Motivation Maximizers at Trader Joe's

A - Z Characteristics of High Achieving Organizations

Edward L. Deci and Richard Ryan in the 1970s introduced Self-Determination Theory (SDT) which has wide-spread acceptance as a sound empirical theory on human motivation. According to SDT, the six reasons people work are: play, purpose, potential, emotional pressure, economic pressure, and inertia.

Companies such as Trader Joe’s are noted for creating motivational cultures by maximizing positive motives, i.e. play, purpose, and potential, while minimizing the negative motivators, i.e. emotional pressure, economic pressure, and inertia. Joe Coulombe founded Trader Joe’s in 1967 with the intention of appealing to a rising demographic of what he called “newly educated—not smarter but better-educated—class of people.” Coulombe opened his first stores in college towns in California stating that “Trader Joe’s is for overeducated and underpaid people, for all the classical musicians, museum curators, journalists.”

Purpose is when the direct outcome of the work fits your identity.

Essentially, Coulombe created Trader Joe’s to give purpose to over educated non-technical people who could no longer support themselves in a society with limited opportunities. At Trader Joe’s employees received at least the median family income for the state of California. Employees with artsy backgrounds could earn a competitive wage and healthcare benefits while working in an environment where they were granted creative license in making customers happy. They also enjoyed the camaraderie of co-workers with similar backgrounds.

Play is when you are motivated by the work itself.

You work because you enjoy it. Play is integral to Trader Joe’s culture. The stores maintain a dynamic product mix that makes shopping there seem like a quest or treasure hunt. Employees strive to discover and place new products every week; they also improvise ways to help customers locate items or cope with the loss of discontinued products. The store aisles have a unique floor arrangement with chevron shaped angled passageways artistically updated and maintained. Employees are encouraged to try various items throughout the store and the company provides the funds for employees to sample new foods.

Potential is when the outcome of the work benefits your identity.

Trader Joe’s taps into the country’s talent pool of educated young people who graduate without the skills needed for technical jobs. Consistent with employee’s liberal arts orientation the store encourages people to be generalists. Employees (crew members) learn how to do every job in the store; therefore, preparing them for promotion which is mostly internal. Employees rotate roles hour by hour. In fact, managers typically do not allow crew members to work at the checkout stations for more than two hours at a time. Promotion is based on performance. Seventy-eight percent of supervisors and 100% of store managers are internally promoted. Forbes and Glassdoor.com have both ranked Trader Joe’s on their list of the “Top 50 Companies to Work For” in the U.S.

Trader Joe’s designed its roles based on a nautical theme using titles like crew member, merchant, mate, and captain. Each role is clearly defined. Employees are carefully selected from large pools of applicants based upon an assessment of strengths, weaknesses, conflict resolution skills, favorite products, interpersonal skills, and reasons for wanting to work at Trader Joe’s. New hires are assigned to a crew that consists of other crew members, merchants, mates and a captain. Crew members spend the initial phases of their employment rotating through various roles and learning store operations. There is an emphasis on team work and customer relations. Promotions are mostly internal; mates and captains come exclusively from within and receive intensive leadership training.

An organization’s identity, its mission and behavioral code, is the second biggest contributor to employee motivation.

The primary mission of Trader Joe’s is providing its customers with the best quality food and beverages at the best possible price. Within this overarching mission is founder Joe Coulombe’s vision to create an offbeat, fun, discovery zone that elevates food shopping from a chore to a cultural experience while promising employees a good wage, a creative working environment.

Trader Joe's performance review system is exemplary for the grocery industry. Employees are evaluated on objective measures like punctuality and thoroughness, but also on friendliness and moral deportment. The company selects ambitious, outgoing, and friendly people and stresses those traits in evaluations. The nautical theme and crew concept aligns individual and group interests resulting in both higher group and individual performance. On the corporate level there are only two levels between the CEO and a cashier. The performance system is a critical factor in keeping annual turnover to 4% amongst full-time employees and motivating the workforce to maintain the company’s reputation for high customer service.

Creating a company culture that ensures employee motivation is to some extent an engineering discipline. Certain elements combined in the right quantities produce a strong and durable structure. The research indicates that organizations such as Trader Joe’s achieve success by leveraging specific motivators such as play, purpose, potential, and carefully designing job roles, company identity, and performance expectations.

Articles in this Series: A - Z Characteristics of High Achieving Organizations

1. Agility Thinkers at Facebook
2. Boundary Spanners at Juniper Networks
3. Change Agents at IBM
4. Decision Drivers at Cisco
5. Execution Experts at Caterpillar
6. Future Scenario Planners at Shell
7. Gritty Explorers at SpaceX
8. Honest Culture Creators at GE
9. Innovation Masters at W. L. Gore
10. Justice Ambassadors at General Grain
11. Knowledge Management Champions at Xerox
12. Loyalty Partners at Starbucks
13. Motivation Maximizers at Trader Joe's
14. Nurturing Leaders at FedEx
15. Optimistic Visionaries at Intel
16. Performance Navigators at Gap
17. Quality Virtual Instructors at Boeing
18. Resilient Re-inventors at Barnes & Noble
19. Servant-Leader Heroes at Southwest Airlines

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Sandhya Johnson, PhD is a leader in HR optimization, leadership development, team performance, and organization effectiveness. She has a proven track record of developing innovative talent management strategies for a diverse group of leading organizations. Sandhya is the founder and Managing Director at Ingenium Global, a Dallas-based consulting firm that is committed to co-creating talent-driven organizations. Connect with her on Twitter @IngeniumGlobal