John Hartman CEO

CEOtoCEO participant awarded National SBA Young Entrepreneur of the Year

2010-06-21T17:22:00.001-07:00

I recognized that confident smile immediately. It was CEOtoCEO Breakfast participant Dan Price, Co-founder of Gravity Payments. Dan was recerntly recognized as the National SBA Young Entrepreneur of the Year. Dan's company works as an intermediary between merchants and credicard companies, has 50 employees and more than 5,000 customers.

I asked Dan to share his experience with the rest of us. Congratulations and thanks for your thoughts Dan

"It was awesome," said Price of his meeting with Obama. "It was the coolest thing I've ever done."

I am just very proud to be a part of the Gravity team. Even though it is technically an individual award, it was clearly presented because of the accomplishments we have made supporting small businesses as a team. I was afforded 45 minutes in the Rose Garden with President Obama, two Governors, and members of congress. I found everyone engaging, open to my ideas, and appreciative of our work. The President emphasized that he sees small business leading out of the recession and recognized that 2 out of 3 new jobs created come from entrepreneurs like me.

In the meantime, not a lot changes…we still need to focus on providing merchant processing at half the cost of competitors, keep our focus on transparency and honesty, and continue to provide world class customer service. It was a great award, but full steam ahead…we haven’t quite arrived yet!

Congratulations Dan. Look forward to seeing you at the CEOtoCEO.

Corporate Citizenship: From the inside out

2010-06-01T16:48:00.000-07:00

As business leaders we are approached by a number of community organizations to help support their cause. Most provide worthwhile services that benefit the communities we do business and the needs have escalated over the past few years. The “asks” are made from members of numerous charitable organizations, our employees, clients and trade partners.

You can’t say yes to everybody and it doesn’t feel good to say no to anybody. Scott Harrison, CEO of Barclay Dean Environments shared his company’s corporate citizenship strategy at the May CEOtoCEO Breakfast Rather than reacting to every request made for assistance Barclay Dean uses proactive approach by incorporating corporate citizenship into the company's strategic thinking and planning. The company corporate citizenship focus is children, health and education.

The results of Barclay Deans approach speak for themselves. The company has been selected as the 2009 Corporate Citizenship of the Year Award for consistently supporting over 20 non-profit organizations each year. In addition being actively involved in corporate citizenship allows Barclay Dean to build valuable relationships with other businesses in the community.

CEOtoCEO provides helpful advice from peer leaders

2010-04-05T11:33:00.001-07:00

Jeanne Wintz of Gilmore Research Group is a regular at the CEOtoCEO BreakfastCEOtoCEO Breakfast in large part because of the valued input she gives and receives from other participating business leaders.

A few months back Jeanne arrived at a with a heavy heart and looking for advise and support from other business leaders. After a rigorous budgeting process evaluating the impact of the economic turndown, the decision was just made to layoff a number of employees throughout the organization. The decision had been made carefully and seemed to be the best move to make for the long-term viability of the company, but it wasn’t a comfortable choice for a company with a 60-year history and a strong reputation for loyalty to its workforce.

As with other business leaders she was concerned about how the layoffs were going to impact productivity and morale of the surviving staff. Sharing her situation with other leaders seated at her table she received great advice from these empathetic and experienced colleagues on how to go about implementing the layoffs and keeping remaining employees engaged. In a meeting with Jeanne last week she commented that the input she received at the breakfast enabled her to carry out the plan with confidence and be more effective while leading the organization through this difficult time.

To help solve your problems with solutions from other leadership peers plan to participate at one of our CEOtoCEO Breakfasts soon.

Improving Employee Engagement and Productivity Using Social Media

2010-04-05T11:26:00.001-07:00

An old-timer once told me that there is only one way to kill a rumor….make it a fact. Easier said than done in this period of uncertainty and anxiety in today's workplace. As leaders we have all know that harmful rumors become "facts" if we do not communicate with employees on a regular basis to keep them engaged and productive.

