Hello, my friends. This is Brett Kiesling of the EO podcast network. You're about to meet Jessie's guests who are three great employee owners at Anessa services. And Dessa is a great Aesop that has appeared on our prior podcast episodes. Ron Schiess CEO of Endesa appeared with Jesse Tyler and I on episode 203 of the Aesop podcast, which you can
[email protected]. Jessie. And I also spoke with As marketing manager, Carrie Ann Geist. On episode 21 of the owner 200 podcast, which you can
[email protected]. We hope you'll check out these two great previous episodes and enjoy this new episode. Welcome to the Owner to Owner podcast with your host, Jesse Tyler, part of the EO Podcast Network. Welcome to the Owner to Owner podcast. It's great to have you with us. I'm Jesse Tyler. I work at Hypertherm, a 54 year old global manufacturing and technology company that is almost 2000 employee owners. I focus on employee experience and engagement across career stages. I do a lot with onboarding. Start new hires, helping them come in, get up to speed, start to learn what it's like to work in an employee-owned company with shared decision making and trying to work through career stages to learning the stories and advice of our pending retirees and working on participatory decision. Making forums like Problem Busters, which I actually learned about seven years ago from interviewing Butler Till who have also been guests on the podcast. So I do a lot of that kind of culture work. So the goal of the podcast is to have discussions about a range of ownership experiences. I think there's a r huge opportunity for the individual owner voice to come and you can hear different podcasts, different media. there's a lot of CEOs and heads of hr, and all of that is important. I'm not challenging or teasing that in any way, but I find the most interesting conversations after talking to literally thousands of people over 15 years being fascinated by. Employee ownership, culture, and experience. The most amazing voices are the ones that are never asked. And so the goal of this podcast is to bring different voices in so your peers at your company can hear themselves in your experience or new insights or people across industry can hear it as well. So kind of bringing ownership in to the folks that don't always go to conferences or have those opportunities. But it's great to welcome essa. I'm. Turn it over to each of you, Sarah, Becky, and Greg to do the intro. And if Sarah, if you could kick us off, I think it's a lot more interesting when a guest given overview of their company, then I research it and then hope to get that right. So if you could give a little ESSA overview and then introduce yourself, kind of like your role and what you do, and then we'll move on to Becky from there. That'd be great. Absolutely. Um, yeah, so ANDA services, we are a financial services company. Um, we service the life insurance and annuity space, um, and we build custom software applications and solutions for their products and services. We do some service aspect as well, but that's predominantly what, what, what we focus on every day. I am Sarah Engel. I am a project manager here at essa. I've been with the organization for a little over 11 years now. Great. Thank you Becky. A little bit about yourself and what you do at essa, please. My name is Becky Olds and my title is a Business Analyst at essa. I am what's called our Adjacent markets team. Essa got started in the Coley Bully Markets. Space about 40 years ago now, and we are also branching into the individual life and annuities market space, and that's what my team primarily handles. I was brought on a year ago, and I have been in the individual life insurance marketplace for almost 20 years, so I was able to bring that to the table. That's great, Greg. Sure. Hey, Jesse. I'm Greg Lansbury. I'm a systems development manager on our client implementation team. And client implementation team is a team that, you know, does a lot of projects, you know, new carriers, introducing new carriers to our environments and our solutions or larger efforts for existing existing carriers. I've been at Anesa for 16 years in January. It's, I would consider it my first. Real career job out of college. I started out as a software developer, so me being a systems development manager, managing six 16 developers. a lot of sense. That's great. That's great. Yeah, I, we have a similar tenure on February. I'll be 16 years at Hypotherm, so it's interesting to look back across that. So, we'll, we'll delve into that a little bit. Your reflections from each of you on tenure with that. So I'd like to do is start with acknowledging that employee owners. Tend to be, they, they, it is fair to accuse the average employee owner of having some enthusiasm around it, but it's not always the most translatable topic, whether it's somebody at the grocery store, a new coworker who found the idea appealing in the job ad or interviews. It does take a little bit to get a get. people to get their hands around it. So I wanna do is ask you a similar question that's intentionally layered a little bit, but how do you talk about ownership when you're out in the world and you're not around any employee owners? Sarah, if you could kick us off, how do you talk about eo? Yeah, so usually what I start off with is I say that my company is an esop and most people look at you and go. Esop and I'm like, employee stock ownership plan. Basically it means that as an employee owner, I own shares of the company's stock, and most people kind of look at you and go, okay, well, so what? What does