Dave Cain: Welcome to unsuitable on Rea Radio, the award-winning financial services and business advisory podcast that challenges your old-school business practices and the traditional business suit culture. Our guests are industry professionals and experts who will challenge you to think beyond the suit and tie, while offering you meaningful, modern solutions to help enhance your company’s growth. I’m your host, Dave Cain.
Regardless of how great you are as a business owner, without a great team in place to maintain the day-to-day responsibilities of the business, you wouldn’t have a business for very long. Take a minute to think about it. Where would you be without your key employees? When was the last time that you showed your appreciation towards them? If you’re struggling to answer that last question, you may have identified a problem that could end up hurting your company in the long run.
Peggy Minnig, a principal in Rea’s Lima office, located in West Central Ohio, believes that when an employee feels appreciated the company will be rewarded with increased productivity, greater employee satisfaction, renewed loyalty, and improved retention of quality employees. Sounds pretty simple to me. Let’s learn a little bit more. Welcome to unsuitable, Peggy.
Peggy Minnig: Thank you for having me.
Dave: This is your first shot at unsuitable.
Peggy: It is. I’m a little nervous.
Dave: You are Guest, probably, 93, 94, 95, somewhere in there. Maybe 96.
Peggy: Okay.
Dave: You’re getting closer to that 100.
Peggy: I wish I was 100.
Dave: A couple things before we get started. We like to just look at your bio and see some things that you’re good at. Obviously you’re very famous in your market for client service and client strategies, and we certainly appreciate that on behalf of the firm. Well done.
Peggy: Thank you.
Dave: We also like to take a little bit of a look at the personal side. Some of the things you listed on your bio, you like to hang out with family, which is always a cool thing. A Rea employee is encouraged to do that. You also like to attend concerts.
Peggy: I do. I’ve got a couple coming up.
Dave: What’s coming up?
Peggy: I’ve got Bruno Mars and Kid Rock and Little River Band.
Dave: That’s a little bit of everything there.
Peggy: I’m a music lover.
Dave: What’s your all-time favorite concert?
Peggy: Maybe James Taylor.
Dave: James Taylor. Okay. All right. You’re all over. You’re good.
Peggy: All over the place.
Dave: Good. The other thing I noticed is that one of your things is we might find you throwing dice at the craps table. Is that a hobby of yours?
Peggy: That is. That is.
Dave: Now, it says “throwing dice.” It doesn’t mean winning.
Peggy: I can win. I can win, too.
Dave: You’ve got the hot table.
Peggy: As long as I keep them on the table.
Dave: Can you get a hot table going?
Peggy: I can get a hot table going.
Dave: Good. Big red, huh?
Peggy: Big red.
Dave: There you go. Today we’re going to talk about employee appreciation, and such a very integral part of every business and course. Let’s start with the discussion. You’re not an HR expert by any means.
Peggy: No. I am not.
Dave: You’re a CPA providing client service and mentoring to a lot of employees. This is not an HR module by any means. A little disclaimer: I’m not in HR either, so we’ll disclaim that left and right. Talk to me, in your experience, about this employee appreciation. We all get very busy, no matter what industry we’re in.
Peggy: We do. But it’s important to remember that appreciation, it’s a fundamental human need. Everybody wants to feel appreciated. Nobody wants to go to work and be ignored. Who would want to go to a workplace and be ignored all day? You need to give feedback, reward people for doing a job well done. It’s just a very important thing for employee satisfaction.
Dave: Have you been in a client situation where you have witnessed or seen firsthand where the appreciation is not being recognized?
Peggy: I have. Generally, those valued employees don’t tend to stay. Everybody wants to feel that their work is valued and important.
Dave: Kind of, I guess, an unofficial question, but would you correlate lack of appreciation of employees and employee turnover with bottom line and company growth and company culture?
Peggy: Of course I would. People are generally more productive when they’re being recognized and feel that their work is valued. I think people have higher loyalty. It boosts morale in the company. There’s just a lot of benefits to it.
