Ursula Burns has been much in the news lately, it seems. One article on her that particularly caught my eye appeared in Fortune magazine a couple of months ago. The article opened with this:
She got noticed for speaking bluntly in a genteel culture. Yet that’s something she wants to change in the Xerox culture under her tenure. Later in the article, Burns says:
So how do you do that? How help them get comfortable in operating independently when you know this is something they can do? You can’t just tell them to “operate independently.” You have to directly, consistently and frequently recognize and reward employees when they do just that. Call them out specifically – “Jane, thank you for operating independently when you made the decision to do XYZ. You clearly understood our challenges in Project X and took the necessary steps to alleviate those challenges and please the customer extraordinarily. Well done.”
But this isn’t something that Burns or anyone on her team should have to figure out how to do operationally. Just as she explains Xerox takes that burden of detail off of their clients:
Globoforce does the same. Too many companies spend too many hours and too much budget trying to manage disparate recognition programs, some home grown, some outsourced, all around the world. Similar to Xerox, we manage recognition business process for our clients around the world so they can focus on the business. We do this by applying strategic recognition technology and solutions to make recognition fun and easy. We are the only truly global provider to make sure all employees can participate equally and experience the same opportunity for recognition. We give everyone the same access to uniquely personal, culturally appropriate and meaningful rewards. Our clients don’t worry about this. We make it happen for them.