that really mean? And it's like, okay, I can't fire my boss. It's not like that, but it means that all employees have an opportunity to own a piece of the company that I work for. That's great. That's great. Do you find that. Works for people, or do you, do you get multiple layers beyond that? That seems like a very succinct description. It seems like it seems really effective. What's, what's the kind of reaction that you get to that? Most people go, okay, that's pretty cool, so tell me more. That's cool. You know? And it, yeah, usually gets them to start asking more questions about what employee, what it is to work for an employee owned company. That's great. Becky, what are your thoughts? Well, how do you. So when I tell people that it's employee owned or an esop, I live in a pretty rural area, so they give me kind of a like, eh, and you know, confused look. And I try to equate it more to around here. We have co-ops, our farmers are owners of, and their stuff can go out and they get a share of that. So, How I equate it to a lot of the people in my area is comparing it to that and they're like, oh my gosh, that's so awesome. And you know, like it's in a white collar, you know, like not a farming sort of situation. No. So they always think that that's fun. That's great. That's great cuz it gives 'em something sort of a comparable to relate to. That's great. Greg, how do you talk about ownership when you're around folks that aren't familiar with it? Similar to, similar to Becky, probably for me, I find that the, the, probably the most effective way of describing employee ownership is to relate it to a form of ownership that. They, they might have. So the easiest example for me is the comparison is, is a home and specifically a home that's shared by multiple members of a family. For example, a spouse, children, everyone living in that home has a responsibility to some degree for ensuring it's taken care of. If someone slacks on their responsibilities. You know, whether it's paying the mortgage, paying the utility bill, fixing the leaky roof, taking the garbage out, it has an impact to everybody living in the home, not just the individual that slacked on. The responsibility is the home shared by everybody. So those decisions may impact the home for everybody that lives in it. So I kind of, I like to relate it to something that makes a little more sense to, to individual. That's great. And other ESOPs and new ESOPs that are trying to figure out how to take that already from what you've shared from the three of you. That's, those are super examples of ways to relate it to the home, to the farms, to the, the shares and things. That's great. That's, it's fun to have these conversations. All right, so bringing it a little bit closer to home, we'll come back to Sarah for this. How do you describe the experience of employee ownership to your friends and family closer to home? Yeah, so I kind of explained to them, Because everybody in the company is an owner. Everyone in the organization has a vested interest in seeing the company succeed and be profitable. When employees know they have a stake in the company and their work per performance can affect that value, they have a shared concrete motivation to succeed and stay at the organization. Nice, nice. Becky for you, friends and family. I, I explain it in a way that from my background and where I came from, micromanagement was a very big deal, right? And I'm like, we're all employee owners here, and so we. Understand that we have a vested interest, that this is our company and therefore we need to trust each other to do our very best. And like the micromanagement that I have seen is incredibly small. like if anything here, especially compared to where I came from. So I just tell them that I'm like, I don't have anybody breathing down my neck. They trust me and respect me and know that I'm doing my best because I also have a vested interest in this company. That's great. Greg, what about for you with friends and family? Yeah, sure. Driving into my exam, my specific example we look forward is, Hey dad, you remember that time that I didn't take the garbage? and you kind of were upset. Upset. I get it now. You know, so that that's, it's sort of like that. I'll drive it down to that layer and. And as simple as that really. That's great. Yeah, we just, I just came from onboarding five new hires and Yeah, I've on after all these years as we run the company on care and trust, it takes a lot of new hires coming in a little while to get used to the, you know, to Becky's comment about, you know, specifically about the, the micromanagement where, you know, from day one, we wanna support, we want to coach, we wanna develop and all of that, but we are gonna trust you. do what you say you're gonna do. We have paid volunteer time, and occasionally we get the question, do I need to bring back like evidence that I went, like something signed or a picture? I'm like, well, we'd love to have the picture if you're willing to share it. In our internet globally, we'd love to share pictures of smiling associates using their community service time. But for some folks coming in, it's, that's a hard thing to get used to, is that we trust you to, to come and go and manage your time. And so it's, it's interesting to hear your. Your perspectives, and I think something I'll add is I'm thinking a lot more this year about peer pressure, where it's, you know, how we can talk a little bit later about in our conversation about leadership and whether it's different or not at a, at an employee-owned company. But it's very