Culture | Jeff Kortes

I Don’t know my Co-Workers

by Jeff Kortes | Apr 22, 2019 | Careers, Culture, Employee Engagement, Employee Performance, Employee Retention, Goal Setting, Leadership, Learning

As an employee retention speaker and employee retention author, I am always struck by how little leaders know about the people they work for, those they work with and the people that work for them. This amazes me in that we spend probably a minimum of 8 waking hours...

Continual Training…Continual Growth

by Jeff Kortes | Jan 13, 2012 | Accountability, Careers, Culture, Employee Performance, Employee Satisfaction, Goal Setting

Who should be responsible for the training and growth of an employee? Ultimately… the responsibility lies with the employee. But, it also lies with several others as well. The immediate supervisor and the organization itself also have an obligation to provide...

Performance is a Function of Leadership

by Jeff Kortes | Jan 5, 2012 | Culture, Employee Performance, Leadership

When I hear leaders talk about the poor performance of people on their team I like to listen closely. What I generally hear is a lot of blame because “they don’t care,” “they have no work ethic,” “they haven’t learned the system,” and on and on and on. The manager...

Buzz Words…Enough of Them!

by Jeff Kortes | Dec 29, 2011 | Culture, Employee Engagement, Employee Satisfaction, Leadership

While writing my blog on Saturday morning I found myself using the buzz word “exit” in the piece. It got me thinking about all the buzz words that drive me insane when I hear them. And guess what…it drives your employees insane when they hear them as well. But what it...

The best thing about Praise…It’s FREE

by Jeff Kortes | Dec 29, 2011 | Culture, Employee Engagement, Employee Performance, Employee Satisfaction, Leadership, Motivation

When I was teaching a management class last week at Upper Iowa University my class was talking about praise. It then dawned on me the best thing about praise is that PRAISE IS FREE. It does not cost you a dime, motivates people and acknowledges them for a job well...

Fear…A Retention Nightmare

by Jeff Kortes | Dec 29, 2011 | Accountability, Culture, Employee Engagement, Employee Performance, Employee Satisfaction, Leadership

In the past several weeks, managers I work with have told me that people in their organizations are still fearful despite the fact they have seen an improvement in business in the last year. So what is driving this fear? Fear results primarily from three sources:...