Episode 112 - Lori Kaiser | Just Ask Your People: Practical Ideas to Grow Your People, Engagement and Business

Are you looking for strategies to grow your business and your people? Are you committed to being a leader and organization focused on putting your people first? Do you want tools to achieve your business goals by putting your people first?

Our special guest Lori Kaiser answers these and other questions about people first leadership, culture and business growth.

Lori Kaiser is the Founder and CEO of Kaiser Consulting, which she founded in 1992. Lori is a chief executive, corporate leader, and business strategist with a proven track record in assessing risk and creating solutions for Fortune 500 Company C-Level Executives and Boards. Kaiser Consulting is an international professional services firm specializing in accounting, finance and IT consulting with 80 finance and accounting professionals.

Most important, Lori and Kaiser Consulting have grown the business on the simple premise of putting their people first.

In fact, Lori and Kaiser Consulting have built and grown a business based upon what you may think a crazy approach – ask your people what kind of career and practice they want and then deliver it. In 2015, 2016, 2018, 2019 and 2020 Kaiser Consulting was named a Columbus “Best Places to Work”.

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Show Notes

Episode highlights…

Building, growing and running a business based upon your people’s optimal schedule
The death of the 40-hour work week and the benefits of having flexible schedules for your people
You can run a people first business and still deliver high value to all clients (including large corporations)
Building and nurturing an attraction model for building your team
The importance of cultural fit with your team members
Creating and using a success factor grid for your business and team
Interview questions to help you assess cultural and success factor fit
The importance of training and developing your people
The value of providing a training and development allowance for your people (in addition to in house training)
The challenge in offering flexible schedules is worth the returns
Get clear on the skills that are needed for your people to advance their career (and support them in growing those skills)
Using internal processes to continually evaluate your people’s time and schedules (avoiding overwork)
Keys for growing and advancing your people based upon the skills needed for the next level (not just their current level)
Every person is different which requires enhanced listening skills to understand each person
The clearer you are about what kind of people you want, the clearer it will be who’s not a good fit
When you put your people first, they will serve your clients well
Be willing to fire clients that don’t treat your people well
Be willing to say no to potential clients that don’t fit your people first model
It’s essential to understand and use your key performance indicators
Ask your people and make it safe for them to tell the truth and even say “no”