All Jobs Matter

There once was a company that was having an issue with sales. The sales team was not producing results and consequently the company was struggling. The CEO decided to reallocate budgets to provide greater resources to fix the sales team.

The company used these additional funds to invest in new sales talent with higher salaries, develop a new training program and provide a larger commission structure to get the right people to stick around. Hearing the sales team was getting all the attention and taking part of the budget from other departments created controversy.

A woman from the marketing team wanted to know why marketing didn't matter.

A man from operations wanted to know why servicing the clients wasn't important.

A man from IT wanted to know if his role was less valuable to the company.

And a woman from legal didn't believe she was appreciated.

As the complaints continued, the CEO gathered the entire company. The CEO spoke for exactly thirty seconds to say the following.

"We cannot move forward as a company without a respected sales team. This is the team that is hurting right now. All jobs matter, but we need to concentrate on our sales numbers first. Our priority will be to lift up the sales team, so we can lift up the entire company. All will benefit from the efforts we make for the sales team. So, everyone must put forth energy and effort in our quest to build up this portion of our business."

The CEO left the room leaving the company to digest the words he had spoken.

The message was heard and people started to take action. The woman from marketing worked with her team to develop new ways to generate sales leads. The man from operations lead a group designing a fun and educational training program for sales hires to learn the product. The man from IT helped develop a more efficient process to sign up clients electronically. And the woman from legal updated all of the sales contracts to more client friendly terms.

While no one individual could solve the problem alone, they were able to do much more as a team. And Twelve months later, the organization had a respected sales team producing record revenue for the company. As a result of building up the sales team, the company flourished. Each individual found a higher level of job satisfaction by helping the team that needed it the most. Consequently, it also resulted in higher pay for every person in the company. While it is true that all jobs matter, it's most important to focus on the greatest need first.

We are better together.

We have another need in America. And many of us don't know what to do. Tossing a #blacklivesmatter on a social media post won't change tomorrow. But it's a start. The point is we all need to understand this is a problem for everyone. And everyone will be better off if we fix the problem. What can you do to abolish racism in your home, company and country? Focusing on this greatest need will produce the greatest result.