Dave: What are some things that you have done personally in your career to reward employees? Can you share? Can you think of a few examples and share with us?
Peggy: We do some spot bonuses, where if we see people maybe complete a special project or do something out of the ordinary, we’ll give them a gift card or something right on the spot as soon as it happens. Verbal praise constantly. We don’t want to go overboard, but if somebody does a nice project or a nice … we want to tell them that right away. We want to encourage that behavior to continue. We also have done Years of Service Awards, Employee Appreciation Days, where we take the firm out. We’ve done the golf, taught golf. We’ve taken employees for that. It’s all part of valuing your employees.
Dave: I’ve been out on an employee appreciation outing with you. It is kind of fun.
Peggy: It is a good time. It’s a good time.
Dave: It was. That was pretty good.
Peggy: Did you feel appreciated?
Dave: I did.
Peggy: Good.
Dave: I did.
Peggy: Good.
Dave: Thank you very much for organizing that.
Peggy: You’re welcome.
Dave: That’s a good example. It’s just not, like you mentioned, it’s just not money that’s the factor that drives. It’s the recognition in front of your peers.
Peggy: It’s important, too, to know that it’s not always at the manager level or the owner level. Peer-to-peer recognition is also very valuable for employee morale. It improves the workplace culture. There’s lots of benefits. It creates a more positive workplace.
Dave: When you see an opportunity to praise someone, I think you mentioned earlier you try to do it immediately, or close to the event. Can you talk about that?
Peggy: Right as soon as something happens, it has the most potential to make an impact. If you wait three months, four months, it’s past. It’s not in that employee’s mind anymore. What you’re trying to do is reinforce that same behavior.
Dave: Try to replicate it. You mentioned, too, you have to be sincere. A lot of times, please and thank-yous, those go a long way. But sometimes it’s just that’s automatic and it’s not sincere.
Peggy: Employees can tell. I can tell if somebody’s not sincere when they give me a compliment. Employees and staff, they can tell too.
Dave: It’s April 12th. You’ve got that April 15th deadline, rushing to your desk, and I come by your office and say “hi,” and you don’t acknowledge. That can be a challenge, can’t it?
Peggy: It can be a challenge at times. That’s why I say the peer-to-peer is just as effective, because sometimes as managers, as principals, we all get busy, especially at certain times of the year. Just that feedback even from your peers is very effective.
Dave: Let’s switch directions just a bit. Is praising via e-mail good, bad, or indifferent, in your opinion?
Peggy: In my opinion, it’s good, but it might not be as effective. If it’s done publicly or at a meeting or something like that, it can be more effective than just an e-mail.
Dave: You would advise maybe stay away from that?
Peggy: I wouldn’t say stay away from it, but be sure … Maybe bring it up at your next staff meeting, or something, so that everybody hears so-and-so did a great job on this. I wouldn’t discourage somebody from sending an e-mail like that, but I would also make an effort to make it public too.
Dave: Are we really talking about the culture of an organization that adopts employee appreciation? Is that what this is … It’s employee appreciation, but is that really part of a company’s culture?
Peggy: It’s a very important part of a company’s culture. It creates a more positive workplace. Employees are happier. Productivity, retention of quality employees, it all goes hand in hand.
Dave: Good. It has to be continuous. We also talked about benefits of employee appreciation. You touched a little bit on a few things early on, but let’s talk about benefits of employee appreciation.
Peggy: There’s increased employee productivity, greater employee satisfaction, just a general enjoyment of their work. Like I said, nobody wants to come to work every day and get ignored. Nobody flourishes in that environment. Higher loyalty to the company. It can boost morale. Your retention of employees increases. There’s all types of benefits.
Dave: We all get very busy in what we do, no matter what industry, whether it’s accounting, whether it’s an architect firm, contractor, manufacturer. We just get extremely busy, and sometimes you just, you forget. Do you have any tips to help me remember to do this on a regular basis? It’s the whirlwind that gets you, and sometimes you need to praise at a very important time and you just forget to do it, you miss an opportunity.
