Follow Your Dreams

Did you see the recent story of the seven-year-old Chloe Bridgewater from the UK who sent a handwritten letter to the "Google Boss"? She said she wanted to work at Google but also in a chocolate factory and "do swimming in the Olympics." She shared that she's good with computers and is "very good in class and good at spelling and reading and my sums." She thanked him for reading her letter and said the only other letter she'd ever sent was to Father Christmas!

Her letter was amazing for a seven-year-old, but that's not the best part of this story!

Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google, answered her letter, saying in part, "I think if you keep working hard and following your dreams, you can accomplish everything you set your mind to do-from working at Google to swimming at the Olympics." He said he looked forward to receiving her application to work at Google when she's finished with school. How wonderful that Mr. Pichai took the time to encourage this child when he told her "follow your dreams."

This story made me think about the importance of encouraging people, including kids, to dream big. I know a lot of people who had big dreams as children and some who still hold on to those dreams. But what happens to most of our childhood dreams? Reality sets in and we make decisions that take us farther and farther from our dreams.

What if we could do better as a society and help our kids, like Chloe, reach their dreams? What if we not only encouraged our kids to dream big but our grown-up employees as well?

If you haven't seen the Oscar-nominated film Hidden Figures, please see it! I'm delighted that schools across the US are taking kids to see it as a field trip. It is the "incredible untold story of Katherine G. Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan, and Mary Jackson – brilliant African-American women working at NASA, who served as the brains of one of the greatest operations in history – the launch of astronaut John Glenn into orbit." The movie brings to life the story told beautifully by Margot Lee Shetterly in her book Hidden Figures. These women certainly followed their dreams and helped change the world, and look what they accomplished without a lot of support from people around them.

Who works for you or who do you know who could use a word of encouragement today to follow their dreams? Maybe there's something you've always wanted to do yourself, so here's a word of encouragement from me to you! Go for it and let us know what happens!

Fortune’s 100 Best Companies to Work For

Each year when the Fortune 100 Best Companies to work for list issue is released, I pour over it to see if something new is revealed.  While I always learn something, what comes through loud and clear is that it isn’t the things these firms do for their employees—it is the organization’s culture that really makes the difference.

You may not know that the primary tool Fortune uses to select and rank organizations is the Great Place to Work’s Trust Index (TI).  The TI is sent to a sample of employees at each nominated company so, as Fortune puts it, “in effect, the workers vote their companies onto the list using criteria related to their workplace cultures.”  It really makes the ranking meaningful to know that the organizations aren’t selected just by what their leadership says—the employees themselves participate and share how they feel about their company.

One of the lessons from this year’s list is that the best employers are focusing more attention on workplace culture as a competitive tool.  And, the great news is that most of the companies on this list are also doing really well in their business segments. 

One thing that amazed me is that 12 companies have made the list every year since it started in 1998.  That is a real achievement.  Since 1998, the 100 best companies are “shining examples of a different way of doing business that puts to rest the old notion that treating employees well might hurt the bottom line. “  These 12 companies prove it is just the opposite!

I worked for Marriott for many years and that organization (on the list again this year as a Great place to Work) follows the advice we all learned from the founder of the company, JW Marriott who said, “take care of our associates and they will take care of the customers.”  It was true when he said it and it certainly is true today.

Each of the companies on the Fortune list this year has leaders who sincerely listen to their employees.  They hear what is important to their work force and then do their best to provide benefits and policies that meet their employee’s needs at this point in time.  Some of these companies have amazing perks for employees but none of them merely add things to their benefits package just to be nice—they do it because it makes good business sense to take good care of the people who take care of your customers!  Fortune quotes the founder and CEO of Ultimate Software, Scott Scherr who says, “The true meaning of a company is how they treat their lowest-paid employees.”  How true!

Of course, many organizations on the list do amazing things for their employees but nothing stands out to me more this year than Google (six years as number one on the list!).  This year they increased their parental-leave benefits—new parents, regardless of gender, can now get up to 12 years of fully paid leave along with $500 of “bonding bucks” to all new parents to use during the first three months of a child’s life.  That is the kind of commitment to employees that really tells the employees how valued they are! 

Consider what you do each and every day for your employees.  Is there something you might do differently to let them know how valued they are?