interesting if the peers are helping each other, coaching each other and helping with accountability can make for a very different environment. Greg, you mentioned 16 years, so I want to start the question here. So we've talked about non-owners, we've talked about friends and family. Let's just say that you and I are teaming up to do an onboarding. And you had to talk about ownership their first day. How do you talk to a new, new coworker about employee ownership? Yeah, maybe for, for me, it's easiest for me if I can connect it to the work that you're specifically doing as a, as a coworker. Maybe I'll give an example as my perspective, going back 16 years as a developer in the organization, so I interacted, for example, I interacted directly with clients a lot as a developer during, under a different organizational structure. And I like to believe that that creates that unique perspective that I, that I have, especially with other developers at esa, but not just developers. So I'm very genuinely curious about everybody's work and what they. I understand how important the work that they do is for themselves and for their clients, and I like to leverage it to help them understand that employee ownership is much more meaningful and powerful than theoretical examples. So the real things that they do is better than those theories. Yeah. So as we discuss what they're doing, I like to search for opportunities per to provide guidance by asking questions to help draw connections from their. To employee ownership. So maybe I'll give an example. I empathize with how in the weeds a developer can be. I like to get the team to step up, we call it on the balcony, and widen their perspective out of it. What is the impact of that? One line of code you're writing? Is that line of code needed written well defect free? Will the next developer understand what it means? So in the moment of problem solvings, those, those questions aren't really immediate. Come to mind, but taking a moment to understand that impact of what we are doing helps build ownership character and to ensure we're taking care of Anesa, our clients, all the other employee owners that that line of code supports and ourselves. So it's just, it's just a little bit more than that one, one little line of code that they're, they're writing. So that's how I like to do it right down to the work that they're doing. that's. That's great. Becky, what about for you with new, new coworkers, how do you bring ownership to life? I, I try to explain how ESSA is, so it's interesting, Greg is actually sort of my inspiration for this because in our first 90 days, we're expected to have manager meetings. With all of this senior leadership team and we set up these meetings and we go in and we, you know, ask any questions that we're able to ask and, you know, have a conversation and get to know each and everybody. And it really helps you get a better idea of ESSA as a whole, you know, where we're coming from, where we're going, and one of. My question that I asked most of the managers that I met with was, if there is one thing you could change about essa, what would it be? And Greg's answer was the one that really like got me to understand. And so I use this now when I talk to new employee owners, he said, and this is not verbatim, so I'm sorry Greg, that I don't remember word for word, but he told me that. Wanted people coming into Anesa, so not necessarily anesa itself, but to help the new people coming in understand that we want them, how they are, that they, that it's a good organization, that we trust them and we accept them, and we hired them for a reason. And that is what I share with. Owners who come on board and it's something I have never experienced before and neither have they. So it's building trust with them and letting them know that the face you see coming from senior leadership and your coworkers is real. Yeah. Is real. Right. We are not trying to fool you. We're not trying to build you up just so we can tear you down. We genuinely. and we want you here. That's great. Yeah. It can be. I was thinking about this recently is you see on LinkedIn like 70% of people leave leaders or, or bad relationships. They don't leave organizations. So whether that's true or not, that means 70% of the people we have on our next launch day, our next, you know, day one, hire day can, you know, might be coming in with some. Wounds, bruises. Mm-hmm. and dismay. And we actually had, this morning, we had somebody that had a really hard time with competencies and expectations that a prior company was led to them leaving. And I, I understood after that. That was why there was this, a very targeted question about our competencies and what they really mean, and if that's a behavior type of thing. It's a very pointed question and, and it was hard to know that it was apparently why he. and otherwise successful company that it didn't matter. So it's almost like flipping it a little bit is like, your voice matters. We're gonna meet you where you are, and in its own way. I, I observe, be a little bit jarring to people like, I've wanted this, but gimme a little while to get used to it because I haven't experienced it in a long time, or I haven't experienced it before. So I appreciate the perspective and a. Greg was able to have that impact on you. Sarah, what about for you? So I think for me it's really showing them examples of our culture every day. I think we really facilitate and have an employee ownership culture here, and you see it every day in, in what people do. So it's not out of the norm for coworkers to go