Peggy: I don’t know. My biggest tip would be to repeat it at staff meetings or principal meetings, just to remind people. Put that reminder in people’s heads so that they tend not to forget. If you’re always bringing it up, it might be on the tip of your brain, I guess.
Dave: Let’s switch this around a bit. You’re a partner with a top 100 CPA firm, and it seems like … I’ve been around you enough. You’re always praising your team. What about you as an individual? What about the praise going upward? How do you deal with that? You want the praise from your co-workers. Are you seeing that on the increase? Not just you, but in general across …
Peggy: I think in my position it’s more peer-to-peer.
Dave: Peer-to-peer.
Peggy: Than it is upward.
Dave: Is there a fear when you get into this upward appreciation that somebody might be accused of sucking up or trying to get a preferred position? Is that maybe a fear?
Peggy: It’s not a fear for me. You can tell what’s genuine and what’s not. That personally is not a fear for me.
Dave: When’s the last time you threw dice?
Peggy: A couple of weeks ago.
Dave: Good outcome? Bad outcome?
Peggy: I broke even. I’ll say that.
Dave: You broke even. While we’re on the air, and you’re in the tax area, I need a tax tip. Are gambling losses deductible on a tax return?
Peggy: They are to the extent of your gambling winnings. Yes.
Dave: What’s that mean?
Peggy: That means that your gambling winnings would be reported as other income on your Page 1. Then, if you itemize, you get your gambling losses to the extent of your winnings. If you win $10,000, you can deduct $10,000 of losses. Now, they have to be substantiated, so a win-loss statement or something from the casino is helpful.
Dave: See, and here’s a tax … We were talking about employee appreciation and went into tax strategies.
Peggy: We did.
Dave: Are you good at craps?
Peggy: I can be.
Dave: Can be.
Peggy: Uh huh (affirmative).
Dave: Okay. All right. Our listening audience, if they need a tip, they can call you.
Peggy: They can give me a call.
Dave: Get some tax advice.
Peggy: Give me a call.
Dave: And a little bit of gambling advice. This employee appreciation, let’s talk about some specific examples. I think every time, every now and then, you just get … It’s the same thing over and over again. You need to refresh and come up with some new ideas. You had mentioned the Rea team took a bus trip to do a virtual golf outing, or whatever that was involved. But what are some other things that you’ve done in your career or would like to do if you had a dream list?
Peggy: A lot of times over the summer we hold cookouts once a month, or something. Maybe on a Friday afternoon we might hold a cookout for everybody and have a corn hole tournament. Something like that, just so people can have a good time, enjoy each other, know that they’re appreciated. That’s something simple. It doesn’t have to always be a high monetary amount. It can be as simple as a cookout or ice cream. Sometimes in the summer it’s like, “Okay, we’re going on an ice cream run.”
Dave: “Who wants it?” Sometimes the simpler is the neatest thing. What about sending a note or a thank-you note to the employee’s spouse? Does that work?
Peggy: That’s also very helpful. That’s a good tip for me. I have not done that.
Dave: Do I need to send a note home?
Peggy: You should.
Dave: Okay.
Peggy: You should.
Dave: We’ll get that out here after the podcast. By the way, you’re doing a wonderful job on the podcast.
Peggy: Thank you.
Dave: Does that qualify as appreciation?
Peggy: That is. Thank you.
Dave: That was sincere.
Peggy: Yes, and it was on the spot.
Dave: It was on the spot.
Peggy: Very good.
Dave: Good. Do you ever run into any negative responses from an employee from feeling overly appreciated? That’s kind of an odd question, but …
Peggy: I have not, but that doesn’t mean amongst themselves that they don’t make comments. I don’t know that a person could feel over-appreciated.
Dave: Maybe they don’t feel it’s sincere. Maybe that’s more the question.
Peggy: That’s true. That’s true.
Dave: What is next? What do you have? When you start talking about events and employee appreciation, how far out do you … You’ve got to get it on the calendar. Do you plan those out in advance? Do you actually sit down and do some things?
