Employees First, Customers Second

I love the title of a book I recently read called “Employees First, Customers Second” written by Vineet Nayar.  The reason I love it is because I’ve seen this philosophy yield great results in many different settings during my career.  And this book tells the story of how the author, as CEO of HCL Technologies (HCLT), helped change the success of his organization by employing strategies to live this philosophy. Though the book was different than I had anticipated and didn’t reach my high hopes based on the title, I still loved some of the ideas found in it which included increasing transparency, focusing on the need for constant change, and improving and creating innovative ways for communication.  But perhaps my favorite idea found in the book was how the author changed and enhanced the role of management. 

The traditional role of management has changed in the best organizations such as HCLT.  No longer does the boss yield all the power, get all of extra privileges and perks or hold all of the cards.  The author who was the former CEO of HCLT changed the way leadership was viewed in his organization and as a result, it was one major reason for the company’s eventual success. 

At HCLT, rather than employees being solely accountable to their boss, the organization made the bosses accountable to those they supervised.  In fact, if team members were unhappy with their supervisor’s performance, they were encouraged and provided innovative, constructive ways to share their views.  As you can imagine, those leaders who were not interested in doing all they could to help their people become successful, quickly left the organization.  

Additionally, HCLT made it known that people in supervisory roles were primarily responsible for serving and enabling those they managed rather than those they managed being there to serve them.  According to the author and his story, this put more value in what he refers to as the value zone which created greater results for the company.    

This idea, that the boss’ primary measure of success is based on the value he or she adds to those they supervise is brilliant.  I’ve seen the best organizations embrace and live this kind of management philosophy and would add that if we want to be great leaders, we must be willing to serve those we lead.  As the author explains, a leader’s primary role is in enabling and supporting rather than governing and controlling.  If we ourselves can embrace these ideas in our areas of responsibility, I know we will have greater success. 

I think every organization and every leader should espouse the Employee First, Customer Second philosophy, and this book provides insights and an example of how to do just that.     

To see how I rated this book, click here.