Paving a Path to the Trades for High School Graduates
The last decade has seen significant social and economic ups and downs, but from a business owner’s perspective, one thing seems likely to remain constant: workforce shortages in skilled trades will only continue to grow. This has affected us at Lozier Corporation, a leading manufacturer of products used by retailers and warehouses: store shelves, backroom storage, sortation solutions and checkout and self-checkout systems.
More than a decade ago, we realized that our skilled trades workforce was retiring faster than we could fill those roles. The knowledge gap was only likely to grow, so we decided to work toward diffusing it. Our most successful effort so far has been an initiative designed to engage high school students and introduce them to the opportunities that trade school can provide. Through this work, we have not only helped solve a critical labor shortage, but we’ve also provided young adults with an education at no cost to them, as well as a viable, stable career path.
Lozier is headquartered in Omaha, Nebraska, with facilities across the US. In Omaha, and now in Scottsboro, Alabama, we have created a program that is building us a robust pipeline for developing skilled tradespeople, thereby addressing our workforce needs.
When we first perceived this issue, the average age of our skilled trades employees was between 55 and 58 years old. It was clear that this created a looming retirement cliff. With fewer workers entering the skilled trades field, and demographic data that suggested this would only get worse, we saw that we were on the verge of a critical shortage of trained employees in essential areas like electrical, mechanical maintenance, and tool and die. We had to get out in front of it.
Our options were limited. The first option was to enter an expensive bidding war for existing talent, but this brought with it obvious disadvantages far beyond financial, as that talent was harder and harder to find. We decided we could do better and partnered with the local community college to help develop our own talent, proactively.
Inspired by some others in our industry in the U.S. and especially in Europe, our Chief People Officer and a dedicated community outreach specialist led the charge to develop a training and apprenticeship program aimed at cultivating a new generation of tradespeople from the ground up. A significant advantage was that, by creating our own program, we could tailor it to meet Lozier’s specific needs. The groundwork required to get it started included an enormous amount of community outreach and forging of relationships with local schools and organizations, but in the end, that work, and those relationships, have become the reason it has worked so well. It also confirmed one of the competitive advantages of being an Evergreen® company: people and relationships contribute value that compounds over time.
Lozier’s program, now well-established in Omaha and in Scottsboro, operates on a multi-faceted approach, each aspect of which is designed to benefit both the company and the individual who engages in the process.
A critical piece of the program is the early outreach and recruitment. In an effort to connect with high school students while they are far enough along on their journey to have started to think about life after school, but not so far that they have committed to a specific option, we engage directly with local schools. We visit students at school, we invite students and their families to visit our sites, and we work with Career & Technical Education teachers to identify promising students with an interest in skilled trades. Our focus is to educate the students, the educators, and the parents about the great career opportunities in manufacturing at Lozier. While high school seniors are the primary focus, the outreach efforts often begin earlier, sometimes in even middle school.
Students selected into the Sponsorship for the Trades program receive myriad benefits. Upon graduating high school, selected students work for Lozier and then enroll in the local community college to pursue an associate degree, at no cost to them (books and tools included), while continuing to receive paid, on-the-job experience at the manufacturing company. Upon completion of their education, the student is guaranteed a full-time job with benefits at Lozier.
One of the most innovative and fun aspects of our program are our Signing Day Ceremonies. Each Spring, we host a formal event equating signing to a career in the trades to signing to a college to play sports. These days are designed to celebrate the students and their bright futures, and we involve families, teachers, current and former Sponsorship students, the community and invite the local press. This public recognition helps to elevate the trades as a respectable and desirable career choice.
In order to make the associate degree piece of the program possible, we collaborate closely with local community colleges to provide formalized training at the same time as students are gaining hands-on experience in our plants. The opportunity to earn a degree, all while getting paid, and then start a full-time career without any college debt at all appeals to a great many young people and can be an excellent opportunity to launch into their professional lives and feel quite far ahead of the game.
The impact of this initiative has been significant. Approximately one third of our current skilled trades employees have come through this program, effectively closing the gap of the talent crisis we perceived a decade ago. What began as an effort to merely survive a labor shortage has evolved into a thriving, self-sustaining talent development pipeline and transformed individuals’ lives.
In the time since we have started this program and through its growth, it’s been interesting to watch national trends around post-secondary education. In the U.S., parents and educators used to prioritize four-year college paths over the trades. This contributed in large part to the shortages we saw coming down the line that inspired us to begin this work in the first place. But as college costs continue to soar, the national perception of skilled trades has shifted dramatically. An increasing number of students do not want to start their professional lives saddled with debt, and they are starting to see that they don’t have to; there is another path. Our program, while initially slow to attract applicants, now receives more applications than available spots, making participation increasingly competitive.