above and beyond for each other. It's not out of the norm to see friendships that evolve outside of work, to see people that jump at the chance to support each other and be there for each other. All because that common goal is to see the company succeed, to see the company grow, to see us meet our, you know, our objectives. So I, I think you, at this company in particular, I think you see it every day in our culture. And what better way to show a new employee. This is what the ownership mindset looks like. This is what the ownership culture is by showing them how we do it every day. Yeah, that's great. And and I'll say is if you don't see it, you don't hear it, you don't feel it, then it isn't there. It's just you have to be able to hear it. You have to be able to measure it. You have to be able to know the cadence. So with that in mind, I'm curious. You know, specific to essa, if you want to go there or more broadly just with leadership. It's been the theme in your comments so far. So is leadership different, and Sarah, we'll start with you. Is leadership different at an employee-owned company than what you've experienced in. In other companies or see friends and family experiencing in other companies. So I think the leadership structure is the same. Certainly we have the same hierarchical structure that any other company would have. We have C-suite executives, you know, we have directors, we have leaders. But I think what you see the difference is the level of engagement. I think having one-on-one conversations with the ceo, the cfo, the cio, They happen on a regular basis, a daily basis. You know, I just think that they're more involved and engaged with everybody else in the organization where I tell people that, I'm like, oh, I just had a great conversation with, you know, the CIO yesterday and they're You did. And it's like, yeah, I do all the time. Like that's, that's just part of, that's part of our culture. That's how, how it works in, in our company. And I think that's what's special about ESOPs and that's what's special about our ESOPs. That's great. Is that's great connection to leadership. Yeah. Thank. Becky, do you, how do you see leadership, just your general thoughts on leadership in an employee owned company? From my experience here, it's very, it's more ground up, right? We teach our, I guess if you look at a hierarchical structure, right? Because regardless if you want that or if your company believes in that operating like that, you need to have managers and whatever. So that way we're. Someone to keep us on the right track. It's ground up leadership. We are teaching everybody from day one, the foundations of being a leader. Our onboarding suite is full of how to help yourself first, how to find your purpose, how to find or how to work with coworkers or maybe difficult people, how to run meetings. I. Onboarding that I was immediately being set up for success and to become a leader, should I want that. That's great. Greg, what about for you? Yeah, so another interesting perspective is I was an non-manager and a manager. So I mean, I know a leader is a different than that, but you know, you learn some things from the two different sides of it and. What I, what I see is, you know, a lot of leadership intent. It's, it's setting, you know, given the power of the information, power to the individuals who have the information, let them have the autonomy to drive change, challenge the process. A lot of ground up things that Becky, Becky is talking about. And when decisions need to happen at the, you know, management, you know, leadership level, it's clear that you know that it's a people. Organization that ESSA is and they're carefully made, all those decisions are carefully made in the benefit of the employee owners. That, that perspective comes to me after I've, you know, made my way into management and seen it from that level. And understanding how much time and effort and thought goes into making sure that we make the right decisions for everybody in the organiz. Yeah, that's great. I think it's, it is an interesting one to look at the leadership cuz of the, from the ground up to borrow from Becky and just looking at your voice matters. You know, sort of helping people get used to using that for good, even if that's asking that hard question. but then for leaders and managers at a play own company, you have a, the most engaged, you know, most vocal people possible. So it's gotta be a completely different experience. It sounds like, you know, for you it's been rewarding and engaging and valuable, but it's, it's something, you know, if you, if it's quiet and there's micromanage, micromanagement will bring some quiet because no one wants to speak up. But what if everybody feels that they can speak up and everyone can challenge everything? So it's fun to, fun to take a look at that a little bit. So at. Fairly personal questions coming up. I want to ask you, and, and I'll start with you, Greg, what does ownership mean to you? And then we'll go back around and just have a little bit of fun with if in, in today's conversation, if you describe ownership in three words, what would they be? So if we could start with the big ownership question, what does employee ownership mean to you? So the first word that comes to mind, and it's the big one for me, is, is a mindset. And it's a, it's a question is how do you care for something that is your. And to me it's pride of ownership, but it goes more than just yourself. It's amplified when you're sharing that with others. So when I share it with Becky and Sarah here, it's, it's