Penney’s, FactoryMade Team Up (Nicki Loizzi)

Penney’s entered a three-year partnership with FactoryMade Ventures — an entertainment-oriented consultancy that under a previous incarnation helped Hasbro bring Transformers and G.I. Joe to the silver screen and got HSN to blend online gaming and e-commerce.

“It is part of the FactoryMade DNA to understand that entertainment combined with modern technology has the power to ignite and bolster customer engagement,” said John Fogelman, chief executive officer of FactoryMade, who has worked with J.J. Abrams, Michael Bay, Kevin Spacey and others. “As J.C. Penney begins to reimagine their future, our creative engineers will help mine opportunities that will revolutionize their storied brand.”

Fogelman said Hollywood can help retailers better connect to their customers emotionally.

“If you step back and think about what Hollywood is actually, what it is great at it is it’s great at emoting,” he said. “Great storytellers can drive great emotion.”

And right now Fogelman said there is almost a “sadness” in malls.

“It doesn’t feel like it’s an event to go to a store today and if they’re really going to compete with the…convenience of shopping online, [shoppers] are going to have to feel that this is an event.”

Fogelman said he has a couple of ideas for Penney’s, but that nothing is set. Anything could be in the offing with Johnson overhauling Penney’s pricing and reshuffling the store, replacing the center core of the store into a service-oriented area called Town Square.

“J.C. Penney is partnering with the best, most innovative marketing and branding firms in the country,” said Michael Francis, the former Target Corp. executive who is now president of J.C. Penney Co. Inc. “Working alongside our talented in-house creative team, FactoryMade and our other key agency partners will be leading the charge in engaging customers and transforming J.C. Penney into America’s favorite store.”

Established in September, FactoryMade was previously part of talent agency William Morris Endeavor and was called Skunkworks.

Employees No Longer Baggage, but Blessing (Tierra W.)

Marketing 101 teaches that the focus must be on the product and its attributes, but it’s also coming to recognize the role of employees as brand ambassadors — not just as the “face” of a brand in campaigns for companies such as Pizza Hut and Overstock.com, but also in an important behind-the-scenes role for companies such as Kraft Foods, where employees serve as everything from focus group participant to product developer and social-media evangelist.

Put simply, employees — who became collateral damage during the recession as companies downsized — are now emerging as brands’ best assets.

While employees have always been the front line of customer interactions for brands, particularly those in the service industry, a number of factors of late have brought them more to the fore, including a more transparent and socially engaged society, a still-fragile economy where everyday value trumps aspirational brand attributes, and an ongoing lack of trust in corporate America and CEO spokespeople.

“It’s moved from treating employees as a liability when it comes to communicating to now treating them more as an asset of engaged people who live and breathe your brand,” said Rohit Bhargava, author of “Personality Not Included” and senior VP-strategy and planning at Ogilvy. “Employees need to be a part of the marketing supply chain,” said Jim Speros, CMO of Fidelity Personal, Workspace and Institutional Services. “Many companies forget that their employees are their ultimate brand ambassadors.”

Overstock hasn’t. Its new TV spot features those ambassadors as stars, some 30 of them singing while they work at jobs from customer service to warehouse shipping as they get ready for the holiday season.

“It’s the world of social that we live in. Consumers want to deal with a real company,” said Stormy Simon, Overstock senior VP-marketing and customer care, who herself has appeared in previous ads. “We’re showing our employees as the face of our company in this age where in the last few years, people have lost some trust [in corporate America]. These are people you can relate to … our real employees, and we’re letting them do their thing. You no longer need to hear it from the CEO.”

In fact, you may not want to hear it from the CEO. “If we went out and had the president of Pizza Hut say how ‘We really care about you and the food we’re making for you,’ I just don’t think it rings quite as true,” said Kurt Kane, VP-marketing at Pizza Hut, which recently introduced a campaign themed “Your Favorites. Your Pizza Hut” that features eight actual restaurant employees. “Right now, with consumers’ financial challenges, if they’re spending money they want something they know they will get value out of. We’re showing them that what they’re spending their money on, someone really cared about making.” The Pizza Hut ads also serve an internal purpose, generating buzz inside the company and among franchisees. At a recent franchisee conference, Mr. Kane introduced the eight “stars” of the ads to a standing ovation. Morale is up as well, he said, and the ads help set the recruiting and customer-service bar for potential Pizza Hut employees.

