How to find and keep good people: he who ignores the growth of his employees will wonder where the customers went.

• Author: Wiesner, Pat
• Position: Column

[Part IV in a series on the startup challenges of Wiesner Publishing]

Good people! We all know that they are the key to having a good or great company. Over the last 25 years we have had our share and managed to keep many of them for a long time.

But we have lost some of the best. It hurt the company and me personally. I always wanted to have the kind of company that would attract and keep good people, yet it didn't always work that way.

Recently, my wife and I stayed in a Hampton Inn hotel. You know the one. They are everywhere--new, clean pretty good service, convenient, serve a quick breakfast, and they're affordable.

This one was even better! It is in Stuart, Florida, and from the moment we walked in the door until we left the next day, it seemed that every single employee of that place wanted to make sure that we understood that we had spent the night in the most comfortable and friendly hotel ever.

In the morning we had breakfast (you know, the kind where everything comes in, or on, plastic). The food was better than average, and the service a little better yet. A grandmotherly waitress kept coming by with an extra roll or donut and a big grin.

"You look happy!" I said to her. She smiled big. "I am!" she said. "Why?" "I've been trained!" she said proudly. I'll bet that everyone working there had been trained to do his or her job well. That made them happy, effective and proud. It also makes for happy customers who will come back.

First, we must help our employees to be the best they can be at their jobs. This means train them and motivate them and then do it again next year. They will be competent and happy, and they will like their customers. Miracles will happen.

For years we didn't do a very good job of training our salespeople. We gave them a list of accounts and a telephone and told them to get their feet wet and come back with problems.

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