a much larger pride that I have of that ownership. So my responsibilities may differ, differ from Sarah and Becky, but I'm equally as account accountable for Andes Health and Results. As any of my fellow employee owners, I share a responsibility. Our successes and, and our challenges. And that's what encourages me, that mindset to take initiative day to day, to ensure that, you know, we keep this company around for a hundred years or longer. That's great. That's great. Becky, for you, what does, what does employee ownership mean to you? It, it means that what I do matters. How I treat others to helps them if they're going to stay or not, right. How I treat customers and support them. Matters for my retirement and the rest of the company and the valuation, and if we can continue to be successful. So employee mindset, I feel like I have so much more value here than I have anywhere else. Great. Thank you for sharing that. Sarah, what about for you? What does ownership mean to you? So for me it, it really means that the decisions that I make every day not only define that exact situation, that exact moment, but it shapes the future of our company. I think for me, the things that I use to describe ownership are a sense of commitment, sense of engagement. and sense of security. I think Becky just said it too, you know, there is that retirement security that comes with, with being an esop, that additional layer of, of retirement savings that, that I know are going to to help in the long run. That's great. So, Thinking of your customers, thinking of the people that you take care of with your services, how does employee ownership impact you? Have them in mind? How does it impact how you work? This is a personal question, so I want to be fair that occasionally when I ask this question with other employee owners, there's an occasional almost defensiveness, like, I don't work any harder because I work in an employee-owned company, and there's that, and other times there's a more, there's a different reaction. So I want to. Give you all permission, but just really thinking about how deeply entwined you are with your customers and how customer focused you're, you're known to be just on a per level. Starting with Sarah, how does being an employee owner impact how you take care of your customers? So I, I think. For me, it honestly just shows in everything we do every day. So I think they're seeing, they're seeing that cohesiveness, they're seeing that camaraderie and support that we give each other and then in turn give to them. So, so I think it's really, I don't think we act any differently to your point. I don't think we change the way that we treat our clients or anything like that, but I think because we. Because we have this owner ownership mindset. Our clients see that in the products we deliver and the services we deliver in the relationships that we have with them. I think it just shows. That's great. Thanks. This, this is probably the hardest question I'm asking all of you today, so I appreciate you're playing along. Becky, what are your thoughts to go off of Sarah? I, again, I don't think that we try to treat our customers any differently than we would have if we were at another company. I think our culture helps us support them better. I think they see that. We want to support them and that we have coworkers that support us in supporting them, and they just feel like they get that much better service when we come to them and we're able to let them know that, hey, we are working on this right now. And they know with the type of company they are that we truly value, you know, them coming to us and our help and we want to do what's best. That's great. That's great, Greg. What, what does, how does ownership impact how you take care of your customers? Yeah, I, I would, I would tend to agree with, you know, Sarah and Becky, that I wouldn't think that it would change all that much. I feel, I feel like maybe the quality of the product might come out a little bit better because we're looking at things from maybe, maybe my one line code example earlier. We're looking at things a little bit more holistically and how can we make things better? Always. And then ultimately that's gonna affect them longer term. But that's a, that's a mindset and you know, an ownership mindset, I believe somewhat existed if not entirely existed before we transition to an esop anyways. Yeah, that's great. That's great. When I've, when I've been pushed and I'm stirring the pot on this question with, you know, coworkers or talking to conferences, my personal belief is that if you. A service provider, a business partner that feels safe, is met where they are and who they are and is really passionate about your success being, their success then is bound to be a completely different different experience. So while I respect. Differing views. I don't personally agree with people who say it's not different working at an employee-owned company. I work just as hard, it's very different. If you can just turn around, I could, you know, I could pause this and go get 20 people to help me in the next minute. In your own version, remote or otherwise, you could do the same thing. And then when clients and business partners, customers pick up on that, it's, it's just very compelling. So it's a lot of fun to see each of. Kind, kind of bring that perspective, so I appreciate it. All right, so we're gonna try to take a big, big topic and trim it down in this moment to three words. So this is not as super strict. If you can do the three words awesome, by half the time people can't