By Chantel Schirmer

How does a manager lead a company and its employees to become a Fortune 100 Best Company to Work For? 

Come with me as I compare 4 leading companies and find how the threads of Strategic Planning, Clear Vision, and Goals, provide a sense of team, value, and individualize that keep employees coming back for more. For any aspiring manager including myself we can pay close attention to how exploring internal strengths both the individual and within the organization as well as aligning with the vision of the company, and implementing organizational strategy can lead to some of the top companies to work for. Let’s dive in.  

When it comes to the top companies employees enjoyed working we see Strategic Planning as an essential cornerstone to the company’s success. This is found specifically in what the lecture titled the W1 Lecture 2 – Strategic HRM (Swift, pg.3). Additionally, according to the Fortune 100 Best Companies to Work For® 2020 Hilton is the leading company (2020). Hilton’s employees’ happiness is at an overwhelming 96% coming from the company’s ability to incorporate what the lecture above states incorporate Step 1 of Strategic Planning known as to “Create a mission, vision, and set of values” (Swift, pg.3) (2020). Not only that but the key theme of Hilton, Baird, Pinnacle Financial Partners, and Wegmans Food Markets, Inc. are seen to incorporate vision into the company’s team dynamics. While Hilton leads the way in hospitality it is their ability to be “Dedicated to fulfilling its founding vision to fill the earth with the light and warmth of hospitality” as Great Place To Work says, that essentially leads to their success of happy employment (2020). 

When a company sticks to its mission and its goals while also allowing expansion it creates stability as well as is the foundation for innovation for many employees. For example, Baird is said to have kept their vision alive through “The cultural principles put in place by our founder 100 years ago remain core to our firm today.” This is a rare strength yet has led to the strength of the company and its excellence. 

Vision, goals, and principles are essential to the organizational structure of every HR department. 

All of these companies have shown the divine ability to focus on the collective skills, abilities, and
expertise of the organization’s workforce” (Swift, pg. 4). Likewise we learn from Pinnacle Financial Partners that their culture was one of “same team, working towards the same goals” (2020). 

As a manager, I desire to lead a company that focuses on identifying the internal strengths and weaknesses of a company while aligning with the vision and goals that can expand the opportunities for each individual as well as the company. 

This first key is known as the “willingness to individualize” and learning to master that key into your own management style (Buckingham, 2014, pg. 3). Moreover we can learn from Wegmans Food Markets, Inc., that the way they made their employees “feel wanted and valued as a person and employee.” They not only master the art of the key theme above as a values-based family company and mission but have understood the importance of how to individualize their employees too.

A second key is found in First, Break All the Rules: What the World’s Greatest Managers Do Differently when it states “the best a manager can do is to make each person comfortable with who they are” (Buckingham, 2014, pg. 5). 

Again incorporating both of these keys into my own manager style will allow me to look past insecurities and beyond strengths or weaknesses to value the individual and find the places to allow them to shine. Aligning the strengths and weaknesses of individuals and the organization will be a challenge I would face as a manager as I analyze strengths and weaknesses and yet value the individual using weaknesses to provide growth opportunities. Thus the importance of finding strategies and polices to help align a successful HR department I will have to put into practice to be able to manage an outstanding company that others would desire to work for. With the insight from some of the Greatest places to work, incorporating Strategic Planning from the vision of the company to the strengths and weaknesses beyond analysis to the value of each individual I hope you too can manage a top Fortune 100 company. 

References:

Buckingham, M., & Coffman, C. W. (2014). First, break all the rules: What the world’s greatest managers do differently. Gallup Press.

Great Place To Work. (2020). Fortune 100 best companies to work for® 2020. Great Place To Work®. https://www.greatplacetowork.com/best-workplaces/100-best/2020

Swift, M. (n.d.). W1 Lecture 2 – Strategic HRM. MGMT 453×400.