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Benefits and Pensions MonitorOne Big Happy Family
It all started when a young comptroller, unsatisfied with the way the company he worked for was run, decided he could do better himself. He decided to take the chance and bought a box manufacturing company out of receivership in 1982. That’s how the Great Little Box Company Ltd. started, with only three employees and 5,000 square feet of plant space. Today, its Vancouver production facility covers 140,000 square feet and its four locations employ more than 170 people. Aside from its business success, the company is the recipient of many awards, particularly in the areas of management and employee satisfaction. It’s all about the people, says Robert Meggy, founder, president, and chief executive officer. He believes that so strongly that the company’s mission statement is ‘Great People to Deal With!’ Meggy believes that a happy, loyal, and involved employeebase is the key to success for any business. So he has personally developed and organized a multitude of benefits and social events and developed bonuses for all employees of the company. “Everybody has the same needs and wants,” he says. “Number one is recognition and being appreciated. Number two is knowing what’s going on.” Recognition And Being Appreciated As an accountant, Meggy believes strongly in measurement. “We measure everything. From there, you create a lot of rewards programs for people doing well. Every person in the plant has a graph of how they’ve done each week. I’ll go on the plant floor every week and congratulate the people who have done well. It’s a lot more fun working on a machine if you make it a little competitive.” Other initiatives to let employees know they are appreciated include social events such as internal golf tournaments, Christmas parties including a party just for employees’ kids (Meggy goes around to each employee to find out what their kids want – and there are more than 100 children – and the company spends more than $50 on presents for each), summer parties, weekly hikes, and lunches to celebrate safety records. GLBC offers its employees a full health and welfare benefit plan. The company used to pay 100 per cent, but changed that to 75 per cent “so employees would appreciate the value of it.” It recently implemented an RRSP and contributes three per cent for every employee. A $1,000 bursary is also given to all employee children who pursue post-secondary education. In The Know “We have a meeting every month with all employees where we review the financials. Managers discuss the balance sheet and income statement so everyone can find out how they contribute in all aspects of the company. If people know when things are good or bad, they dig in.” The company also has a profitsharing program that pays 15 per cent of profits every month equally to all employees. The profit-sharing program “is strong for the company and builds a very good culture. It creates a high sense of trust and loyalty.” Each budget year, Meggy sets a multi-level goal for the company which he calls The BOX Goal – the Big Outrageous eXtravaganza. “If we meet it, the whole company goes on a trip.” This year, the company went to Las Vegas; last year, Puerto Vallarta. Meggy also meets with employees on a regular basis and has employees fill out surveys where he asks them what they like most about the company, least about the company, and if they had $1,000 to spend in the company, what would they spend it on? Ultimately, says Meggy, the customer comes first. “You accomplish that with people who feel appreciated and support the growth of the company.” |
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job, help customers, and so on. Once a month, in every branch, we all get together and all the nominees – 10 or 15 – get a gift certificate. The winner gets their own parking space at the front door (the only assigned parking spot in the company) and they get a sweatshirt.”