At the March CEOtoCEO Breakfast speaker Richard Law, CEO of Allysis, shared the following examples of how he keeps employees informed and involved in whats going on in the company using social media tools.

“You Ask, We Answer” Forum Hosted on Intranet
• Anonymous Post Option
• 24 Hour Turn Around Commitment
• Ask Anything … Management Has to Answer
• Deeper Understanding of Company Direction
• Shared Decision Making
• Two Way Conversation

Kudos Program
• Clients & Employees Encouraged to Call Out Exceptional Performance
• All Kudos Posted Monthly; Top 3 Get Awards Quarterly.

Employee Blogs
• All Topics Allowed
• Encourage Sharing of Knowledge
• Quick Insight into Departments, Leadership, Employee Development Opportunities

Benefits of being a 'Best Company to Work For'

2010-04-05T09:41:00.001-07:00

Eric Overton, President and CEO of Sparling Electrical Engineers, the largest specialty electrical engineering firm in the country headquartered in Seattle. I asked Eric what does Sparling do to be selected and recognized as being a 'Best Company to Work For', and what benefits does his organization realize from this effort? Read on for Eric's response.

Sparling being rated as a best company to work for is a recruiting edge as potential recruits want to work at companies that are progressive, have happy employees, opportunities and so on. I think it demonstrates that a company is progressive and cares about its people.

I believe my employees find Sparling a great workplace for many reasons. We offer a great environment that supports collaboration, team work, progressive office space design, the firm’s graphic image and brand is all over the offices, we utilize technology a lot as a part of our culture. We offer very competitive benefits and compensation, based on performance based incentives and we are delivering. We aspire to be a fun place to work, a very strong culture of open communications, risk taking is celebrating when the focus is on innovation or client satisfaction.

As CEO I preach honest, open and transparent communications. We publish our KPI's monthly in a dashboard environment so everyone can see firm performance, right down to each design studio and practice area of the firm, and we talk about it regularly. We do a lot of the same things other companies do, hold quarterly company update meetings and serve food and drinks, we engage in outside activities and encourage our staff to get involved. We have a very strong Corporate Social Responsibility program and actually pay every employee an extra day of leave when they go volunteer at a charity. We make our CSR program a big deal because I realize that people really desire to give back, not just monetarily but with their time. Our younger staff don't always have the money but they have the desire to contribute and have the time to give, the young Gen Y's want to change the world, money isn't as important in many ways.

In the end, we do what we say. We are a business centered practice and we return firm profits to our staff in the form of performance bonuses, leadership bonuses for our shareholders (when we do really well) pay a dividend to our shareholders and fund our 401K, annually. We have done this for 25+ years and I am committed to this as part of our commitment to our staff. We watch our business very closely.

Sometimes I think it isn't that difficult, but it is hard work. One of the very unique benefits of our culture and being a Best Company is that it attracts great talent, Sparling is considered one of the premier engineering and consulting firms to work for on the West Coast, and we attract talent from all across the US and even abroad. I guess it works.

My "Journey" continues...

2010-02-23T11:34:00.000-08:00

As many of you know by now, I have thrown myself into the "social media fray" and have become fully engaged in learning, understanding and using this revolutionary new media. It has been an eye-opener to say the least.

When I first met Blaine Millet and Clay Loges, my consultants and coaches, I realized the world was changing for me and for every business out there. If you haven't been to one of their presentations, I would highly recommend it. You can get more information out about them and what they do at WOM¹⁰ . They will open your eyes to an entirely new way of thinking about your business.

What I am realizing as I get more and more involved is this is a huge "mind shift" for me to make - away from "promotion" and more toward "sharing useful information in real-time". Everyone wants something of value and fast - exactly what social media offers. Because of this, one change you will see me making is away from the larger, more formal Breakfast "e-mail newsletter" to shorter, summarized e-mails you can read in less than 30 seconds and decide if you want to know more. If you do, there will be links to a brief story. This will "help" my audience get more without having to sift through information that might not be as relevant to them right now.