Peggy: I do. I plan those for our Lima office and now some for our Dublin for our region. I think our next one coming, our next major one is our Kickoff to Tax Season party, which will take place in early January.
Dave: What are we doing then?
Peggy: It’s in the planning stages.
Dave: It’s in the planning stages. You’re taking ideas.
Peggy: Taking suggestions.
Dave: I understand that you get up very early in the morning to do CrossFit classes and training. You’re big in athletic training and dietary. Is there anything you can do in that area with employees to encourage those type of events, or is that a little bit tricky?
Peggy: A few years ago, we used to pay for all the employees if they wanted to participate in a local 5K. It was a run/walk event. We used to encourage that, that we would pay the entry fee. We’ve done those kind of things. I know here, at Rea and Associates, they always have a lose weight goal with a monetary prize to encourage people to lose weight or quit smoking or something, something to better their health.
Dave: To help them out. Good. Have you seen in other organizations where that does work?
Peggy: I think so. I think so.
Dave: We talked money. We talked events. What about titles with employees? Is that a big …
Peggy: It’s a big motivator for some employees. For others, maybe not so much. I’m one of the others. That doesn’t do much for me. But, for some people, it’s a title.
Dave: The title. I’m going to have to challenge that, because at the last golf outing you wanted to be team captain, and you insisted in team captain, and that was a title. Maybe we caught you on one of those untruths, or whatever. Is that where we’re at with this?
Peggy: Golfing is a whole nother aspect. That’s a whole nother ballgame.
Dave: I played golf with you a few times, and I know that for you it’s all about the outfit that you gotta wear to play golf.
Peggy: It is. That’s true. That’s true.
Dave: Did I compliment you on the outfit?
Peggy: I ended up being sick, so I could not wear the outfit.
Dave: But the year before.
Peggy: The year before, yes.
Dave: Did I compliment?
Peggy: You probably did. Yes.
Dave: There, we touched on something. There’s a male complimenting a female on appearances.
Peggy: On her golf attire.
Dave: On a golf attire. Yes? No? Thumbs up? Thumbs down? Stay away from? Watch how you say it?
Peggy: I’m okay with it. It’s fine.
Dave: That’s fine?
Peggy: It’s fine for me.
Dave: Okay. As we wind up, we just have a few minutes left, but let’s just wrap up a little bit. If you could give me maybe top two or three things that you would recommend to our listeners that what they could do that would be easy to do and just very effective. We’re talking about effective.
Peggy: Okay. The first thing I would do is encourage people, when you see the opportunity to praise somebody, do it. Do it immediately. It’s going to have the most potential for impact. That employee is going to confirm that their work is valued. It’s very important to do it as close to the event as what is possible. That’s one thing.
Dave: Again, as a business strategy individual, I think we can all point to this, and we get away from this a little bit, the cost of employee turnover. We’ve seen statistics and talked about that on the show, that it could cost between five and 10K, if not more, if you have constant employee turnover, per employee. The employee appreciation and the building of culture is critical to the bottom line. You mentioned earlier, it does impact bottom line. It has to.
Peggy: It does impact bottom line. It’s very expensive for all the training and things for if you’re turning over employees constantly.
Dave: Got an extra ticket for that Bruno Mars show?
Peggy: No I don’t. No I don’t.
Dave: Our guest today has been Peggy Minnig from our Lima office in West Central Ohio. Peggy is a partner with the firm. Thanks again for joining us on Unsuitable today. Very insightful.
Peggy: Thank you for having me.
Dave: Listeners, what are you doing to show appreciation for your employees? Share your experience and tips with us. We’d love to hear from you. You can contact us on Twitter at #ReaRadio. You can also e-mail us at podcast@reacpa.com. We’ve also included some great insight and information on our website at reacpa.com. Don’t forget to subscribe to unsuitable on Rea Radio on iTunes. Until next time, I’m Dave Cain, encouraging you to loosen up your tie and think outside the box.