Sports/Entertainment
A passion to succeed
How to spread your enthusiasm to your employees
By Meredyth McKenzie
Smart Business | June 2008
Page 1 of 2
Ash Robinson
owner, president and CEO, JW Tumbles
Ash Robinson is passionate
about helping people develop along a career path.
And to share that passion and
motivate employees at JW
Tumbles, a $9.1 million national
chain of children’s fitness and
learning centers, she rewards
them with “Tumbles Dollars,”
which they can spend on a team
or another employee doing a
great job — “sort of a pay-it-forward kind of thing.” Robinson,
owner, president and CEO of
JW Tumbles, says this creates a
team environment among her
employees — 18 in her office and
270 at franchises nationwide.
“It’s a great reward to see people grow and move up,” she says.
Smart Business spoke with
Robinson about how to find the
right employees, motivate them
and become engaged with them.
Q. How do you find the right
people for your team?
Our culture is well defined,
and either people are passionate
about those things or they’re
not. It’s almost a self-filtering
process because people who
aren’t [passionate] usually aren’t
interested in us.
Situational-based questions
are a great way to find out how
a person reacts and handles
themselves. Spend a lot less
time talking about the job and
more talking about them.
Q. How do you ensure employees are in the right positions?
It’s constant feedback and
being engaged with their work.
If they’re not in the right position, re-evaluate.
Handle it sooner than later,
and bring it back to the job
description and whether or not they’re successful. If you have
another position they’d be great
at, move them to that spot. If
they’re not right for your company, amicably part ways and
allow them to be successful
somewhere else.
Q. How do you become
engaged with employees and
stay open to feedback?
Set up a system to formalize
the feedback process. You can
never have enough feedback
with your employees, whether
it’s criticism or praise.
Create a schedule. Go to
employees’ workspaces
once a week to ask how
they are doing, what
they’re working on and
what you can help with.
When an employee hits
a home run, let everyone
know. When they make a
mistake, correct it as
soon as possible and
make sure they have an
active role in the solution.
Utilize all communication tools, from e-mail,
project management software, phone and face to
face. Add more face time
whenever possible.