contain it to three, you're certainly welcome after to give color. But Greg, if you wanna kick us off, what three words would you use today to describe employee ownership? I might have talked a little bit about some of these in my, my prior comments, but the three words I have are. And as an employee that thinks and acts like an owner is taking responsibility, they understand and take their role seriously and are certain that it matters and take pride in their work. To be an owner is one thing, but to be a proud owner is an attitude that creates excellence. So pride is definitely one of them. This one. The second one's a little. It's it's, I don't have to explain it, but it's stewardship. It's close to ownership most of the time, I would say, but it's ever so slightly throttled back to avoid individuals taking complete control over something. So to be a steward, you can't be possessive. You understand it. Your contributions are for a cause bigger than. That's the enterprise mindset. Total systems thinking. And that gets me to the last word that I have is teamwork. It's not you or me, it's us. We're all accountable for taking care of the care of our company. And like I said before, our responsibilities differ across the individuals, but we all share the same responsibility of thinking and acting for the betterment of each other and, and, and Assa. We all own it together, so we all need to work together. Very nice. Thanks for kicking that. Becky, three words to describe ownership. Well, I think responsibility is the number one you feel responsible for your clients, for your coworkers, for your company as a whole. And I will take a gr Greg word that he's used a lot today. Holistic. I think when you get into the employee ownership mindset, look at the company. As a whole in how to make it better and in its entirety, and how it all works together and functions together, and where are there places that you can make improvements. Third, I will go with entrepreneurial. You are an owner. and what your ideas can play into it, and you can bring your ideas to the table and know that people are going to listen to them and take them seriously and run with them if there's something that will work. And. At essa if nowhere else, I've seen the entrepreneurial spirit being taken above and beyond. You know, we are always looking for new ideas, things to improve upon, and for people to enact those without necessarily getting permission to do so. If it's a small change, do it By all means, make it better. Nice. Sarah, three words. Yes. I think I hit on my three before, but I'll go into to a little bit detail around them. So my, my first is commitment and I think on so many levels. Commitment, I think commitment of each other, you know, to each other. Each of us commits to bringing our best every day. Each of us commits to making and us the best place that it can be. Giving our clients the best experiences and commitment that you tend to see with ESOPs that people commit and stay at the organization much longer because of that culture and mindset. Engagement is my next word, and I think it all plays off of. You know, Becky and Greg said, it's the teamwork, it's the engagement in what you're doing. It's the engagement with each other. It's the, the camaraderie, the support that the team building, all of the work that, that we do every day to, to be engaged with our clients, be engaged with each other, be engaged with ourselves and, and it's security. It's, you know, I talked a little bit about this before, but it's the security. It's the long term wealth potential that can be there and the wealth building, it's just one more in addition to your 401k, it's another wealth building, you know, plan and it can help set you up for an even more successful retirement. So it's certainly a positive thing from a, from a wealth building and security standpoint. That's great, and I'm glad you added that as well. It's an interesting when you welcome new co-owners, new, new employees. they need to stick around for a while. ESOP is a long term game in a world right now that certainly in. I'm in my fifties. I've never experienced such a short-term view from, from folks with just being worried about the economy and the environment and the politics and all those other things. So it's an interesting to sell that long-term game that if you stick around for several years. And so something that I emphasize with the onboarding we talk about, I talk about a lot is this, what does it feel like to come to work? So even as you're, you're building those days and weeks to month towards your, your wealth generation, you know, how does it. Frankly, how does a bad day feel? And if a bad day feels like you can shake it off and come back again tomorrow and, and drive up again, then that's likely a better work experience than, than the average worker. So I appreciate the way, the different aspects that you, you all brought to that. So I wanna give the endesa culture a shoutout. I would like you to pick something that your company does really well around ownership, ownership culture, communi. You can pick from that. But what's something that you're really proud of, you think does well, because this is a intent of the podcast, is to just keep sharing great ideas, keep bringing voices to other, other connections, to other ESOPs. So Sarah, if you wanna kick it off, what's something around ownership culture that you can share that ESSA has as a strength? So I think we're, we're coming off of one of the greatest examples of that at essa, and that was employee ownership month. We had a month