2

The SEVEN
“C’s”
that Keep Your
Employee
RelationShips
Afloat
by
Dawn L. Billings, M.A., LPC

Copyright© 2005 by Dawn L. Billings a

Published by DCB Publishing
Bixby, Oklahoma
All rights reserved.
ISBN 1-893431-
 3

Dedicated
to mangers
who want
to support
employees
and
increase the potential of their
workforce.

There is someone at work

who encourages
my development.
No. 6
on The Gallup Organization’s List
of the Consistent Dimensions
of Quality Workplace
4

The 7 c’s that keep your employee

relationships afloat

Introduction………………………………………..5
Great Managers:
1. Collaborate Creatively……………………….6
2. Coach with Consistency……………………….8
3. Communicate Clearly……………..……….…10

4. Champion with Commitment…..…………….12

5. Consider Carefully…………………….………14

6. Consult Candidly.……………..………….…...16

7. Care about Conduct………………………….18

www.DawnBillings.com.............................................22
 5

It is not an
accident
that the best
places to work
are also the
places
that make the most money.
Gordon Bethune, chairman,
Continental Airlines

Attention employers:
Make sure your employees
feel valued.
Otherwise,
they could bolt for other jobs
as soon as the economy
starts to improve.
Jane Kim
Wall Street Journal
6

INTRODUCTION

T imes have changed. The economy is

facing is greatest challenges in history
and the job market is increasingly competitive.
With thousands of trained, experienced workers
exiting the market for retirement, companies are
scrambling to replace these critical positions with
much needed talent. There is a great shortage of
reliable, well trained personnel in many fields.
Health care, for example, is an industry that must
recruit and retain quality personnel in order to be
effective as well as, competitive. Sadly, the
enemy to retention is often sitting in a
management position. There was a local hospital
that lost 35 well-trained nurses before they
realized that it was the supervisor that was the
problem.
Employees usually don’t leave jobs.
They leave managers.
That is why we have written this simple
reference guide to teach you The Seven C’s to
Keeping Your Employee RelationSHIPS afloat.
The interest we pay on our credit cards is too
high while the interest that we pay to our
employees is often too low. It is time for us to
grow strong and smart and give our employees
what they need to thrive and grow. Take these
characteristics to heart. Memorize them, reflect
on them and contemplate them. Then apply them
to your life and work and watch the
transformation begin. All it takes is you, and
your willingness to be a great captain.
 7

1.

Collaborate
Creatively
It is better
to light a candle
than to
curse the darkness.
Author unknown
8

1. C ollaborate Creatively:
When employees understand the difference their
individual roles make in the success of the whole, they
work harder to ensure that
success. When they recognize that
they are an important and intricate
part of something larger than
themselves it gives them a sense
of unity, security, honor and pride. When they use their
unique talents in collaboration with another employees
unique talents they become more than one person
working with another, they become a team. They begin to
define themselves with a mission statement larger than
“What’s in it for me?” and instead consider, “What is best
for the whole?” Team members become great role
models for other more self-focused individuals. As
people collaborate they become more creative because
they are inspired by the genius of each other.
Collaboration and teamwork is one of the best recruiting
tools an organization can have. (Translation: “Let’s work
together to create something bigger than both of us.”)
 9

2.

C oac h
With
Consistency
The greatest good
you can do for another
is not just
share your riches,
but reveal to them
their own.
Benjamin Disraeli
10

2. C oach with Consistency:

Are your people checked in, tuned in and turned
on? Are you providing the essential coaching to
developing and enriching their
careers? Coaching and mentoring has
been proven to be one of the most
effective tools for developing new
skills in the workplace, as well as, loyalty. Loyalty in
today’s marketplace is priceless. When you believe that
you will be coached with consistency, that you will enjoy
follow through with regard to training, it becomes fun to
come to work. Do your employees look forward to
coming to work? Are you a mentor? A consistent role
model? Dedicated to being a great coach? If you are you
will find that your employees perform at higher levels,
feel more loyalty toward you and your company, and are
sick less often. Even Michael Jordan had a coach and he
is considered the “best basketball player of all times.”
How much better would your employees be with a
consistent coach? (Translation: “Help me to enjoy my
work and grow professionally”)
 11

3.

Communicate
Clearly
We should every night
call ourselves to an account:
What infirmity have
I mastered today?
What passions opposed!
What temptation resisted?
What virtue acquired?
Marcus Annaeus Seneca
12

3. C ommunicate Clearly:
Your employees are formal representatives,
front line soldiers if you will, of you, your department
and the entire organization. Oftentimes
they are making the vital “first
impression” that will have the lasting
impact upon an organizations success.
Are you communicating clearly and directly as to specific
attitudes, behaviors and duties so that your employees
have the greatest opportunities for success? Are you
consistent, clear and methodical about your expectations?
Are you accessible? Are you a great listener? Have you
trained your employees how to be great listeners as well?
Clear communication is the backbone of effective,
efficient, successful results. (Translation: “Explain
clearly what it is you need me to do, allow me to ask
questions so that I understand, give me the tools I need to
accomplish the task, then step back, and let me do it. I’ll
probably exceed your expectations. Measure how well I
do and appropriately recognize, reward, re-train or retire
me!”)
 13

4.

Champion with
commitment
By helping yourself,
you are helping mankind.
By helping mankind,
you are helping yourself.
Christopher Isherwood
14

4. C hampion with Commitment:

Are you building a team-based work
environment that encourages diversity, respect, creativity
while never letting go of the
importance of working as a
cooperative, dedicated, and united
front. A Great manager is a
committed champion of the
employees he or she leads. Individual strengths and
differences are valuable because they make the whole
stronger. We must champion those individual talents,
perspectives and gifts toward the end goal of unity. A
melting pot of great resources requires that the individual
talents melt into a great pool of talent called the whole.
When you are able to champion individuals while
simultaneously teaching them that their greatness is not
just about them, but about what they can bring for the
benefit of a larger good, you will create a team of
champions. (Translation: “Please encourage me to tap
the elements that make me different, while asking myself,
what difference can my difference make?”
 15

5.

