Even while Cindy and I were still in our full-time roles, we had a few client interactions that were less than desirable. We actually stepped away from one, which was our largest to-date at the time, due to an ever changing scope of work - after we had put in nearly half the allocated time for the entire project and the deliverable they requested continuing to change. Interestingly, some of the time I had in that, which was never billed to that client, became part of our Emerging Leader Development course - but not until a few years later. The interaction with that client, as well as some with a few smaller ones, gave us some perspective for recognizing some juice just ain’t worth the squeeze. But after limping through 2020, I felt like I could only be so choosy…

My initial conversations with them were mixed between phone calls and Zoom sessions since they hadn’t moved to Virginia yet. Each of those went fine but I still wasn’t all that excited about what they needed me to help with: all the regulatory mumbo-jumbo necessary to comply with employment law when purchasing a business… After a month or so and at least a half dozen phone conversations, we finally had the opportunity to meet in person over dinner. Since they weren’t familiar with the area, and insisted on coming to us rather than having me and Cindy drive an hour to meet them, we got to choose the location. If you know us very well at all, and you’re even remotely familiar with Harrisonburg, you’ll understand why we opted for The Sub Station Mexican Grill!

Just in case you’re not, this place has become one of our very favorites! The food is excellent and the owners are even better. From the outside, though, especially back then, it was very easy to mistake the building for a Waffle House - because that’s what it used to be. Once inside, there was little to remind you that it had previously been a hot spot for the after-the-bar-closed crowd - other than the wooden benches in each booth, which have since been replaced.

The guy who connected us asked where we were meeting them for dinner and was nothing short of appalled. He thought I was nuts for taking a couple of their stature to what he viewed as a hole-in-the-wall. I blew him off, saying “if they don’t like me because of where we’re going to eat, we probably won’t get along too well on much else either!”

As it turned out, they weren’t the type to turn up their noses at a place just because the waiter didn’t show up at the table with a towel over his arm. We all enjoyed the interaction, and the food! And we were able to develop a plan for all that would need to be done as they took ownership of the business. I had quite a bit of homework to do coming out of that conversation, but I still didn’t realize how much that interaction would help me connect the dots on just how important values are in serving as the right foundation for any business.

A Painful Process, but with a Twist

Having been a few years since I handled all aspects of human resources for an organization on a daily basis, and never dealing with an ownership transition, I left that initial dinner meeting with a list of items I’d need to dig into prior to their upcoming acquisition date. As much as I never liked homework, I held up my end of the bargain and was ready to roll on the morning of September 2, 2021, when the formal transition took place.

Prior to working through the employment verification and other forms each team member would need to complete, the long-term owners of the business introduced the entire team to Craig and Kim. While Craig and I had touched on this several times in our conversations, I genuinely enjoyed how he detailed the core values that would drive each decision they made for the company moving forward. As you can likely imagine, Craig had to field a number of questions and address a few concerns at that point too. In each response, I saw him exemplify each of those values; Compassion, Integrity, Humility, Family, and Dependability.

Once the paperwork was behind us, it wasn’t long until we started working to fill a few positions; some to take advantage of growth opportunities and some to develop the team’s bench in preparation for some pending retirements. As with any hiring I had been involved with, we needed to identify candidates with specific skills and experience. But there, more than with any other organization I had supported through a process like this, they were just as focused on ensuring anyone joining the team matched their values as they were about determining they could adequately perform the work involved. That was so refreshing, and not something I had the chance to discuss the management team I was supporting when I hired 225 people in an eighteen-month stint just a few years prior.

Over the next few months, Craig and I hashed out what would be the 75+ year old organization’s first official policy manual. I had helped at least half a dozen other companies through similar processes in the decade leading up to that. While I had never enjoyed anything about it, I had become pretty effective in tying these together; juggling all the required government language while still maintaining a voice that represented the actual business. From November 2021 to mid-February 2022, we discussed every single line of the template we used as a starting point. The part of that process that stands out more than anything was how adamant Craig and Kim were about not filling the handbook full of rules just for the sake of having rules. If we couldn’t tie something directly back to one of their core values, it wasn’t included in the final edition - government regulation notwithstanding, and we would have been happy to have scrapped quite a bit of that, too, give the discretion!

Once complete, our next step was to meet with the entire team, in small groups, to roll out what would serve as their overall policy manual moving forward. I had done that several times as well, so I created a slideshow that offered an overview of the entire thing and covered the more critical segments in detail. That went far different than I could have ever imagined!

A Strange but Enlightening Experience

I blocked my calendar on the afternoon for February 24, 2022 to roll out that new handbook for all the team members working with Craig and Kim. Having done similar rollouts several times in the decade leading up to it, I had a picture in my mind of what to expect - and I dreaded it! While my goal was to be brief, highlighting the specific areas everyone would want to get familiar with and touching on several of the most important procedural guidelines, I had never had one go quite that smoothly. Inevitably, there was that one guy in each group who was determined to pick everything apart and convince the rest of the team that management was out to get them…

As I mentioned, the business was about an hour away from our office so I left plenty early to make sure I’d be onsite well before the meetings started. In each human resource role I’ve held, I’ve always been very intentional about developing relationships with every member of the organizations I support, be that in a full-time position or in a consulting role. Even then though, I can’t say that I ever received a very warm greeting before presenting what would be included in a new employee handbook. At best, I had been tolerated, and there were a few times when tolerance was nowhere to be found! All said, I wasn’t feeling all that positive about this one. Being so far away, I had only been with the team a few times at all and just hadn’t been able to get to know folks as much as I had leading up to other handbook rollouts. From the time I walked through the door, though, I could tell something was different.

Our goal was to issue physical copies of the handbook and provide the overview as the team enjoyed a lunch provided by the owners. Since I rarely eat before presenting anything, mainly so I’m not burping on people, I had a chance to mingle as everyone got their food and settled in. To keep from shutting the retail section of the business down completely, we met with all the team members through three different sessions. To a person, everyone was positive. As I wrapped up one of the sessions, one of the most senior team members, one who pushed back his retirement date to help the new owners get acclimated, came to me in tears. He told me that prior to Craig and Kim taking ownership, he had “one foot out the door and the other was on a banana peel.” He said the handbook gave him and all of his coworkers a level of clarity that had never had before. He went on to explain that the five values the handbook was based on had been something he had heard Craig and Kim explain routinely since the acquisition; and more importantly, he had seen them live those values out in every interaction - with the team and with each customer the business served.

I won’t kid you, I wasn’t sure what I was experiencing. At one point, I looked around for a hidden camera! Was I being punked? Nobody thanks you for a handbook! To that end, I’ve never even liked those meetings… After talking with nearly everyone that day, and reflecting on it as I drove home, it was clear that their five values were not just something we had listed in the initial pages of the handbook; those values were indeed the foundation Craig and Kim had chosen to run and build that business.

While Cindy and I had various experiences with employers and other clients that helped us realize how important values really were, rolling out those handbooks served as a tipping point for how we wanted to run our own business and for the ideal client we wanted to serve. We’ll pick up there soon!