long celebration of the benefits that being an ESOP provides to the owners, to the community, to the company. And we spent a lot of that time doing educational exercises, giveaways, raffles, and ways to get people engaged in really what it means to be an esop. I, I. Think I was so blown away. Even Becky and I are both part of the, the communications team that, that headed that and I think we planned it and, and we spent all this time doing it. I don't think I really, truly appreciated how impactful it was going to be until we went through all of the different events, activities and e education opportunities that we had. It was, it was really cool. So I think we do a really great job of educating our employee owners about ESOPs and, and the benefits that they. That's great. That's great. Thank you. Becky, what's, what's something that Endesa does really well you can add on or bring different topics, but what's something around ownership? Ownership culture that your company does a great job with? I think we do a great job setting each other up for success. That's great. It sounds like a nice place to work. It'll finish it's We'll finish with an opportunity for all of you to speak to future coworkers so that you can do some extra hiring help at the end. That's what we'll finish with, but that's great. Setting up your success. What about for Greg? What are your thoughts? Maybe in the same vein as Sarah, I think ESSA does a phenomenal job at education. You know, we have. Business acumen, financial literacy, continuous quality improvement. So all that information there that in the hands of an employee with a ownership mindset, that's a powerful com combination. That's where that environment for employee, employee owners will lev that that'll leverage your problem solving skills, their innovation, give 'em the autonomy to, you know, take Andes to new levels. I was at an N C E O conference a while back last year, I think it was, and there was a quote that came out of that that, that stuck with me and, and that's how I answered this question. They, they said that a knowledge is valuable and knowledge drives value. a knowledgeable workforce is an engaged workforce. So that circular deal there is That's great. Very interesting. That's great. Yeah, that's great. And empowering too. All right, so last personal question of our conversation today, we'd like to ask our guests, their, their eo their employee ownership Aha moment. So it wasn't the first time you heard of ownership, it was that moment you can reflect on if you have. where it's like, okay, this is gonna be a game changer. This is gonna be a big deal for me, or a big deal for my family. Do you have a moment, Greg, that you wanna share? Yeah, quite recently too. Um. Again, it goes back to the communication, all the, all the various ways that ESA communicates employee ownership talk topics. One of 'em really caught my attention and it quickly helped me realize how, how powerful the financial benefits of an ESOP can be. I didn't talk too much about the financial benefits. I'm very cultural oriented type individual, I believe. But this specific one was a wealth calculator that you plug in your parameters and it projects out and put the future. I know it's just a per projection and, but using conservative figures, you can really see where you, you can be and how it can benefit you and your family in the future. And it's, it's, to your point, Jesse, earlier, it's the long game and they've really helped energize me, you know, to, to, you know, continue to improve ESSA and help all of us for the future. That's great. Thank you for sharing that. Becky, did you have an EO aha moment that you would like to share? Yes. I'm going to, I don't know if it's necessarily eo, but it's ESSA specific. Great, great. Which every year is eo, so Yes, it was. So I'm a remote employee. I live in Wisconsin and ESSA's out of Pennsylvania, so I've been to the home office twice and I think the My aha moment was the second time I went to visit and one of my coworkers picked me up at the airport and we were driving over and. Kind of we were hired or we started on the same day. So we're kind of comparing our notes, you know, like, this is how, what I've noticed, this is what I've noticed. And I think it hit us both at the exact same time. This is where we belong. Like we have something that we can contribute and, and Dessa needs us. Like we, neither one of us and we are both in different places in our career, worked for different kinds of companies and we're like, I've never felt needed. And that is an empowering feeling when you know your company needs what you provide and your strengths and that you bring them to the table and that. My aha moment and I will, I'm pretty sure it was hers too, was that car ride. And we had the most effective and efficient and like quality car ride for our company that you could imagine Like just laying out all the things that we could see that just we could improve on. Right? That's right. And we know that we can start these things and. Put them into play and it's going to make the company better like it's in our hands. So that was great, our haha moment. That's great. Thanks for sharing that. Sarah, do you have an o aha moment or an Endesa moment that you would like to share, I do. I do. So I was at the organization before we became an ESOP and before we even started talking about an esop. So I have the benefit of seeing the organization. Changed over these last, for me, 11 years. And I would say that my aha moment came when I started to see the organization transition to an