Beyond direct workforce development, this initiative has created a ripple effect within the communities we serve. Several former Lozier tradespeople have transitioned into teaching positions at local community colleges and high schools, bringing real-world experience into the classroom, reinforcing the value of trade careers, and further strengthening the relationships that we have forged with the local schools and community colleges.
With our Omaha and Scottsboro programs running successfully, we now have our sights set on expanding the initiative in other locations. However, it’s a big undertaking; such programs require long-term commitment and resources to be effective. For example, Lozier attended and participated in 96 school events in the 2023-24 calendar, along with 34 community events. To support these events and activities, 38 employees volunteered their time. We have learned that in order to be effective and take root in the community, we have to be ready to commit for real and for the long term. We have to take the time to build relationships, set a foundation, serve a small number of people initially, and build a meaningful presence in the community. With time, trust is earned, and success begins to compound.
While the skilled trades labor shortage remains a nationwide challenge, the model we have developed provides us with strategic investment and community engagement. We have been able to both secure our own future workforce and also provide young people with stable, lucrative career opportunities. We are an Evergreen® company whose Purpose is our people. We want our people to become better versions of themselves and to have the opportunity to improve their lives, take care of their families, and give back to their community. This initiative has allowed us to serve our people, and to improve and strengthen our business at the same time.
In closing, I’ll share a few words from one of our newer hires, Sam, who is in Tool & Die. Sam summed it up succinctly, but in some ways, he said it all; "Don't second guess the trades, because we need trades more than ever."
Innovating Through Values-Aligned Partnerships
My father founded the Larkin Company in 2001, after selling the first company he co-founded that administered self-insured disability benefits. The Larkin Company also manages employee benefits, including disability and leave of absence services, and focuses on providing customized, People First solutions for each company’s specific needs. People typically go on leave for reasons that are associated with a huge life event, which means they can be emotional and often difficult situations. We are in this industry because we believe we can help make people’s experiences easier and more positive, by connecting people with the right people and building solutions that matter. This is, we believe, what differentiates our Evergreen® company from most of our competitors.
At the same time as we are driven by a desire to be People First, we are a business, and we must continue to grow and evolve to stay relevant, successful, and Evergreen. For this reason, we are always looking for ways to be innovative and take advantage of opportunities that present themselves, in as smart and creative a way as possible.
The initiative I am going to share with you today grows out of these dual perspectives of the Larkin Company: to take good care of people, and to continue to grow and evolve in our changing market.
As is often the case with the best ideas, this one came to me not because I went looking for it, but because life brought it to my door, in the form of a deeply personal experience. My wife’s father started to decline, and she faced the daunting challenge of navigating healthcare, benefits, and resources for him, a task that proved to be overwhelming and time-consuming. As I watched and helped her navigate this difficult journey, I was struck by how nearly impossible it was to manage these responsibilities while maintaining a full-time job.
From this realization came a broader recognition: many employees, especially those in the “sandwich generation,” are stretched thin, balancing care for both their children and aging parents, not to mention their responsibilities at work. These are often unplanned emergencies, such as a parent’s sudden fall, requiring immediate action and extensive navigation of healthcare and benefits systems. It is rarely possible to manage this and stay productive and focused at work, but there is often no alternative but to do as best as one can. Often, the only choice is to take a leave of absence from work which is when they call The Larkin Company. Seeing the gap in support available to employees, I wondered, could we help make this journey easier? Are there services we could provide, better than what an employer may find through an EAP, that might help the employee and either alleviate the need for a leave of absence entirely or at least reduce the amount of time needed away from work.
Through our personal experience, we had met two women who had just launched an eldercare startup called Ways & Wane. They had done several years of research and had worked hard to lay the foundation for their business. We thought, why not benefit from this hard work, and at the same time, help them get their new business off the ground? We invested in their company, becoming part owners, and set out to bring an eldercare service to life, in partnership with Ways & Wane.
Founded by two sisters, this small company already had a road map for eldercare services navigation, and our investment allowed them to scale and integrate the service into our broader offerings. Rather than building from scratch, the partnership fast-tracked the solution, capitalizing on the startup’s groundwork and building from our shared vision for high-impact, employee-first care. This partnership appealed to us in great part because the founders of Ways & Wane shared our People First orientation. We were a great match.
Like the rest of our services, the eldercare navigation service we developed together places empathy at the core of the solution. Our high-touch model ensures employees have a supportive guide who walks them through every step, from understanding Medicare options to exploring VA benefits for veterans. The service even includes personalized research, like identifying suitable care facilities and ensuring they meet the necessary standards. This matches the level of care we provide for other leave and disability benefits, so it fits right in with our larger profile of offerings.
