Transportation and Logistics
Culture of excellence
How Peoples Services’ Doug Sibila acquires companies that fit his corporate culture.
By Abby Cymerman
Smart Business Akron/Canton | August 2006
There’s a saying around the Peoples Services office: “What’s right is right.”
This motto reflects the Golden Rule and treating people the way you want to be treated, says Doug Sibila, president and CEO of the Canton-based warehouse, distribution and transportation services provider. And it is regularly applied to relationships with management, employees and customers.
With 320 employees, Peoples Services has grown from $20.7 million in 2003 revenue to an expected $28.5 million in 2006 revenue.
Smart Business spoke with Sibila about how he increases Peoples Services’ revenue through organic growth and acquisitions.
How do you grow your company?
Both through organic growth and being on the lookout for potential acquisitions. If our customers are growing and doing more business, you would expect our activity to increase as well.
The other part is doing more services for that customer. The more things that we can do for our customers, the more revenue opportunities we would have. It means paying close attention to your customers.
It means being flexible and willing to try new things. When someone asks you, ‘Can you do that?’ rather than saying, ‘No,’ even if it’s something that you haven’t done before, try to look at new opportunities. It’s a calculated risk.
If you take the risk and are successful, then hopefully you’re ahead of the pack and doing it before somebody else is, and now that customer is closer to you because you’re doing more for them.
What do you look for in the people you hire?
People with passion. I’ve seen people who are more than capable of doing the job, but if they don’t have the passion, then it may not be a good fit. When people have a passion for what they’re doing in the company, it’s a way that we can differentiate ourselves.
How do you benefit from that?
We have a low turnover rate. We have a lot of long-term employees, including second-, third- and even fourth-generation.
We’re also a partial employee stock ownership plan (ESOP); 30 percent of the company is owned by the employees. As the company’s stock value increases, so does the value of their portfolio. It’s invested not only in our stocks, but also in other outside entities to diversify that risk — you hear a lot about having all your eggs in one basket.
How do you determine which companies to acquire?
We look at their customer base and what industries they serve. Are there some synergies with our customer base or services we provide, or complementary services?
Then we look at the culture of a company. Do they have a lot of long-term employees? How do they treat their customers and their employees? Culture is very important.
How do you control the speed of your company’s growth?
We organized our management team and can spread the overhead over all of our operations. We have centralized all those departments that provide support to the operating companies so that as we grow or acquire an operating company, it becomes a subset, and the infrastructure is already in place.
How can business owners maintain their core values while growing their companies?
That’s a challenge. We try to hire local people from the community to be involved in those operations so they want to be there.
That’s how we compete against some of the larger national and regional companies that tend to move people around. We want people to be from the local area so they can maintain those relationships with the customers in that area.
As your communities grow, so do opportunities to grow your business. It’s just part of our culture to be involved in the community, both on a personal level and a professional level.
We share some of the things that we do as a company in our newsletter. We support some of the organizations in which our employees are involved, whether through donating items, services and personal time or leadership positions.
What advice do you have for other business owners trying to grow their companies?
Be flexible to try new things and look at new opportunities or services. Get out of your comfort zone.
Manage your change, or the change is going to manage you. The only certainty is change, and how do you respond to that?
You have a plan, but you have to be able to adapt. That’s where that flexibility comes in.
HOW TO REACH: Peoples Services, (800) 353-3709 or www.peoplesservices.com