Let me know what you think when I send some of these out to you over the next several weeks. The beauty of social media is I can react to your comments and make changes immediately - how cool is that!

Social Media - Inside and Outside

2010-02-23T10:33:00.000-08:00

We all know Social Media is one of, if not the hottest topics of conversation today. So what? Why should we, as business owners and leaders, care? Great questions and EXACTLY what we are lively presentations and discussion are going to be in the next CEOtoCEO Breakfast Series.

As a business owner, there are some questions you might want to be asking yourself in regard to social media. How is this going to help me increase sales? How is it going to bring in more of the "right" customers instead of wasting our time with the "wrong" customers. How is it going to replace my expensive traditional media I have used for years - even though the results are going down? How can I use it to increase employee loyalty? How can I use it to create a better "teamwork" environment inside my company? How can I use it to attract the "right" employees? These are just a few of the questions that are being asked and will be answered in March.

If you have thought about social media at all for your business - whether it is thinking "outside" the organization to increase your sales and build more business or whether it is thinking "inside" the organization on how we can use it to improve internal communications and teamwork, we will have some great discussions about BOTH these topics. Blaine Millet and Clay Loges of WOM¹⁰ will talk about how this will "change your business" in regard to sales and Richard Law of Allyis will talk about "changing your business" on the inside.

Increased employee engagement a key to improved team performance

2010-02-09T10:16:00.001-08:00

One of the keys to the improved performance of the Mariners that Jack shared is the focus on building a roster of engaged team members. Engaged employees are those that exert discretionary effort, are enthusiastic about their jobs, and their intend to stay with the organization.

An increasing number of business leaders that I work with are taking note of employee engagement because of the growing evidence that an engaged workforce shapes more traditional business outcomes like retention, client satisfaction, sales, costs, and profit.

In a three year study involving the winners of Best Companies To Work For initiatives across the United States, we assessed the impact of high engagement on business success. Among winning companies:

• 87% reported increases in sales

• 86% reported an increased market share

• 57% reported improving employee turnover

• 90% reported higher stock prices (among publicly traded companies)

Leaders of some of the Best Companies to Work For in Washington shared ideas on how they improve their team’s performance at our recent CEOtoCEO Breakfast. Best Workplace CEOs participating at the breakfast include Mike Mayes of Mayes Testing, Tim Gibbons of Pharmacy One Source, Jeff Lyon of GVA Kidder Matthews, Eric Overton of Sparling, Brian Paulen of the Madrona Solutions Group and Richard Law of Allysis.

I welcome your thoughts and questions on employee engagement.

Business Tools??? - Executive View of Social Media"

2010-02-08T11:08:00.001-08:00

Social Media is on just about everyone’s mind these days. It has been on mine for a while and I've been busy pioneering and learning the art of social media with my own blog. In fact, it just happens to be the topic for our March meeting.

Last year I had the privilege and opportunity to get my first real meaningful introduction to Social Media at a seminar led by Blaine and Clay of WOM10. It was an exciting and very revealing 2 hours for me. I decided it was a new direction that this old dog should take. So I committed myself to learning some new tricks for both me and the CEOtoCEO Breakfast Series. In the past four months I've already learned how game changing social media can be – and I'm slowly becoming a master of the new "social media speak".

Enough about me - here's the GOOD NEWS FOR YOU! Blaine and Clay have compiled an executive introduction to social media in an e-Book called, “Business Tools??? - Executive View of Social Media”. It's a great executive overview of the driving force behind this new form of marketing and communications. The book is short, to-the-point, and practical. It offers a business view of social media.

Because of my relationship with them, I've arranged for a limited number of copies to be given to our CEOtoCEO group for FREE. If you are one of the lucky few who can act quickly, you too can get your own copy of their powerful e-book, courtesy of CEOtoCEO. Just CLICK HERE and you will be on a page where you can simply enter your name and e-mail address and it’s yours! Doesn’t get any easier than that. I hope you will take advantage of their generous offer and get your own copy today.