Feedback from clients has been overwhelmingly positive. In fact, for some of our larger corporate clients, eldercare support has become the top-rated employee benefit within its first year, with participants praising the relief and clarity it provides. Sometimes, employees access eldercare and are able to successfully navigate their situation without taking any leave at all. Many employees have shared that the guidance they received made their process so much easier and more efficient that it prevented them from needing to take extended time off work, which of course benefits both the employees and their employer.
Could we have opted to start our own elder care division, from the ground up? Given that we operate in an adjacent industry, of course we could have. But it would have taken time. The decision to partner with Ways & Wane saved us so much time and money that it was an easy decision to make, particularly given that we are so values-aligned with the co-founders. At this point, Ways & Wane has expanded to cover children as well. So, the solution is evolving into a full family care package. We have a similar collaboration with Navvisa, a startup specializing in cancer care navigation, which grew out of the same strategy: identify critical employee needs and invest in solutions that bring immediate value. Mental health is another area we see opportunities in the near future.
Despite the advantages of the partnership and the relative speed with which we were able to put this initiative into action, it has not been perfect. Our eldercare service has seen slower-than-anticipated adoption—partly due to market conditions and company cost-saving measures. However, the feedback has been so consistently positive that we are optimistic. Given the demographic realities of the country, this is a need that is not likely to abate any time soon, and as it becomes adopted by more companies and normalized, we expect it will continue to grow. Recall that not much more than a decade ago, parental benefits were not mainstream. I was involved in that work at the time, and it took a while for that to get going and for people to see the value of it. But today it’s more or less standard; I think the eldercare piece is following the same trajectory.
From the employer side, it’s a classic win-win. By reducing or even eliminating the need for leave altogether, this service saves companies money on backfilling positions and maintaining productivity. Employees feel supported, and employers see the financial benefits. I can’t imagine that this is going to do anything but continue to grow, especially as people are living longer and longer lives.
To me, this initiative is all about balancing empathy with strategic investment. By listening to the real, often emotional needs of employees and finding agile ways to address them, we are finding more ways we can create meaningful support systems that benefit everyone involved. Taking good care of people isn’t just good ethics—it’s good business.
The Science of Happiness and Social Connection
Dr. Sonja Lyubomirsky is an experimental social psychologist at University of California, Riverside. She has been studying the science of happiness for decades and her work has included consulting on projects like the film Mission: Joy, featuring the Dalai Lama and Bishop Desmond Tutu.
In this Tugboat Institute® talk, Sonja poses the question, “Is it possible to become happier?” and shares the findings from her many years of research in order to answer it. Happily, she found that there are many things we can do. Even better, the most powerful ones align with Evergreen® best practice behaviors.
Watch and be inspired to take steps to increase your own happiness, and to connect with others at the same time.
Discovering Evergreen
As most of you are aware, Dave Whorton and I have written a book about Evergreen® businesses—or rather, more precisely, about Dave’s discovery of the Evergreen way of building and running a company. Until then, the Evergreen companies had been completely unrecognized as a business phenomenon, not to mention a critical component of the American economy.
I had been introduced to Dave by his erstwhile partner Chis Alden, who had approached me about attending the second Tugboat Institute® Summit in 2014. I was the co-founder of the Small Giants Community, based on my book titled Small Giants: Companies That Choose to Be Great Instead of Big. Alden thought some members of the community might be interested in attending the conference. I couldn’t make it, but I was fascinated by the concept, especially given its unlikely origin in Silicon Valley, the last place you’d expect to find any interest in private companies that eschewed venture capital and never intended to be sold. I resolved to find out more and possibly write about it for Inc. magazine, where I was editor-at-large at the time.
Toward that end, I introduced myself to Dave and met him at his office in Palo Alto in mid-December 2014. We chatted about the Evergreen companies in his institute. They sounded a lot like some of those I had met through Inc., including one in particular, SRC Holdings—formerly Springfield Remanufacturing Corp.—of Springfield, Missouri, with whose co-founder and CEO, Jack Stack, I had written two books. During the meeting, I suggested that Dave read the first of those books, The Great Game of Business. A couple of weeks later I was surprised to learn that not only had he read the book right after our interview but he’d arranged to visit Stack in Springfield.
I continued to do research for an article. Among other things, I attended the next Tugboat Institute Summit in Sun Valley, Idaho. I had recently published another book, this one titled Finish Big: How Great Entrepreneurs Exit Their Companies on Top and, at Dave’s invitation, had agreed to give a brief talk about it. The experience at Summit gave me a better sense of the organization he was building and the business leaders he was attracting. I was most struck by their determination to build companies that would last much longer than they themselves would be around to participate. I decided to make the companies’ longevity the focus of my article for Inc.
