Kare Partners

Ok, so I confess I’ve been feeling contemplative lately. The combination of the usual year-end reflection along with a decade birthday staring me down has moved me. Add to that my employment anniversary with Kare Partners yesterday and we have the makings of some serious reflection. All of this got me thinking, do employee anniversaries still matter?

Lots of people who should know believe we are in the midst of a labor market realignment similar in scale to what took place during industrialization (think massive). For the nerdiest among us you might enjoy listening to this recent podcast from Bloomberg on the Economy (link here), specifically the November 9^th show with Neal Soss, chief economist at Credit Suisse. As a quick aside I must say I have learned more from Tom Keene, the host of this program, than I can ever repay. If I began mowing his yard now and never stopped I’d still come out ahead, but I digress. Suffice it to say, things are crazy for employees and employers these days.

For me, this idea first became personal in the mid-1990s when, for the first time, I owned my own business and felt the weight of dozens of families counting on me for the opportunity to earn their livelihood. I remember thinking that the only thing that mattered was what value I added to the process on a daily basis. It did not matter at all how long I’d been at it, but rather what I’d done to make the business work better. If I failed to do that, those folks who worked so hard every day would lose their opportunity to play their part. It’s a weighty thought.

From that point forward I began thinking of things differently. No longer did I count up my days and hours, only my contribution. Ultimately, what matters is contributing more value than you extract. That way there is value left over to invest in growth and to reward (return on investment) those who risked the money for your paycheck to begin with. Additionally, if the value of your contribution rises consistently over time it is quite true that the value you extract will also rise. It’s simple economics. Try it.

So, the next time you’re feeling in need of a boost, give yourself an “anniversary” by boosting your contribution. The fact is, just as influence is more important than position, contribution is more important than tenure.

The challenge for employers is to find a way to recognize and value those contributions that stand out every single day. Otherwise our best contributors will disappear, as they should. And of course our anniversaries matter, as my wife reminds me. So feel free to wish me a happy KP anniversary, but you are a day late!