ownership mindset. You know, when I started hearing my fellow employee owners talking more strategically about the long term of the company at the company's future, when words and phrases like innovation, total systems, mindset, operational, ex excellence, all became part of the lexicon, Andes. That was really the aha moment. So it wasn't maybe a singular moment. It was, it was when I had that moment to step back and realize how much had changed from when I started at a not employee-owned company to being in a full-fledged employee-owned company and realizing how magical that was to, to be able to have witnessed the evolution over the. that's great to be able to have that perspective and to see that at in Greg as well, where you, you, you make that giant leap together and then it's neat to hear your vernacular change and strategy is at the surface and toolkit is always at hand. That's wonderful. Well, let's stretch that a little bit and starting, starting with Sarah. The, the hiring environment is very challenging and people are reacting to. The reality is we haven't even gotten to the hard part yet. So with the long-term view, as owners, this is a chance to promote your company and maybe catch that critical person that you need to join you at essa. If you want, the floor is yours, why should they join you at essa? What's great about working at edessa so you can hook maybe a few more future employee owners from participating in this podcast. What are your thoughts? My answer is short the people. So I have such meaningful relationships with my fellow employee owners that I've worked with some for over a decade. These people make me wanna do my best every day. They challenge me every day to be the best person I can be. Not just employee owner, not just, you know, and as a project manager, the best person I can be every day. They make me bring my best to the table because I wanna show up for them. I wanna be there for them. I wanna be that support for them every. So it's hands down, always has been and always will be the people we have here. That's great. Thank you. Becky. I'll play a little bit off of what Sarah said and I'm just going to take a another step and go. Culture I, I use this comparison. With our COO one day, which to me, coming from external companies where there are thousands of people and you report up to a C E O or COO or cfo and you don't actually see them like they have no idea who you are. They don't whatever these people do. But here is, I think, so I worked at a company that had a culture. They did their culture well. They. but it, but what happens is you go there and you are a slab of rock and that company chips away, chips away, molds you, moves, you grinds away into what they believe you should be. You know, they turn you into the employee that that company needs. I came to essa and within the first three months I could see this difference. And Dessa is more of a living, breathing thing. It supports you. It's like a trellis or plants that are working together to support each other to grow, right? So they support you as you are in the environment and allow you to thrive and grow and become the best person you can be to that organization. They hire. For you. They plant your seed as the seed that it is supposed to be, and they don't change you. They just support you to become the most best. Thriving one out there. That's great. That's great for somebody in that 70% not enjoying their, not having a healthy relationship or a healthy work environment. I think the two of you have put some pressure on Greg to finish the conversation with why, why essa? So Greg, with your, with your tenure, with your, your leadership management experience, well, why ESSA for somebody else? Well, first of all, I love Sarah and Becky. Answers. I thought that they were really good, but for me, you're not gonna find much of a different answer here. Even at the management la layer here, hands down. My favorite part of ESSA is the culture. It's made up of some seriously special, supportive and kind people. Um, everyone genuinely, and that's the word, genuinely cares about the success and growth of e growth of everybody else around them. It, it's not, it's not an everyone out, out for themselves type of environment. It truly feels like we're one. Rowing in the same direction, sharing a common purpose. Sometimes you hear the employee owners of ESSA referred to as a, as a family, and that's a powerful word, but it actually applies here. And I don't think that all companies can say that. That's great. That's great. Well, I really appreciate the conversation today and the insights that you've shared. It's great to meet you on this call and, and have this exchange. This is what I do this podcast for, to amplify, amplify the voices like yours and the insights from the, the worker owners giving the culture the business. You know, the customer reach and support insights that you did. So I really appreciate it. So thanks to our listeners. This is Jesse Tyler with the Owner to Owner Podcast on the EO Podcast Network. We encourage you to work employee owned, eat, employee owned, and. Shop, employee owned, whether that's Co-ops, ESOPs or otherwise. So again, really appreciate the, the voices today from Odessa, and I wish you all the very best. Thank you very much. We'd love to hear from you. You can find us on Facebook at EO Podcast Network and on Twitter at ESOP podcast. This podcast has been produced by Brett Kesling for the EO Podcast Network. Original music composed by Max Kesling, branding and Marketing by Bitsy Plus Design. And I'm Bitsy McCann.
