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PERSONAL CONNECTIONS, from page 7
more than qualified in the transportation industry, freight planning was not an area we truly had the experience or skills to succeed. TZL: Diversity and inclusion are lacking. What steps are you taking to address the issue? BS: Our approach is two-fold. First, we educate ourselves to understand what is valuable in our quest to be an inclusive culture with a diverse staff makeup. Simply defining metrics is not the answer because we need to understand what behaviors are effective in creating the culture around diversity and inclusion that we desire. Second, as we educate ourselves, we are taking steps to ensure all employees have an awareness around unconscious bias, discrimination, and equality. Using the experience gained by many successful companies around the world, we are in the process of modifying our recruiting strategies, hiring processes, and communication norms as well as forming employee resource groups that can sustain our efforts to learn and grow. TZL: When Olsson hires people, they look for folks who are collaborative and demonstrate personal accountability. During the hiring process, how do you ensure you are finding the right people to fit the bill? BS: Time spent during the hiring process to assess an individual’s talent and goals is absolutely essential to long-term success. We use several analytical tools to help us understand strengths, weaknesses, leadership traits, technical skills, and career goals. We focus our conversations with potential employees on culture – mostly around teamwork and personal interactions with others – to understand a person’s likelihood to succeed at Olsson. As much as we are searching for highly-competent technical abilities, we think a person’s ability to function in Olsson’s team atmosphere and employee-focused culture is just as important to their long-term success and happiness. We look for people who are honest with others about how they view accountability, performance, hierarchy, authority, collaboration, client service, and respect for others. When we’ve strayed from this formula, it’s been difficult for new employees to find their footing at Olsson over the long haul. TZL: A firm’s longevity is valuable. What are you doing to encourage your staff to stick around? BS: Provide opportunity. We believe staff stay at Olsson because they see more opportunity is available to them, such as a leadership or management role, technical challenge, simply shifting to a new role or learning a new skill. But the overriding desire is for the firm to provide a framework for a person to be part of something new or different. And while some employees are happy and content to perfect the job they are in, they still want to be valued and appreciated. So, while career advancement and working on more complex projects is the desire of many, Olsson strives to provide each employee with the opportunity that is right for them. Our rewards system is all-encompassing, meaning that each person has the ability to earn recognition based on whatever path is right for them. Seizing an opportunity does not have to be prescriptive. Managers can recognize their staff for different reasons based on the success of the team.
de-motivating factor they face. I’ve always admired the consulting business for its constant reminders that under performance, even in small quantities, can be lethal to the business. At Olsson, we talk openly about the need to perform – providing a high-quality product for our clients and doing so in a reasonably profitable manner for the sake of our employee-owned business. This is fundamental to our culture, and for those who may not understand this aspect, Olsson is likely not the place they will find success. TZL: How often do you valuate your firm and what key metrics do you use in the process? Do you valuate using in-house staff or is it outsourced? BS: We’re a partial ESOP, so we’re required to perform a valuation annually with an independent third party. Our board of directors oversees the protocols and methods to ensure an accurate and fair value. The valuation is then used for all transactions between shareholders, the corporation, and ESOP. The valuation uses key metrics such as EBIT, EBITDA, asset/debt ratios, working capital and liquidity, future performance expectations, public company trading ratios, and third-party private transactions in the industry. TZL: Ownership transition can be tricky, to say the least. What’s the key to ensuring a smooth passing of the baton? What’s the biggest pitfall to avoid? BS: The key is planning. In my experience, failure to transition is rooted in lack of planning along with inappropriate use of profit generated by the business. Too often, principals extract capital from the business, starving it of the ability to invest or fund transition to junior staff. In our industry, most professionals don’t have the means to acquire large chunks of ownership without significant assistance from the firm. If the current owners do not recognize this, they fail to plan accordingly and typically are forced to sell the business, often during down economic times when cash flow cannot support the business or the lifestyle choices of the principal owners. Smart owners plan for the transition early and view the next generation as deserving of an opportunity to own the business long-term. For Olsson, we have a continuous employee ownership transition that is well funded annually and includes a broad spectrum of employee owners. TZL: They say failure is a great teacher. What’s the biggest lesson you’ve had to learn the hard way? BS: The biggest failures have come when we have not been true to our strengths and beliefs. Denying who you are and what you are good at can be confused with taking on new and different challenges. But, if those challenges take you too far away from your core talent and experience, you can fail very quickly. For Olsson, this has happened when we tried to provide a new service to clients where we didn’t have the expertise, skills, or credibility required. As an example, we tried to enter the freight planning business several years ago with a very qualified individual who was new to our firm. The clients did not view us as credible since we had virtually no project experience outside of this one individual. They were not willing to take a risk and hire us for any project of significance. So, while we were
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THE ZWEIG LETTER DECEMBER 7, 2020, ISSUE 1370
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