The Power Of Input

                                              The company had always given everyone break food every morning.  Wonderful, homemade goodies that were delicious and not necessarily healthy.

The company became employee owned and asked the new employee owners to start thinking like owners.  One day the question was asked "How much do we spend on break food every year?"  The answer was $10,000.

After a few days it was brought forth by the employee owners that maybe the money should be spent on dental insurance instead of break food.  The research was done and it was announced that dental insurance would cost $12,000 per year.

In short order a company meeting was held to decide what to do.  It was agreed that a vote would be held, one vote for one person, and that the majority vote would decide - dental insurance or break food.  It was explained that if voting on issue was to work, if you were not in the majority you could not throw stones and complain about it.  People raised their hands in agreement.

So a vote was called for by a show of hands.  The results - I will let you think it through.  After the vote one employee owner came to the CEO and said "I am not happy with the outcome, but at least I got to vote!"

The moral of the story - give people the chance for input and they will be more accepting of the decisions that are made and help you improve the bottom line.