Franchise Update Magazine Issue IV, 2014 | Page 23

than those of impersonal or acrimonious
groups, which can explain the difference
between success and failure.
11) In the last six months, someone
at headquarters has talked to me about
my progress. Your worst-performing
franchisees, according to the statistics,
are likely to be those who are ignored
by their operations consultants statistically, an outcome from failure to coach
on an ongoing basis. My own franchise
CEO survey data shows that 62 percent
of franchisors don’t have formal training
for operations consultants and field staff,
so the chances are fairly high that “how
to conduct performance reviews” isn’t
likely being instructed or carried out in
an effective manner.
12) In the past year, I have had opportunities in my system to learn and
grow. When franchisees and management
feel they are learning and growing, they
work harder and more efficiently. Business
units in the top quartile on the Twelfth
Element surpass their bottom-quartile
counterparts by 9 percent on customer

engagement and loyalty measures and
by 10 percent on profitability.
A wealth of research proves that
challenging franchisees to meet goals
motivates higher performance. One
of the most interesting wrinkles in the
research is that team members perform
better when they are working toward a
specific difficult-to-attain target than
when they are told simply “do your best.”
What are commonly called “stretch
goals” are psychologically invigorating
and good for business.
It’s my strong contention that one of
the most important things that you can
do as a CEO to motivate your enterprise’s
franchisees is to first look out for the
operations consultants and field staff. n

Grow Market Lead

have 15 to 30 percent lower turnover.
9) My fellow franchisees are committed to doing quality work. If a team
lacks a strong work ethic and a sense of
responsibility to each other, the group
becomes a convenient place to hide a
little slothfulness, to push a little work to
the other guy, or to point fingers when a
project doesn’t hit its deadlines. By a margin of six to one, team members are more
upset with a colleague who has the ability
and doesn’t try than with a colleague who
tries hard but doesn’t have the ability.
10) I have a best friend in the system. If you’re a franchisee who strongly
disagrees with this statement, you are
lonely in the system. Numerous qualitative studies of employee engagement
suggest customers not only sense the
level of camaraderie where they shop,
but also that it makes a large difference
in their experience, if for no reason other
than its natural contagiousness. In the
service industries, the customer ratings
of work