Strategic Map is a great tool for teaching leadership

2010-02-02T16:00:00.000-08:00

I had the privilege of getting to meet and talk with Randy Gardner, CEO of Red Dot Corporation a while back and he shared with me a great story. He attended one of our CEOtoCEO Breakfast meetings and saw David Katri from Clark Nuber present their Strategic Map. He really grabbed onto that idea and felt he could use a tool like this in his own company. Below is a recent letter he sent me that I wanted to share with you because it is applicable to just about every CEO and business. Thanks Randy...

Over the past several years Red Dot had identified its Core Values, and established its Mission and Vision Statements; which have been placed on placards throughout the business. Red Dot has also gone to great lengths to communicate these strategic company choices, but as they stand alone, it isn’t entirely clear to the average employee or often managers how they fit into an over company strategy (the big picture).

When I saw the Strategic Map developed by Clark Nuber at the CEOtoCEO Breakfast, I immediately thought it might be a tool to help me communicate the place that Mission, Vision and Values have in Red Dot’s “bigger strategic plan or thinking.” I found it relatively easy to put our thoughts in to Clark Number’s Strategic Map structure, and our Graphic Design Manager worked his magic with regard to the final visual.

In the end, It helped me more easily put the pieces of our strategic thinking in to a succinct, easy to understand graphic that I could use to explain the associations, intent, and roles of Red Dot’s Strategic choices. Even then, strategic thinking is a very conceptual domain, and isn’t grasped by everyone who sees it. However, it is a great teaching tool for Red Dot’s leadership, and a solid reference for up and coming management prospects who will need to do this type of conceptual planning as they progress.

I hope this helps!

Randy Gardiner
President & CEO

RED DOT CORPORTATION
direct line (206) 394-3553
http://www.reddotcorp.com/

Mariners secret to retaining top talent Felix Hernandez

2010-02-02T15:59:00.001-08:00

At our recent CEOtoCEO Breakfast speaker Jack Zduriencik, GM of the Mariners, was asked to share the secret to retaining Felix Hernandez the team's Ace pitcher for the next five years. Jack modestly told us it was easy …. "What's not to like about being paid $78 M for 5 years when you're 23 years old?" Baseball pundits say Felix's performance was worth significantly more money than what he agreed to with the Mariners.

A secret to keeping top talent? Jack told the executives in attendance that when the Mariners shared the organizations values, vision and mission of the future, and strategies to develop and retain top talent with Felix his response was "I'm in."

WELCOME - our new "Social Media" Sponsor...

2009-12-03T23:41:00.000-08:00

During the last CEOtoCEO breakfast meeting in November, I had the privilege of announcing a new sponsor to the CEOtoCEO breakfast series. Our new sponsor is WOM10 - "Word-of-Mouth on Steroids". Blaine Millet and Clay Loges are the two co-founders and principals of the firm and they gave us a brief introduction to their company.

I first met Blaine and Clay when I was attending their seminar on "What CEOs need to know about Social Media". It opened my eyes to the new "REVOLUTION" we are all experiencing around this new and exciting realm called "Social Media." The part that was most inspiring was how they talked about it in "CEO language" instead of some techno-language I couldn't understand.

They showed me why CEOs need to be educated and understand the power of this new way to market and communicate. It was clear after an impactful and educational 2 hours that I needed to help take this message to the CEOs in our CEOtoCEO Breakfast meetings. I approached them about getting involved with us and they agreed to come on board.

I think this will be one of the biggest areas of interest and excitement for all of you, the CEOs that attend and make up this program. I am very pleased and honored to have them as a sponsor and I encourage you to reach out to them and meet them at our breakfast meetings. If you have any questions or want to learn more about how social media can help your business grow, these are the guys to talk to - Welcome Blaine and Clay!