My editors loved the idea, and I thought they would make it the cover story, but—as the publication date approached—I was told that the magazine had a big “scoop” that it would have to give priority on the cover instead.
The “scoop” turned out to be what my editor described as an “exclusive” interview with Elizabeth Holmes, the founder and CEO of Theranos, manufacturer of a supposedly revolutionary new blood testing system. Sure enough, the October 2015 issue appeared with Elizabeth Holmes on the cover portrayed as “The Next Steve Jobs.” Also mentioned was my story about building companies that would last 100 years or more. Two weeks later, the Wall Street Journal published the first of John Carreyrou’s exposés about Elizabeth Holmes and the Theranos fraud, for which she was ultimately convicted and sent to prison. My article about Tugboat held up considerably better.
Thereafter I continued to follow Dave Whorton and Tugboat Institute, attending Tugboat Institute Summit every year. I was very impressed by the company leaders whom I met there—the lengths that they went to support their people, the role that they played in their communities, their attention to the quality of the products and services they offered their customers. I included several of their companies in the monthly column I was then writing for Forbes.
It occurred to me that many more people would like to hear the story of Tugboat Institute and how a former venture capitalist wound up starting it. I had been writing about business for almost 40 years, and I had never heard or seen any article or business school course about companies that followed the Evergreen 7Ps® principles (Purpose, Perseverance, People First, Private, Profit, Paced Growth, and Pragmatic Innovation) that Dave had identified as the defining characteristics of Evergreen companies. I could see they constituted an important part of the economy that had heretofore completely escaped the notice of the wider business world. When Dave happened to mention that people had suggested he write about the subject, I jumped at the chance to volunteer my services. And that’s how this book came to be written.
We did it with long interviews that I arranged to have transcribed. Then I worked with the transcriptions to produce a draft that Dave would change as he saw fit. What interested me most in working on the book was the opportunity it offered to examine two totally different concepts of business—or actually three, if you consider that Kleiner Perkins exposed him to two ways of building companies with venture capital. All of them can produce significant companies. The approach people prefer depends in large part on their values and goals. Dave Whorton thought that the best businesses would do what Bill Hewlett and David Packard had done with their company, Hewlett Packard—that is, build a community that not only makes great products for customers but fosters better lives for the people who do the work required. Dave Whorton’s experience gave me new insights into how it is done and specifically how the Evergreen companies go about it, which is the subject of the book.
My hope is that readers will appreciate the role of those companies play not only in shaping our economy but in enriching our world. I also hope that readers who start their own businesses will see the Evergreen model as one worth pursuing themselves.
Transforming Compensation Practices as a Foundation for Growth
My wife and I founded Home Science Tools in 1994 when we discovered, through personal experience, how difficult it was for parents homeschooling their children to find good resources for teaching science. We launched Home Science Tools, and it grew steadily; there was indeed a demand for this service! By about 2015, we had grown to a $6 million business with 30 employees, and we were starting to face growth-related challenges. We had ideas about how to grow further, but our structure and team at the time did not seem poised to take it to the next level. We knew something had to change.
There were many reasons we struggled with growth at this stage, but we soon realized that, at the heart of it, was our approach to taking care of our team, and specifically compensation management. We had tried versions of benchmarking salaries, worked toward ensuring fairness, and strived to create clarity for employees about their growth and earnings potential. But ultimately, we realized nothing could change until we embarked on a thoughtful overhaul of our pay structure that could solve internal administrative headaches and also strengthen employee trust and satisfaction. It had to start with a scalable, transparent compensation system.
Like many small businesses, the first thing we realized we had to address was Human Resources. Especially on small teams, HR functions often fall to multiple team members, who juggle many responsibilities. At Home Science Tools, at this stage, we lacked dedicated HR resources, and this was the start of some of our recurring problems. Chief among them was how to benchmark compensation effectively.
Up until this point, in an attempt to attend to this issue, we had participated in benchmarking surveys, but the data often didn’t fit our positions. Further, on some of the surveys, the midpoint for a role would jump or drop significantly from one year to the next. The issue was compounded by the small sample size of local surveys. Data inconsistencies—likely due to the variety of industries represented in our region—created more questions than answers. All of this combined to make us question how accurate, reliable, and applicable the data was.
For employees, this uncertainty sometimes resulted in their feeling undervalued. For managers, whose primary role was not HR to begin with, it was a time-consuming and frustrating process of sifting through conflicting reports.
While the trouble started with benchmarking, it spilled over into adjacent areas as well; we struggled with defining pay ranges for our growing list of roles and determining how to position employees within those ranges. Without a formal compensation philosophy beyond paying slightly above market, decision-making became inconsistent. We had no structure, it was haphazard, and everyone felt it.
