Long-term outlook

Hold everyone accountable

Shook is quick to admit nobody — including himself — is perfect. But the responsibility of maintaining a culture means keeping yourself and others accountable to it.

“Part of building a culture that’s sustainable and works is you want to make sure that the people from the very top on down are walking their talk,” he says.

Accountability starts with clearly laying out your expectations. The key is to make it digestible by giving employees pieces they can practice anywhere.

“You boil it down into very small parts that are understandable,” Shook says. “Show them the significance of what it means for them: how it solves their real-world problems that they face every day doing whatever job it is that they do.

“You up the ante any time you can say, ‘This is a technique you can use at home to make your life b
et
ter.’ Extend it beyond just the workplace and provide a ‘what’s in it for me’ kind of thing.”

Of the skills that are crucial across positions and industries, perhaps the easiest place to start is communication. Explain skills that employees will need at the company, providing examples of specific situations they might encounter.

Shook offers sample customer satisfaction issues. A resident’s family members visit and get upset that their mother’s socks aren’t organized the right way. They’re not mad at you, and maybe they’re not even mad about the socks. The point is to teach employees to find out what the issue is and be conscious of their response to it.

“When somebody’s angry or accusing you of something, recognize your own place. Human nature is to protect yourself, to deny,” Shook tells them. “Do the opposite of that: Repeat back to them what you heard them say and make sure that you are hearing them clearly. If they are angry, acknowledge that they’re angry and [say,] ‘I want to know what it is you’re upset about so that I can address that.’”

Only after you’ve provided tools and expectations for upholding your culture can you monitor employees.

Shook’s observation starts with an overall look at the department or location, which includes satisfaction surveys and understanding personnel data. In culturally strong areas, staff satisfaction and retention will be high. But a lot of turnover, low survey response rates and workers’ comp injuries or other liabilities should send red flags.

To pinpoint where the problem is, start at the top.

“First, make sure that the leaders are living that culture and modeling it for their associates,” Shook says. “Because if they’re not, then it’s really difficult to expect the people below them to be doing it.”

Shook and one of his senior vice presidents hold staff meetings at each location — minus the supervisors. He asks employees for their needs and wants as well as the company’s strengths and weaknesses. Then he’ll dig into specifics about the leaders, asking for three things they do well and three things they could improve.

You raise the level of employees’ openness by not including leaders in the meeting and by assuring them you won’t disclose who said what.

While their answers will help you evaluate how leaders model the culture, it’s not all about what they say. Pay attention to how quickly they answer and which list of three comes more easily.

“When I ask about a leader where the culture’s not right, I have silence in the room,” he says. “People have a difficult time coming up with anything good. Sometimes they’ll come up with one thing but they can’t come up with three good things, so I see them struggling.”

If the leader seems to be doing everything right, then you can rely on him or her to help evaluate employees.

“You start with [asking,] ‘Are they living the culture?’” Shook says. “And then, ‘Give me examples of how they’re doing that.’”

If you get a lot of complaints around certain people from peers, superiors and customers, their reaction can say a lot. Do they place the blame on colleagues or talk openly about the issue?

Investigate why they’re out of sync with your culture. If they previously modeled it and suddenly slipped off track, maybe there’s another change in their life affecting them, like a death or divorce. Offer to adjust their schedules or set them up with a counselor.

Maybe they were never on track to begin with. Those are the employees who don’t want to fix the issue. Even if they say they do, the real answer is whether their behavior changes or not.

“My responsibility is to give them a work environment where they can succeed, give them leaders to work under where they can succeed and give them the resources needed,” Shook says. “But it’s up to them to take and use those resources and to improve. They have to be responsible to make themselves successful.”

Those who won’t don’t belong. But the process of helping willing employees improve can also help you keep yourself accountable. Each coaching moment is a chance for you to evaluate yourself on the issue so you can give them an opportunity to learn from your experience.

“I go through my own dilemmas I’ve had and the growth I’ve had as a leader throughout the years and let them know that the feelings they’re having are the same everyone else has,” says Shook, whose sharing gives employees paths to improve how they model the culture, therefore improving the company.

“What’d you learn from your failure that you’re going to do differently next time? What’s your responsibility in that failure, and how can you improve yourself?” he asks. “When failures happen, it’s not that you failed that matters; it’s what are you going to do about it that matters.”

How to reach: Silverado Senior Living, (949) 240-7200 or www.silveradosenior.com