Take, for example, Kraft, which has begun using an app dubbed “Foodii” (pronounced “foodie”), an internal online community of about 2,000 employees it uses to gather information before doing formal market research. The goal is not only to get to market faster and improve a product’s chance of success, but also to get employees engaged and give them an insider look at initiatives and products, a Kraft spokeswoman said.

Foodii was used recently to help choose a name for a new Jell-O Mousse Temptations flavor. Within 24 hours, Kraft got more than 100 ideas from employees, and the best were sent to external market research. The winner, “Chocolate Mint Sensation,” was suggested by an employee.

Kraft also used Foodii to test the preparation method, to find out if it should recommend one pot or two in advance of the introduction of its Homestyle Macaroni and Cheese Dinner. The spokeswoman said Kraft is looking to expand Foodii to get further diversity of employee opinions.

“Employees are the actual heart of the brand,” said Mr. Bhargava. “Yes, the products are important, but especially for service-based businesses, it’s all about the people. This is letting people connect with the people behind the brand, not just what you put in your mission statement.”

In other words, the employees have to understand and deliver what the brand is all about. “It’s one thing to make a promise in an advertisement, but if you haven’t let your employees know what that promise is, it’s going to backfire,” said Jennifer Schade, president of marketing consultancy JRS Consulting.”Employees want to feel like insiders, they want to know the scoop,” said Mary Gilly, marketing professor at the Paul Merage School of Business, University of California, Irvine.

To get that scoop, several weeks before the launch of Fidelity’s “Turn Here” campaign, the campaign was rolled out inside the company. An internal website explained the creative, detailed the positioning, offered FAQs and explained employees’ role in the message and ongoing process. More than 28,000 employees spent an average of eight minutes exploring the site, Mr. Speros said.

The plan was to make sure employees understand why “Turn here” is a solid strategy and serve up visible examples of it in emails, video posts and public forums. Fidelty hosted a breakfast club with 300 to 400 employees to talk about the campaign as part of the effort and worked with employee training to sync ad messaging with what was being taught on the front lines.

And it’s important to continue the effort beyond the ad campaign. Fidelity’s Mr. Speros advises creating and maintaining an internal marketing effort vs. “rocket flare” internal marketing or one-time only blasts to employees right before campaign launches.

“Build an internal communications campaign that is continual, so you’re always getting feedback and staying connected,” he said. The result will be “more highly engaged employees, better morale and pride, and ultimately better business results.”

UAW at Kansas plant authorizes strike against GM (Tiffany)

DETROIT — Workers at a General Motors assembly plant in Kansas have voted to authorize a strike.

UAW Local 31 President George Ruiz said 90 percent of members who voted were in favor of authorizing a strike while 10 percent were opposed in voting that took place Thursday.

A strike authorization vote is often taken to give the union more leverage in its negotiations with an automaker.

Last week the 3,400 hourly workers at GM’s FairfaxAssembly Plant, which produces the Chevrolet Malibu and the Buick LaCrosse, rejected a proposed local contract.

Ruiz said contract talks between the UAW and GM to revise that proposal are scheduled to resume Monday.

Workers at the Fairfax plant are concerned about proposed changes to seniority rights.

A summary of the proposed agreement that workers rejected says the UAW began contract talks at the plant with a set of 250 demands submitted by the members.

“Along with the UAW demands, management presented over 50 initiatives that launched attacks on our seniority rights, transfer provisions, wages and numerous hard-fought issues that we had successfully negotiated over the years,” John Melton, chairman of UAW Local 31, says in a letter to members included in the proposed contract.

The Fairfax plant is a crucial plant for GM, especially this year.

The first 2013 Chevrolet Malibu Eco, with the company’s fuel-saving start-stop technology, was shipped from the plant last Thursday. The 2013 Malibu is one of GM’s most important new cars this year.