Once we had identified this core issue, we had to figure out how to solve it. In 2018 or 2019, I came across Payscale (now called PayFactors), a compensation management tool that has proven to be transformative for us. The platform offers access to a vast database of salary information and uses algorithms to tailor data to specific geographic areas and company sizes. Through Payscale, we were introduced to the concept of salary ranges set at the company level. We could slot positions into these ranges and adjust them annually based on market trends. And thanks to their rich database and sophisticated algorithms, we were able to make compensation decisions with great confidence, as opposed to under our previous method.
Through this work, we created an ascending salary scale with defined grades. At the same time, we developed a comprehensive compensation program document, outlining the philosophy, purpose, and policies guiding our new approach.
Once we had addressed compensation, we were able to tackle many more issues effectively. Recognizing the importance of career growth, especially as an Evergreen®, People First company, we created high-level career paths. While we didn’t draft job descriptions for every hypothetical role, we outlined clear paths for advancement within the company. This provided employees with a clear understanding of their next steps and gave them specific goals toward which they could work.
The result? A system that was easier to administer, more transparent for employees, and adaptable to the company’s growth. Our work succeeded in improving both internal processes and the employee experience. We gained a great deal of confidence in our pay structure, which has allowed us to attract and keep better people. Conversations about performance and raises are now grounded in a structured system, which fosters trust and alignment between leadership and staff. Importantly, our compensation program document is accessible to all employees, further reinforcing transparency.
Since implementing the new system, Home Science Tools has seen significant growth. Revenue doubled from $6 million in 2019 to almost $12 million in 2025. While employee headcount has increased more modestly—to 42 employees—the streamlined processes have allowed the company to scale effectively.
When I look back on this process, and specifically on how our work around compensation has affected our overall success, I see it as one piece of a larger puzzle. While compensation was never the loudest or the most obvious problem, I now realize the extent to which clearly showing employees how much we value them and their growth can, in turn, affect overall performance and company growth. Making room for openness about pay and career opportunities has brought about a key cultural shift. By aligning employee aspirations with company goals, the system supports both retention and engagement.
Looking forward, I know our work is not done. (It never is!) We are approaching 50 employees, and I anticipate that additional HR complexities lie ahead. While we have been able to rely on tools like Payscale for compensation management, eventually, a full-time HR professional will become necessary. For now, the structured compensation program continues to serve as a scalable solution, enabling growth without overburdening the team.
I’d say the overall lesson here is that small businesses looking to grow need to adopt the perspective of seeking and implementing scalable systems early. Our compensation challenges were probably typical of a small but growing company, but through a wider lens, they represent a great example of a system that was not scalable, and then became scalable. If you wait until your growth objectives demand it, you have to wait until the problem is solved to move forward and you can lose time. If you get out in front of it, you will miss fewer opportunities as you grow.
It's also a great example of how you can solve a problem in the period after a certain expertise becomes necessary, but before you have the ability to bring it in house. Whatever challenge you are facing, there is a good chance that a tool like Payscale exists to help you solve it.
Finally, it’s a reminder of the power of valuing your employees and truly putting People First. As we have heard many times, take care of your people, and they will take care of the company. Together, you will be poised to succeed.
Collaborative Landscapes: Shaping Successful Partnerships with Design
How do creativity and productivity thrive simultaneously in a business? The creative and the business mindsets are often very different in their approach to problem solving and innovation, yet in most professions, success in each area is necessary for companies to grow and thrive. So what are the conditions that make space for both?
Paul Seck is a landscape architect and Partner at MVVA, a leading landscape architecture firm nationwide. In this Tugboat Institute® talk, Paul shares how MVVA makes space for both. It starts with a plurality of voices and with a commitment to collaboration.
Watch and learn more about how collaboration is a precondition for creativity and innovation.
EJ+ Launched Last Week at Tugboat Institute Gathering of Teams
Last week, our members and their leadership teams gathered in Nashville, Tennessee for our sixth annual Tugboat Institute® Gathering of Teams. Many aspects of our week echoed the first five Tugboat Institute Gatherings of Teams in structure and format, but there were some exciting innovations as well. This is appropriate, since this is a big year at Tugboat Institute.
In our eleventh year, we are unlocking the second part of our original vision. While continuing our foundational, important work of sharing inspiration, best practices, and wisdom between our members, we are now creating new ways to spread the inspiration and know-how of Evergreen® companies far and wide. An important announcement that we shared at our gathering marked this step forward, about which you will read below.
To kick off the week and set the tone, we welcomed Charles Duhigg, author of the bestselling Supercommunicators and The Power of Habit. Charles introduced us to the why and the how of making deeper interpersonal connections through thoughtful and intentional communication. With the tone of authenticity, vulnerability, and curiosity set, we dove in.