Word-of-Mouth is “gold nugget” to choosing health care

2009-11-30T23:25:00.000-08:00

One of the more interesting questions/discussions we had at the November CEOtoCEO Breakfast was in regard to choosing your health care professionals. I have to admit, this was a surprise to me and I don’t think I was alone.

A part of the discussion was around “distance to your doctor” or hospital. It was pretty common that most chose this because of location, not because of the hospital – at least the location was the primary driver. This makes intuitive sense to me and it did to the other CEOs in the room. However, what surprised me was how people choose their doctors.

Most people at the breakfast reported choosing health care professional via WORD-OF-MOUTH. That is not a typo – this was the primary way physicians were chosen. Not based on their credentials, not based on education and not based on the hospital where they practice. No, it was what others have to say about them.

Does any of this sound familiar? Does your business operate in pretty much the same way? This is directly linked to how most people choose other professionals – based on what others say about you. So when we think of the medical field, there are some really scary similarities to how other businesses are run as well – something to think about…

Many in the group asked to be sent the link to the Premium Designation site which provides some background on methodology used to evaluate providers as well as the ability to look up providers by a number of attributes specialty, location, language etc. Investigate this site if you would like more “facts” in addition to the “word-of-mouth” you are already getting.

CEOs and Health Insurance cost management

2009-11-24T23:20:00.000-08:00

When I decided to schedule David Hansen, CEO of United Healthcare, to be a speaker at the CEOtoCEO breakfast in November I knew we would get a lot of questions from CEOs about better ways to manage health insurance costs. We weren’t disappointed.

This has been a topic I hear about all the time when meeting with CEOs and so we decided to hit it head on in our breakfast series. In the beginning, I was concerned that David might get barraged by all kinds of politically charged questions – especially with all the talk about Obama’s Health Care Reform campaign. To my surprise, this wasn’t the hot topic.

The hot topic was about what a CEO can do to better manage health care costs. Having the right questions is essential to determining the right answers. David posed five questions that leaders should answer which will lead to better-cost management strategies.

Who makes decisions in choosing your benefits and communication strategy and are they asking the right questions?
Do I have the best broker and are they asking how we can actively manage healthcare costs?
Do I have a 3 – 5 year written strategic plan to manage my healthcare costs?
Your company’s historical claims experience is considered in future premium increases in Washington – both self funded and fully insured premiums are impacted!
Do I have an incentive based system that rewards employees and dependent families for choosing the best physicians, leading healthy lifestyles, and managing their/our healthcare costs?

What costs more – Five Star Hotel or Hospital?

2009-11-20T22:44:00.000-08:00

Last week we had a great opportunity to learn the “ins” and “outs” of health care costs from an expert in the area. David Hansen, CEO of United Healthcare was our featured speaker and had everyone captivated by the presentation and discussion. His opening question set the tone for the event – what does it cost to stay at the Fairmont Hotel in Seattle for a day and for a day in a local hospital?

As you can imagine, the answers were all over the board. We had a number of people in attendance that were also very connected to the healthcare arena as well and the answers were still very diverse. This was just one of the many interesting discussion points.

So to answer the question, most agreed that the Fairmont would cost around $400 a night and the range was pretty close from all those who contributed. However, the answers for the day in a hospital ranged from $3,500 to $12,000. The amazing part – they were all CORRECT! Depending on the location, it can be anywhere in that range. The question isn’t “do your employees know where the closest hospital is located?” Of course they do. The real question is “do they know where the most affordable hospitals are located? That is the key question.

If you weren’t able to attend this interesting and controversial session, check out my next few postings for some additional details you might find interesting.

Improving team productivity and morale in challenging times

2009-11-17T13:23:00.000-08:00

Coming up at our CEOtoCEO Breakfast the beginning of 2010 we have a special guest - Jack Zduriencik (zur-EN-sik). Jack was named the General Manager of the Seattle Mariners on Oct. 22, 2008.

