their workers, their customers, their vendors, their community, and on the environment, generate the profits to keep their lenders and investors happy. In their 2007 book, Firms of Endearment, the authors identified a group of companies that met those standards. They earned eight times the S&P Average over the ten years leading up to the research. The levels of growth and revenues gained by the Fortune 100 Best Places companies is impressive, but not close to the earnings of those that made the Firms of Endearment list. It’s no coincidence that companies demonstrating good behavior make more money than their peers. 

However, the ethical business model is not a guarantee. You can treat your workers well, you can follow to the letter the ethical business model and still fail. Any successful enterprise has to have a bit of luck in addition to a lot of hard work and doing the right thing. What we can guarantee is that all things being equal, you are more likely to succeed or to succeed on a larger scale than those who follow a less savory business approach. It’s too bad the bad guys make all the headlines. It’s too bad that sometimes the minority -those bad guys- are seen as the norm.

So it’s no surprise that firms on Fortune magazine’s 100 Best Places to Work list are doing well. As it happens so are most all of the companies on all the lists that document some aspect of good behavior. Surprising to us are the companies that continue to follow the low road in business. While they are a minority, they still are a massive cancer on our economy. Here’s a surprise for those greed centered Wall Street Bankers and corporate executives. They would do better by doing the right thing for all their stakeholders. 

"Am I wrong?"--"Am I crazy?"

"What do you think?"--"Do you agree?"