The Malibu was GM’s second-best selling car in 2011, and LaCrosse was the top-selling vehicle for the Buick brand. The Malibu also is produced at GM’s Detroit-Hamtramck assembly plant.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/breaking/chi-uaw-at-kansas-plant-authorizes-strike-against-gm-20120127,0,4997311.story

Why employees are satisfied but not engaged [Casey G]

High levels of job satisfaction don’t necessarily translate into an engaged workforce. That’s the key finding from research by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), which found U.S. employees are generally satisfied with their jobs, but only moderately engaged.

For example, while 83 per cent of survey respondents reported overall satisfaction with their current jobs, only 68 per cent felt passion and excitement about their work, and only 52 per cent felt completely plugged in at work.

Those focused on driving organizational performance may be tempted to throw up their hands and ask how this can be the case.

But the survey results offer valuable insights that can help organizations identify gaps in their employment proposition. The results show that, overall, employees are fairly satisfied with key attributes of their jobs, including:

• Relationships with co-workers (76 per cent).
• The work itself (76 per cent).
• Opportunities to use skills and abilities (74 per cent).
• Relationship with immediate supervisor (73 per cent).

But other aspects of the work experience were seen as falling short, and had considerably fewer respondents reporting satisfaction. These included:

• Career advancement opportunities (42 per cent).
• Career development opportunities (48 per cent).
• Communication between employees and senior management (54 per cent).
• Job-specific training (55 per cent).
• Management recognition of employee job performance (57 per cent).

SHRM cautions, however, that the areas of discontent could pose a challenge for employers, especially as the economy improves. “As we come out of the recession, the war for talent will be back on. When that happens, there is the potential for turnover, given the dissatisfaction that employees seem to have with the real or perceived lack of advancement opportunities.”

In essence, the survey results suggest many employees are comfortable, but not inspired. They are content with their jobs and immediate work environments, but don’t feel especially connected to their organizations and corporate objectives.

To achieve high levels of organizational performance, however, you need employees who think and act like owners, who are proactive, and who consistently deliver their very best.

But to inspire such commitment, organizations need to deliver more than a steady pay cheque. High levels of engagement require clear objectives, open communication, visible leadership and effective rewards and recognition. Employees are also more willing to support company growth when they themselves have opportunities to grow and develop.

Original article

“If You’re Really Unhappy, Just Leave.” (Bethany R.)

Original Article: Morgan Stanley CEO To Disgruntled Employees: ‘If You’re Really Unhappy, Just Leave’

The CEO of one of the country’s largest investment banks has some choice words for any employees upset about the prospect of a smaller paycheck this year.

James Gorman, the head of Morgan Stanley, said that if his workers are so angry about their latest, trimmed-down paycheck, it’s probably time for them to go. Gorman stands in contrast with many of his executive counterparts, who have largely stayed silent on the issue of declining compensation, despite an industry-wide restructuring.

“I say [to disgruntled Morgan Stanley employees], listen, you’re naive, read the newspaper, number one,” Gorman said in an interview with Bloomberg Television. “Number two, if you put your compensation in a one year context to define your overall level of happiness, you’ve got a problem that is bigger than the job. And number three, if you’re really unhappy, just leave. Life’s too short.”

Morgan Stanley announced earlier this month that it would cap cash bonuses for 2011 at $125,000 and that its executives — including Gorman — wouldn’t be getting any cash bonuses, according to The New York Times.

Gorman and his employees at Morgan Stanley aren’t the only ones on Wall Street contending with smaller paychecks. Anxiety over the state of the global economy, slow dealmaking and a boost in public anger over the financial industry’s high pay have likely pushed firms to slash their compensation pools to the lowest level since the 2008 financial crisis, the Wall Street Journal reports.

And that’s for those that’ve kept their jobs. All told, Wall Street laid off more than 200,000 employees in 2011 alone.

“The world has changed and the banking industry has gone through a fundamental change and we have to readjust,” Gorman said in the interview.

Many workers have had trouble coming to terms with the new reality. Bonus day at Goldman Sachs last week was a “bloodbath,” one mid-level employee told CNBC, as some workers learned they would be taking home smaller bonuses this year — and some none at all. In addition, the firm cut the pay of some if its senior workers in half.