As always, the centerpiece of our experience was our impressive slate of speakers. We were treated to five Tugboat Talks and one panel discussion, all of which offered rich learnings and insights.
Marianne Lewis is Dean and professor at the Carl H. Lindner College of Business at the University of Cincinnati. She is also the co-author of Both/And Thinking, which explores the power of creative tensions. She shared wisdom around how to shift our perspectives on priorities that appear to conflict with one another, such as Profit and Purpose, or Purpose and Pragmatic Innovation, for example.
Tugboat Institute member Ford Mennel gave us insight into the fascinating history of his family’s 140-year-old company, Mennel Milling. He then shared some of the creative ways he has found to grow and innovate in one of the world’s oldest industries – flour milling.
Michael Horn, co-founder of the Christensen Institute and longtime friend of mine and of Tugboat Institute’s, shared a talk grounded in his recent book, Job Moves, in which he explores how and why so many employees are experiencing job dissatisfaction which leads them to make company changes that they later regret. Although the book is aimed at job seekers, his talk offered a perspective into the minds of potential employees and insights into ways companies can attract, hire, develop, and retain talent.
We heard from another Tugboat Institute member and leader of a multi-generational family business, Jayne Millard. Jayne is the fourth-generation leader of her family’s company, Turtle & Hughes, which is a leading electrical and industrial distribution, logistics, and supply chain solutions provider. In addition to sharing the rich history of her family’s company and four generations of leadership, Jayne shared her past experience in the arts and how she was able to meld that passion and experience into her leadership of her firm.
Modern philosopher, Ryan Holiday, author of The Obstacle is the Way and The Daily Stoic, brought forth the wisdom of the ancients, and specifically the Stoics, in his talk. His encouragement to view obstacles not as something to avoid, but as an opportunity to understand and address challenges with creativity and perseverance, resonated with our audience.
Lastly, we enjoyed a panel discussion with Bo Burlingham and me, moderated by Tugboat Institute member Mel Gravely. The topic of the discussion was the book co-authored by us, Another Way: Building Companies That Last…and Last…and Last. This book, which publishes on May 6, 2025, represents perhaps the most important step forward in our push to raise awareness of, and appreciation for, Evergreen companies broadly.
Most of these talks will be available to readers through our Evergreen Journal® in the coming months in both video and audio formats so please keep an eye out for their release. And this bring us to our exciting new initiative, which was launched this past week in Nashville: Evergreen Journal Plus (EJ+).
EJ+ is an upgrade to our Evergreen Journal free subscription and contains our entire library of eleven years of content, which includes over 200 Tugboat talks and 300 Evergreen Journal articles and is growing every week, in a new and vastly improved format. Our library contains a treasure trove of Evergreen wisdom; collected over more than a decade, it includes inspiration, stories, best practices, challenges, and wisdom from Evergreen leaders and thought leaders to help current and future Evergreen company leaders, founders, and owners be more successful. It’s a rich store for anyone interested in learning more about capitalism at its best. Your paid subscription to the EJ+ also includes periodic live events with Evergreen leaders and thought leaders, a curated list of recommended books from me, and much more. As a current EJ subscriber, we invite you to upgrade now to the EJ+ at a discounted price of $99 for the coming year HERE.
By extending the Tugboat Institute experience and know-how to our broader Evergreen community through Another Way and the EJ+, we hope to both elevate Evergreen companies and provide ideas for Evergreen leaders to further improve their companies.
We are grateful and humbled to serve such an incredible community of leaders that make such an important contribution to our communities and society.
Don’t Just Do the Thing Right, Do the Right Thing
Today, at Tech Systems, Inc., we are proud to affirm that when we have a choice to make or a job to do, we do the right thing. Always. No matter what. However, we were not always driven by this commitment. To understand how this has evolved and how we have become the Evergreen® company we are today, we have to go back to 1995.
We are security integrators. In 1995, we were fairly small and, like all security integrators in town, we were continually chasing projects. The low dollar always got the job; we won some and we lost some, just like all of our competitors. When it came to service contracts, after a purchase, we provided a service contract that basically listed all the exceptions to what we agreed to provide. “You pay us X dollars and here are the things this contract does NOT cover. We can do that, but you have to pay us more.” That was standard protocol in our industry at the time. We thought of ourselves as pretty customer service driven in those days, but then something happened that changed us, and set us on a course to become who we are today.
We had been in business for about eight years, and I had become the sole owner of the company. Our largest client called on the Saturday of Labor Day weekend and said, "Hey, all my cameras are out in our parking deck." The service person on call said, "We'll be there the next business day, which is Tuesday, because that's what our contract says." Our client didn’t protest and that was the end of that. I happened to talk to this service person shortly after the call, and he shared the conversation he’d just had with our client. My initial thought was, "Well, that's the way it's structured, that’s the way it's supposed to work."
