Managing a winning team!
This past football season has been exciting and I can't wait to see the upcoming Super Bowl showdown between two great teams, the New Orleans Saints and the Indianapolis Colts. While they are not competing in the Super Bowl, one team which really stood out for me this past season was the New York Jets. A recent NY Times front page story about Rex Ryan, went into great detail on how it was the rookie Coach's leadership that turned around the Jets and made them a Super Bowl contender. While Coach Ryan's leadership turned this team around, he did not do it alone. Coach Ryan spoke loudly and often about the talent that surrounded him, until the players believed every word he said. Rex Ryan changed the way people felt about coming to work. But the team's hard work, great talent and enthusiasm made all the difference. Too often, the press glorifies one leader when there is a whole team that is actually making it happen. Ultimately, the New York Jets great turnaround story reminds me of the great turnaround we made at Signature Community in 2009.
We had the same winning record with Signature this past year.
We started with a team that didn't communicate, lost a lot of money, had no bench strength, and everybody was running in different directions. We changed that by setting out clear goals (97% occupancy, 70% resident retention and operating in the black); we created a real time communication protocol (daily huddles and weekly calls, training and best practice calls); we engaged one another (Signature Ideas Teams); we are creating a bench (STAR Center training), we even look like a winning team (Signature shirts).
The differences are pretty clear from just 15 months ago and will continue to get better with a team of 100 working on making us better, not just a team of three. Over the past year, we have changed our culture from complacency to urgency, from bureaucracy to lean and from good to great. Everyone at Signature jumped in and made this happen and can take pride in the fact that we are a better company today because of your contributions.
Great job everyone for getting us on the right track!
Thanks for making it happen in 2009
Nick
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