He will share some of his experiences from being in the role just a few months. In his first few months on the job, he re-organized the Mariners Baseball Operations, Scouting and Player Development staffs, and has added talent to both the Major League and minor league rosters. In his first year with the Mariners, he helped build the most improved team in baseball, turning a 101-loss team into an 85-77 team in 2009.

Jack will be sharing his secrets of success from the 2009 season and his plans for improving the Mariners in 2010 season at our January 27th CEOtoCEO Breakfast. Keep an eye on my blog for more information….

How to reduce your Health Care spending

2009-11-17T13:18:00.001-08:00

One of the biggest issues I hear about in my interactions with CEOs and Business Owners is “What can I do to reduce my health care costs?” Since one of the main purposes of the CEOtoCEO breakfasts is to bring relevant topics to help businesses run better, I thought we should tackle this subject head on.

In doing so, I have invited David Hansen, the CEO of United Health Care for the Northwest Region to come speak at our next breakfast on November 18th. If you have any interest at all in reducing your health care spending, I would encourage you to come listen to David and see what advice he has to offer you.

I know one area he is going to discuss is a new online resource that is helping businesses of all sizes improve health outcomes and reduce costs by enabling employees to identify and access medical care at the best performing physicians and hospitals. Hopefully he will also discuss so-called "premium designation" resources and other strategies to improve health care outcomes and reduce costs. Being in the industry for over two decades, David has some great perspectives.

I hope you get a chance to meet him on Wednesday. If you don’t and you would like to ask him a question, you can leave a comment below and we can get your questions answered.

"Strategic Map" keeps teams focused

2009-11-17T13:14:00.001-08:00

I recently talked about how great a place Clark Nuber, PS was to work for how they have been recognized in a number of ways for this accomplishment. But what makes a firm a great place to work for and what is it that causes employees to enjoy the company? This is often a question I get asked when I am consulting with other organizations so I thought I would ask Dave Katri, President and CEO of Clark Nuber what his “secret sauce” is to achieving this result.

Dave, being the open and sharing person he is, gave me one of the key ingredients to their success – a “strategic map”. This map allows Clark Nuber to achieve superior operating performance while creating organizational balance. As you can see from this map, it is very detailed and also very focused on what makes an organization really work. There is a solid emphasis on Core Values and People as the primary elements at the beginning of the map – that says a lot right there where their focus lies.

The other two areas, Vision/Mission and Strategic Choices are pretty standard in most strategic plans or maps so they need to be included. To me the magic is in the “placement” of these items. Having your Core Values and People in front of the Vision says something much different than the other way around.

After attending one of our CEOtoCEO sessions, Randy Gardiner, CEO of Red Dot Corporation took a copy of the Clark Nuber “strategic map” from the breakfast and created one for his organization. I have yet to see it but I’m sure I will get a chance to share it with you at some point in the future. Do you have a “strategic map” and if so, does it look something like this one? Let me know…

Clark Nuber - A great local firm

2009-11-17T13:09:00.001-08:00

I just wanted to give a special thanks to Dave Katri, President and CEO of Clark Nuber P.S. for taking time to share some great insights with us at our CEOtoCEO breakfast in July. He had some great insights, observations and stories to share with us.

One area that I wanted to personally congratulate Dave on is how they have been consistently recognized as one of the best places to work in the area. For example, I didn’t realize, until hearing Dave share his story, how many awards they have won. These awards range from “Best Company” awards to “Innovation” and “Best Places to Work” type awards. They have obviously done a great job under Dave’s reign as the leader of this Bellevue accounting and consulting firm.

I thought I would take a minute and just share with you some of the awards they have received:
Inside Public Accounting “Best of Best Award”
Seattle Business Magazine “Best Company”
Washington CEO Magazine “Best Company”
Society of Human Resource Management “Top 25 Small Companies in the Nation”
Practical Accounting “Practice Innovation Award”
Bellevue Chamber “Eastside Business of the Year”
Leading Edge Alliance “Innovative Firm of the Year”

Well done!! Thanks again for sharing some of your “secrets to success”.

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