I was only about a mile from the facility when I spoke to him, so I decided to swing by and see if there was anything I could do. It was still within an hour since the initial call had been placed. I walked in and greeted the guy at the security console, and he said, "Hey, don't worry about it. We got all the cameras up and running." It turned out they had just blown a simple little fuse, and they had been able to diagnose and fix the problem themselves. I thought, what a great resolution.
A couple of weeks later, my contact at the same client called and asked for a meeting. I figured they wanted to talk about a new service or some other new business opportunity. To my complete shock, once we sat down, she announced that they were going to end their relationship with us. They fired us. I was stupefied. We talked it through, and she brought us back to Labor Day weekend. She said, " I know what the contract said, and I know you guys did the thing right, but you didn't do the right thing.”
She explained that they had a bunch of employees, mostly women, working in a call center. They had 34 cameras out in the parking deck, which created a false sense of security. If they went to their cars and somebody was attacked or something, that would be a huge liability for their company. As much as I didn’t like it, I had to admit that she was absolutely right.
Coming out of losing our biggest client, and of realizing what kind of situation we’d put them in, we committed to making a change. We had to do better, and we had to do the right thing, first and always.
It took eight or nine months and more than one iteration. We started by making a list of commitments we were ready to make to all our clients. There were only about 20 of us in the company at the time, so we sat in a room and we brainstormed: we're going to guarantee our response time; we're going to get there within four clock hours around the clock; if we don't do that, we're going to give the client a $250 credit memo, because we're not going to profit on failure. It was an all-inclusive agreement; they pay one price per year, no exceptions. There were lots of other details in there, all aimed at always doing the right thing by our clients.
When we laid this all out and adopted it, we knew it was a financial risk. We were small and not at all sure we could afford this, but we took a leap of faith. Of course, we stubbed our toe several times getting started, but in a very short period of time, it started to become contagious throughout the organization. The team became fanatical about hitting these performance metrics, because frankly, at that time, we couldn't afford to give up $500 of credit. It was all hands on deck
On the other side of this work, we finalized and implemented what we now call F.O.C.U.S – “For Our Client’s Ultimate Satisfaction.” It has made us into an entirely new company. When we implemented F.O.C.U.S, we thought for sure our competitors would copy us and we’d have a new fight for business on our hands. But they haven’t, at all. In fact, ours is an industry where many of our competitors are public, and beholden to their shareholders, and the ones who aren’t are now being rolled up by Private Equity. Neither of those structures have room for an agreement like F.O.C.U.S. We have remained unique in our commitment to complete, consistent, and excellent service.
As a result, we have been able to grow the company an incredible amount, from about 20 employees in 1995 to 515 today. We have clients throughout the US, Canada, and Puerto Rico and 90% of that growth has been purely organic, based on client referrals. Our clients see us as the guys who do a fantastic job understanding who they are and meeting their service needs. It makes all the difference in the world and has become our greatest competitive advantage by a huge margin.
To bring this story full circle, I have one more story to share. About eight years after we were terminated by our client, we had deployed F.O.C.U.S. and it had begun to gain momentum. We hosted a lunch-and-learn presentation in Atlanta where we invited many local security professionals to show them our new products and new technology, but also to talk about F.O.C.U.S. We did a presentation on F.O.C.U.S. and the lady who had terminated us in 1995 was in the audience. After the meeting, she said, "That's incredible. I wish you guys had had that then. We wouldn't have fired you." I replied, "If you hadn't fired me, we wouldn't have it today." They hired us back.
Now at Tech Systems, the spirit of doing the right thing is so deeply ingrained in who we are that it has become the lens through which we make all our decisions, including engaging new clients. If we have a current or prospective client who solely values the lowest price over a long-term service relationship, we will decline their business or even terminate their contract. It’s not common, but it’s an easy decision when it happens. Do the right thing, first and always.
When I look back to 1995, I see clearly that the worst thing that ever happened to us became the best thing that ever happened to us; it allowed us to become the industry-leader we are today. Even though it takes time and can cost more along the way, it pays to not just do the thing right, but to do the right thing.
Eliminate Silos and Improve on All Fronts
Nussbaum Transportation Services is an employee-owned trucking company based in Hudson, Illinois. Founded in 1945 with deep roots in faith and integrity, Nussbaum operated as a family business for many years. In 2018, we transitioned to an Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP), giving each employee a personal financial stake in the company’s success. We’ve grown steadily throughout our nearly 80-year history, but the past 15 years especially have seen significant growth. In 2010, we shifted our focus from short-haul transportation to long-haul, and it was the right decision—but not without growing pains.