Consider
carefully
Some people have a
wonderful capacity
to appreciate again and again,
freshly and naively,
the basic goods of life,
with awe, pleasure, wonder,
and even ecstasy.
A.H. Maslow
16

5. C onsider Carefully:
The word consider is defined in Webster’s New
Universal Unabridged Dictionary as, to fix the mind on in
order to understand; to think on with
care. People intuitively know when
you do and do not consider them.
They feel it, they hear it in your
voice, they see it in the movement of your body. When
you consider someone you actually take the time to
reflect on their unique gifts and talents, as well as their
concerns and struggles. When you understand the
strengths and weaknesses of another, you are better
equipped to support them toward becoming great. It is
apparent to people when you consider them. It shows up
as noticing them, appreciating them, recognizing them,
advising them, and expecting them to be the great human
beings they are capable of being. So take the time to
consider your employees carefully. (Translation: “Notice
me. What am I good for in your eyes? Where can I
contribute my gifts and talents? Where can I make a
difference?”)
 17

6.

Consult
Candidly
No person was ever honored
for what he received.
Honor has been the reward
for what he gave.
Calvin Coolidge,
Former president of the United States
18

6. C onsult Candidly:
Do you realize that when you are hiring your
employees, you are not only hiring consultants, you are
hiring on to be one? Your employees
have a perspective that will inevitably
be different than yours. Not that it
will be adversarial, but without
question it will be different. You will inevitably have a
perspective that differs from theirs as well. Use those
differences. Use new perspectives and points of view to
aid in your decision making processes. When making
decisions about the direction your business is going, ask
for feedback and creative ideas. Are you asking your star
talent for their input? If you aren’t you might be missing
out of an extremely valuable source of creativity and
genius. Ask them how they would improve the
organization and its services? Ask them to assess your
performance as a leader? Consult them, and ask them to
consult you. It works. (Translation: “Trust my opinion,
judgment and loyalty. Allow me to come up with
solutions.”)
 19

7.

Care About
C onduc t
Conviction is worthless
unless it is converted
into conduct.
Thomas Carlysle
20

7. C are about Conduct:

Conduct yourself as a model for the
excellence you expect in others. No one is perfect and
perfection itself is an illusion, but
excellence is a worthy goal to work
toward daily. The best way to
inspire it is to become the very
thing you hope to inspire—excellent. Your conduct
tells everyone who you are and what you believe in. It
speaks more loudly than words ever could. It is the
obvious truth of what you believe and have faith in. In
you believe in success for you, your employees and
you customers; people will experience a feeling of
success when they are near you. Your conduct is the
proof of who you are. If you want the best, be the best.
A great manager makes little distinction between his
labor and his leisure. He hardly knows which is which.
He simply pursues his vision of excellence at whatever
he does. (Translation: “I don’t expect you to be
perfect, no one is, but I do expect you to move toward
excellence because that is the direction we have
committed ourselves to go.”)
 21

Winners
don’t always
cross the line
first, but they
are the first to line up to reach within
the depths of their capabilities and
become the best they can possibly be.
Dawn L. Billings
22

Other Books by Dawn L. Billings

Greatness and Children: Learn the Rules

Greatness is Never an Accident
The Perfect Heart
Entitled to Fail, Endowed to Succeed:
America’s Journey Back to Greatness
Quotes and Poems of Greatness
Choose to Be Great E-workbook
The ABC’s of Great Relationships CD Rom workbook
Possibilities II: Stories from the Heart that Feed the Mind
The Primary Color Personality Test
Co-authored with her son Corbin:
The ABC’s of Becoming Great
The ABC’s of Great People Skills
What Have You Got to Give?
Possibilities: Awakening Your Leadership Potential
(featuring: The ABC’s of Great Leadership)
To order : E-mail Dawn: ChoosetobeGreat@aol.com
Website: www.DawnBillings.com
or www.TheHeartLinkNetwork.com
Phone (918)-605-1492
 23

Dawn Billings, MA, LPC

is the CEO, Founder of The
Heart Link Network®, which is
dedicated to linking women and
their businesses world wide, and
www.DawnBillings.com a
training and coaching company,
focusing on teamwork,
communication skills, improving
productivity and retaining top
talent using her highly acclaimed
Primary Colors Personality Test™. Dawn is co-founder
of Inspiration is the Secret™, a web based company that
provides daily parenting and relationship inspirations that
promote character and excellence in children and adults, as
well as, the creator of the beloved CAPABLES® Learning
and Parenting System.
Dawn has a passion for making a difference in the lives
of children and travels nationally as a parenting and
relationship expert and a highly sought after speaker and
trainer who specializes in entitlement issues that are
currently plaguing our society. Dawn has a Masters Degree
in Clinical Psychology, while her doctorate studies focused
on Organizational Psychology. Dawn is a presenter for the
legendary Love and Logic Institute, where she shares with
teachers, administrators and counselors secrets on how to
inspire children to live the greatness within them. She is the
author of over 15 books including Greatness and Children:
Learn the Rules, Entitled to Fail, Endowed to Succeed:
America’s Journey Back to Greatness, Choose to Be Great
Workbook and her classic fable, The Perfect Heart.
Contact Dawn ChooseToBeGreat@aol.com 918-605-1492. To learn
more visit www.TheHeartLink.com, www.DawnBillings.com,
www.TheHeartAlliance.com