Investment bankers at Bank of America also found out earlier this week that their compensation would be slashed by 25 percent. That’s part of a larger push to cut total costs at America’s second-largest bank by as much as $8 billion per year.

Upset Fort Worth City Hall Employee Tips Off Star-Telegram’s Watchdog (Bethany R.)

Clearly one employee was in disagreement with the $40,000 decision to install employee showers for those who opt to bike to work or exercise during their lunch break at Fort Worth’s City Hall.

It seems that City Hall was rather justified in its decision, which could ultimately  save a significant amount of money in terms of medical costs and compensation of its employees. However, I’m curious as to how they went about addressing this plan that would make someone so distraught.

Original Article: Room to Change

Apparently at least one Fort Worth city employee was upset enough about a plan to spend $50,000 to install five showers at City Hall for workers who bike to the office or exercise during lunch that he or she tipped off the Star-Telegram’s Watchdog.

The tip wasn’t necessary; two local TV stations covered the story after the item appeared on a City Council agenda for approval.

The shower and locker rooms will provide two stalls for women, two for men and one that is accessible by people with disabilities. The money will come from the deferred replacement of an air-conditioning system at the Animal Care and Control Center that was scheduled for this year.

The shower project sounds reasonable and wise considering the city is self-insured and is promoting programs and activities to improve workforce wellness.

With a city staff the size of Fort Worth’s (6,200 full-time workers), if just 5 percent of inactive employees begin exercising it could produce savings of $500,000 a year in increased productivity and reduction of workers’ compensation and medical costs, according to a study by the Wellness Council of America and the National Coalition for Promoting Physical Activity.

Opponents of the expenditure, which turned out to be less than $40,000 according to the city facilities manager, argue that the showers will rarely be used since most employees live outside city limits and don’t bike to work.

Actually, more than 60 percent of the general employees live within city boundaries; about 2,500 work in or near City Hall.

It’s the majority of civil service police and fire employees who live beyond the city limits. And guess what? They already have access to city-provided locker rooms with showers.

In recent months, the city has created more than 10 miles of bicycle lanes as part of its Bike Fort Worth plan to help change the commuting culture. It makes sense to provide employee conveniences that might encourage others to use bicycles as a safe alternative to the automobile to get to work.

To bring about this change, bike commuters need a place to change.

Read more here: http://www.star-telegram.com/2012/01/27/3693696/room-to-change.html#storylink=cpy

36 Obama aides owe $833,000 in back taxes(Nicole C.)

http://news.investors.com/Article/599002/201201260818/obama-white-house-staff-b

How embarrassing this must be for President Obama, whose major speech theme so far this campaign season has been that every single American, no matter how rich, should pay their “fair share” of taxes.Because how unfair — indeed, un-American — it is for an office worker like, say, Warren Buffet’s secretary to dutifully pay her taxes, while some well-to-do people with better educations and higher incomes end up paying a much smaller tax rate. Or, worse, skipping their taxes altogether. A new report just out from the Internal Revenue Service reveals that 36 of President Obama’s executive office staff owe the country $833,970 in back taxes. These people working for Mr. Fair Share apparently haven’t paid any share, let alone their fair share.

Nearly one-third of Obama’s aides make more than $100,000 with 21 being paid the top White House salary of $172,200, each.The IRS’ 2010 delinquent tax revelations come as part of a required annual agency report on federal employees’ tax compliance. Turns out, an awful lot of folks being paid by taxpayers are not paying their own income taxes.

The report finds that thousands of federal employees owe the country more than $3.4 billion in back taxes. That’s up 3% in the past year.That scale of delinquency could annoy voters, hard-pressed by their own costs, fears and stubbornly high unemployment despite Joe Biden’s many promises. The tax offenders include employees of the U.S. Senate who help write the laws imposed on everyone else. They owe $2.1 million. Workers in the House of Representatives owe $8.5 million, Department of Education employees owe $4.3 million and over at Homeland Security, 4,697 workers owe about $37 million. Active duty military members owe more than $100 million. The Treasury Department, where Obama nominee Tim Geithner had to pay up $42,000 in his own back taxes before being confirmed as secretary, has 1,181 other employees with delinquent taxes totaling $9.3 million.

