Culture makes employees brand investors

When you take the time to connect your employees with the purpose behind your goals, they will take your company to the next level. Jane Henry, CEO of Xcution, Inc., talks about how culture and employee engagement changes everything for their clients.

Robin: Hello, and welcome to this edition of Brandonomics, an inside look at top brands and their marketing strategies. I am Robin Tooms, VP of strategy at Savage Brands, and my guest today is Jane Henry, CEO of Xcution, Inc., for a special look at inside branding. So, Jane, welcome to Brandonomics.

Jane: It is a pleasure to be here, Robin. Thank you.

Robin: So, Jane, you have a very interesting proposition. Xcution is about helping companies’ employees connect their actions to the company’s goals and objectives. So tell our audience here, why is that important?

Jane: Well, it’s so important because often we put culture behind initiatives. And when we think about people and connecting the employees to what we want to accomplish up front, what happens is we save a lot of money. We get a bigger bang for our buck. It’s just something that’s worth investing upon in the beginning.

Robin: So this sounds like all companies need to be focusing on this.

Jane: Yes.

Robin: What happens when they don’t?

Jane: Well, when they don’t, what happens is — well, actually, that’s when we get called in. So what happens is issues start to repeat, then recycle. They’re bringing up the same old things over and over again. Ideas don’t get executed, and they don’t meet their goals.

Robin: So that could be a bit of a cautionary tale. Give me some background.

Jane: Okay. So thank you for that. So Xcution was actually established off of my own experience. I was a casualty of Enron. I was part of the mass layoff and was called back later that evening to actually come in and project-manage the divestiture. It was in that moment when I really learned, because I thought I was a smart cookie. Came back in. Called my first meeting. No one showed up. And that’s when the epiphany occurred for me, that it was truly martial law inside the company. People had given up on their values. They had given up on who they were, and they really were struggling with, what do I do now? Almost taking blame for what had happened there.

Robin: So help me relate that because I give core values to branding.

Jane: Yeah. Absolutely. So in that moment what we did is brought everybody to the table and talked about who are they, and what are they trying to accomplish as a group? And what ended up happening is we ended up breaking off 15 systems and creating 750 jobs. So why that’s important to branding and repeat that into every single client we go in to is, if you take that time to have the employees establish for themselves why it’s important for them to be accomplishing these goals and objectives, inevitably, it will turn back in spades.

Robin: Yes, absolutely. So employees as brand investors?

Jane: Yes. Absolutely.

Robin: All right. Well, thank you for sharing that, Jane.

Jane: Thank you.

Robin: This has been another edition of Brandonomics, an inside look at top brands and their marketing strategies.

 

Xcution is a management consulting company that implements strategic change to unleash true velocity behind initiatives. Xcution works directly with mangers supporting strategic initiatives, projects and operations to create high-performing, results-driven and execution-focused teams. https://xcution.com/default.html