For a long time, the entire company worked in one building. Getting to know colleagues or sharing ideas was easy—they were all right there! But as the business grew, we outgrew our building. So, we moved to our new campus in 2012 and added additional office space in 2020. The team is now spread across three buildings—relatively close, and all sharing a common breakroom space—but far from the small, intimate office we knew previously.
As an Evergreen® company, our culture is very important to us. As we entered this new chapter, we still wanted our employees to feel that close-knit connection when they came to work. So, the question became: How do we foster a culture of engagement and communication with a larger group in this new setting? And how do we prevent the building of walls between departments?
These walls (or “silos” as they are commonly referred to) are a serious problem for any business. Less communication can lead to less cooperation, which can stifle innovation, efficiency, and ultimately, the bottom line. One example at Nussbaum was a disconnect between Sales and Billing that resulted in incorrect bills, issuing refunds, and general tension between the two teams. Aiming to address the conflict, we set up weekly touchpoints between the frontline team members to talk through recurring issues and identify solutions. Sales and billing managers also met monthly to share concerns on behalf of their teams, and in the end, the two departments renewed their sense of connection. Ultimately, it reinforced our belief that culture and communication are worthwhile investments.
Many of the solutions we implemented centered around relationships—an essential aspect of culture and beating silos. One classic example is Food Day—a longstanding Nussbaum tradition where employees bring a lunch dish to share and enjoy a meal together. In the “old days,” it happened organically. But in our new office, we established that individual departments would “host” a food day and provide lunch for the entire company. This way, everyone would have the chance to build new relationships, and the host team would get to know one another as they planned and executed the event.
It's been a smashing success—though we realized partway in that department members already spend their days together, so one extra team assignment doesn't really accomplish what we intended. So, we made the simple but effective decision to reorganize. Now, Food Days are hosted by a cross-departmental team with no more than one representative per work group. Everyone still enjoys a community gathering for lunch while the host team forms new connections with coworkers they may not otherwise know.
A second initiative to foster relationships is “The Network Lunch,” hearkening back to the intimate setting of the first Nussbaum office. One of our executives hosts a catered lunch for a small group of employee-owners; anyone may sign up, but no more than two from a department may attend the same lunch. Employee-owners can build relationships with each other and with our leadership team in a more relaxed environment than hosting a Food Day.
That’s great—but what about the “department” that doesn’t work onsite? We’re referring, of course, to the drivers. How do you include them in the broader company? And give them opportunities to build relationships?
One answer is Nussbaum’s Certified RED—a voluntary continuing education and certification program for professional drivers. It helps drivers connect with office staff via hands-on training sessions, mentoring calls, and in-person job shadows. Upon graduation, drivers are publicly recognized at a companywide ceremony, allowing them to see their entire support group! Likewise, the office staff gets to hear the drivers’ stories and learn more about their backgrounds. It’s a win-win! Furthermore, Certified RED training positions the driver to mentor and develop future drivers and create more meaningful connections.
Another small but helpful innovation to improve office-driver connection is Connect Accelerator, a proprietary Nussbaum app. When a driver calls in, the app opens to display their picture on our computer screens. This helps the office staff put names with faces, especially for drivers who rarely come through the terminal.
Our executive team believes that investing in culture is the right choice for our people and the business. We want employees to be on the same team, driven by a shared purpose, and naturally collaborating. Of course, this starts from the top, so our leadership team works hard to model these qualities and make themselves visible to all employees. Our technicians and IT group are two teams in particular that tend to get isolated, so certain executives have intentionally spent time in their spaces, getting to know them and keeping the door of communication open. It makes a difference. Being in front of your people is the first line of defense against silos.
Nothing we’ve done is especially earth-shattering—most of it is simple. The key is a regular, intentional investment. Time, thought, and upkeep are essential. But the dividends—happy, productive employees who drive industry-leading results—is well worth it. As an Evergreen company dedicated to living out our faith, our people will always be the number one priority.
As our founder used to say, “If you take care of your people, the rest will take care of itself.”
The Return on Philanthropy
Tugboat Institute®’s Gary Kunkle spent many years advising companies around sustained growth and then completing a PhD thesis on the true drivers of sustained growth. Through this work, he has built up an impressive store of data and insight. Gary leads Tugboat’s Paced Growth Team Training and our Executive Team Training Series and has helped many Evergreen® leaders and executives understand their own companies better and set the conditions for sustained growth that will last 100 years or more.
In this Tugboat Institute talk, Gary shares a quick insight into why philanthropic efforts, which come naturally to the Purpose-driven Evergreen leader and company, are, in fact, also a wonderful strategy for recruiting, retention, and overall success. Through several examples, he demonstrates that going good is not only good for the community and the world, but good for your bottom line as well.
Watch and be inspired to align your philanthropic efforts with your business’ Purpose - and watch both flourish.