 

Medical Examiner Scandal

http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?section=news/iteam&id=8519382

They fact that they are loosing bodies is scary, but looking at this from an employee side there are lost of changes about to happen. They are changing how long the medical examiner can hold their position, so employees can make it easier to kick he or she out if something like this ever takes place again. I think that is a very smart idea. They have to be more public with their employees about the changes that they are making. It might be embarrassing for them to be working there right now, so they need to let the media know what is being done to solve the problem and change the work place. AB

USPS Postal Worker Hoards Mail for 10 Years (Kayla T)

Karen Samford, who has been a postal worker for 30 years has said for over 10 years she has been hoarding junk mail. She stored this mail in her home and in various storage units. 

“Karen Samford, a 72-year-old postal worker in Texas, has been suspended from her job after admitting she stole and kept literally truckloads of bulk mail over the last decade, MyFoxHouston reports (h/t The Consumerist). Her boss reportedly became concerned with the excess mail in her office and asked if she had stashed any elsewhere, to which she admitted to renting entire storage units to hold the junk mail.”

Grim Comp Day at Goldman Sachs (Amy Jesernig)

By Liz Rappaport

Call it comp day, compensation communication, or this year, D-Day.

Goldman Sachs employees came to work today and learned how much they’ll be paid above their base salary for 2011, and most of them are not jumping for joy, said people familiar with the matter

European Pressphoto Agency

Some Goldman bankers and traders learned they’re taking home a big goose-egg. Some partners’ total pay was slashed by approximately half, while some employees in its fixed income trading unit saw their total pay reduced by as much as 60%, said people familiar with the matter.

Some bankers are doubly miffed because their stock awards are priced as of the close of trading Thursday, and Goldman’s stock has been on the rise in the past couple of days, meaning the bankers won’t get the cheaper strike price for their stock awards.

Its shares closed under $100 a share through most of November and December, a discount to the company’s so-called book value, but as of mid-day Thursday Goldman’s shares were up 10% over the past day and a half to $107.20. The shares gained over 6% Wednesday, even though the company reported a more than 50% decline in its quarterly profits.

Goldman staffers aren’t allowed to cash in their stock awards for five years. Cash bonuses don’t hit their accounts until the end of January, said a person familiar with the matter.

Goldman’s pay was lower than it has been in most recent years. The company has been in cost-cutting mode, slashing 2,400 jobs in 2011 and reducing compensation and benefits expenses by 21% compared with 2010. The company’s average pay per employee fell to its lowest level since 2008, to $367,000, from $431,000 in 2010.

More than half of Goldman’s employees make less than $100,000 as their base salary, meaning the per-employee average is skewed by the upper echelons at the company, said a person familiar with the matter.

Approximately 50 partners left Goldman in 2011 in a mix of retirements, departures to do other things, and encouraged or suggested exits, said one person familiar with the matter. The 50 is a high number of partners to leave Goldman in one year, but it is on the back of three years where there was a dearth of natural attrition, the person said. Goldman typically has roughly just over 400 partners, and had been running with 480 for a while.

Comp day came and went for Morgan Stanley employees on Wednesday, the day before the company reported an earnings loss today. Bankers there already knew their cash bonuses would be capped at $125,000. One Morgan banker said everyone was quietly dreading Wednesday.

J.P. Morgan Chase employees and top executives began receiving bonus information this week, said a person close to the situation. The majority will know the amounts by the end of this week. The bonuses are expected to be close to amounts doled out last year for the top management, including Chief Executive Officer James Dimon, after the bank earned a record $19 billion for the year. Some parts of the bank will see compensation drop, like the investment bank and asset management, while others area like the credit card unit were up.

BofA also reported its earnings Thursday, a profit gain, but its bankers don’t find out their pay for another week, said a person familiar with the matter.

However sad bankers and traders may be on Wall Street on comp day, Main Street likely isn’t shedding much of a tear. The American median household income is just under $50,000 last time the government checked.

Source: Wall Street Journal