People Performance Management Priority No. 1 for Container Store
From the retail cashiers to warehouse workers, not one of the 2,500 employees of The Container Store is more than four levels away from the chairman and the CEO of the company. Just ask 10-year Distribution Center team veteran Juan Gonzalez. He was one of a select group of 12 Container Store employees nominated by their colleagues to vacation with Garrett Boone, chairman and co-founder of The Container Store, and Kip Tindell, CEO and co-founder.
The trip to the Colorado ranch, an annual tradition for The Container Store family, exemplifies the investment Boone and Tindell have made in putting people first.
“What’s so great about this trip is that it’s a random slice of the company,” says Boone. “Job titles get tossed out the window as soon as introductions are made. And we just have fun.”
That’s just one of the many reasons why the company been listed five times running in Fortune’s “100 Best Companies to Work For in America” and recently garnered a Performance Through People Award from the Forum for People Performance Management and Measurement at the Medill School of Journalism.
Boone and Tindell also make a point of signing the birthday and anniversary cards that go out to each employee every year. And a companywide voicemail message system is used to share news—in fact, Boone says he recently forwarded a message sent to him by a store sales manager to the entire company.
The investment in people goes beyond motivational niceties, though. Every full-time employee undergoes 241 hours of initial training, as compared to the retail industry’s typical seven. After the first year, employees usually receive 162 hours of training each year. All this investment speaks to one of the major tenets behind The Container Store’s philosophy: One great person equals three good people. This has become a mantra within the company. While it requires patience and stamina in the hiring process, the dividends are well worth it, Boone says.
The proof is in employee retention. The Container Store experiences just 8 percent employee turnover, compared with an industry average of close to 100 percent. A survey of The Container Store employees done by Fortune found that 94 percent feel they make a difference at the company. Not many retailers can lay claim to a statistic like that.
