A Shared Vision
When lawyers and accountants started becoming licensed to offer financial planning services to clients, Jeffrey Gitterman, founder of financial services company Gitterman & Sacks, knew that his industry was about to become a lot more competitive. A poor economic climate and an 87-percent industry turnover rate for salespeople within the first three years helped Gitterman realize that he was going to need a winning employee retention strategy if his company was going to meet the challenges posed by this new economic reality.
"We decided early on that retention was going to be a critical issue," says Gitterman. "We concluded that in order to achieve our goals of low turnover, the critical element was that employees must have some control over their own destiny. We set out to implement systems that would create a culture of communication and cooperation."
Looking at the industry's high turnover rate for salespeople, Gitterman set out to "create a career so satisfying as to completely reverse those rates." He set goals of 13-percent turnover for salespeople within the first three years, 10 percent voluntary. The result? In the four years the company has been in business, the firm has lost a total of four staff members and only one of those was voluntary.
The secret, says Gitterman, is to continually stay on top of the most common causes for voluntary turnover, chiefly non-competitive compensation, a high-stress work environment and unfavorable working conditions.
Another key to creating a loyal team of employees is to give the entire staff, regardless of position, a stake in the outcome. This kind of empowerment creates an environment of trust and camaraderie. The office staff meets on a regular basis to discuss strategies to manage the office in a more efficient manner. Gitterman offers cash bonuses each quarter for the staff member who comes up with the best idea to increase productivity.
For example, it used to take an average of eight weeks to a client's portfolio over to Gitterman from a competitor, a process that often jeopardized their relationship with their customers. "Our competitor was dragging its feet whenever possible and not cooperating with us to transfer the money efficiently," Gitterman says.
To solve the problem, Gitterman met with the person in his company in charge of the paperwork for these transactions and requested from her a "perfect world" scenario, as in, "money not being an object, what would you need to do this job better." At her suggestion, Gitterman hired an employee whose sole responsibility is to follow up with the competitor and track transferred assets.
"This employee developed a new paperwork-and-tracking system that allowed her to get the rollover process down from two months to five days," Gitterman says. "She took ownership of a challenge and created a solution we never dreamed was possible. We have not lost a client since this process has begun and our planners get paid more quickly on submitted business."
"The staff's future income is tied to the productivity of the office, so they have ownership in our growth and success," says Gitterman.
"We don't procrastinate around here, that's the secret to success," says Gerry Leitrim, who has been a manager at the company for five years. "If someone comes up with a great idea we implement the suggestion ASAP."
Additionally, says Gitterman, the company holds quarterly performance reviews with all team members, which he says have proven invaluable in identifying and eliminating problems affecting employee satisfaction.
Gitterman says that one thing he has learned over the years is that you cannot effectively manage everyone the same way. To help him understand what motivates each employee, and thus be a better manager, Gitterman asks each employee to complete a business plan which includes both short-term and long-term goals. He also asks them to write a personal mission statement and share their vision for the future, both personally and professionally.
"Having this knowledge has helped me become a better strategic coach," Gitterman says. "Foolishly, my expectation was that others would simply work toward helping me achieve my goals because I was paying them. It was not until I began to share my vision with my employees and have them share their visions with me that I effectively got their buy-in. Now, ingrained in our culture is that we are helping each other achieve our visions for the future."
This attention to employee satisfaction has served the firm well. "As an organization we achieved a 35-percent growth rate over the last five years while only increasing our sales force by 10 percent," Gitterman says. "We have made our planners more efficient and more profitable each year."
Company: Gitterman & Sacks, LLC
Web site: www.gittermansacks.org
Industry: Financial Services
Location: Woodbridge, NJ
Employees: 36
Sales: $76-$100 Million
