What Makes a Good Employee?

I was one of the speakers at the North Carolina PRSA seminar a couple weeks ago.  I talked about building an authentic workplace.  It was a great session and I enjoyed pulling the information together to present.

Following me on the agenda was Tom Hoog.  Tom’s kind of a big deal.  He’s had a much-storied career in the public relations industry and after retiring as CEO of Hill & Knowlton, they saw fit to bring him back in a vice chairman role, heading up the organization’s H+K University.  He was presenting on recognizing your most important business asset – your employees.

I’ve got to admit – I was a bit nervous thinking he and I were on the agenda talking about such similar topics.  But I had nothing to worry about, Tom took what I had said and built on it with some additional nuggets of information.

• When hiring an employee I look for three things – a funny bone, a back bone and a wish bone. I want my team to have a sense of humor, to stand up for what they believe in and to have a desire to grow and be successful.
• Mentoring is the only thing that you can give away and still own. So give it away.
• I think it is impossible to make a mistake before the age of 30. The early years of your career are for experiencing new things, growing and with the right people behind you, those “mistakes” become incredible learning opportunities.
• We all have the ability to be a leader. And when we recognize our role in the leadership process, we start to see success.
• Effective client service doesn’t happen without the creative minds that drive high-quality, results-oriented campaigns and client experiences. Motivate ALL members of your team to want to achieve those results.