ESL lives its values by literally sharing growth with community

Three years ago, an ESL relationship banker helped a distraught member whose wife had just passed away. He said his wife had always taken care of everything, even the plants. He didn’t know where to begin. The banker told him, “You’ve come to the right place. I not only can help you with your financial questions, but bring me a clipping of your wife’s plant and I will have it here in case it doesn’t make it at home.” The banker helped the member through a truly difficult time, and kept his wife’s favorite plant alive and well … just in case.

Since then, every time someone asks about the plant, the banker recounts the story and offers them a clipping. To date, she has given out 38 clippings from the plant. Recently, the member returned to the branch to visit the banker, saying, “I’m not sure if you remember me, but I brought you a clipping of my wife’s plant. It looks like that one right over there.”

She responded with, “Of course I remember you. In fact, that IS your wife’s plant!” The banker proceeded to tell the member the story of all the people who have received clippings from his wife’s plant. He was so happy that he started to cry. He said he knew his wife was happy, too, knowing her favorite plant was being spread with such love.

What kind of corporate culture produces such compassionate bank officers? In this case, it’s one that emphasizes core values, rewards ethical behaviors and demonstrates extraordinary commitment to the community it serves.

ESL Federal Credit Union is a full-service financial institution serving more than 384,000 members and 13,300 businesses. More than a century old, ESL employs more than 870 in greater Rochester, and holds more than $9 billion in assets. The bank’s standing in the community, and among its employees, is ample evidence of a years-long effort to support a solidly ethical corporate culture.

ESL has set expectations for all employees to embrace five Core Values—Caring About People, Accountability, Teamwork, Integrity and Initiative—which were set forth by employees through a series of internal focus groups and surveys.

As a regulated financial institution, ESL is bound to the compliance standards of its governing body and deposit insurer, the National Credit Union Administration. But even beyond those industry standards, ESL has established a superb corporate culture and a sterling reputation in the community.

The company has established a number of channels to recognize employees who exemplify ESL’s Core Values. The Values in Practice Award is a monthly recognition that garners each winner a breakfast with the CEO. Departmental Honors recognize excellence in job performance, while On-the-Spot Rewards enable managers to give small tokens of thanks to awardees. ESL Honors top the ESL recognition pyramid. They are used to recognize about a dozen employees each year who excel in their position, have made a significant contribution to ESL and demonstrate excellence, service and/or leadership.

Job satisfaction at ESL is high. In a recent survey, about 93% of employees agreed with positive statements about the company’s mission, vision and values, with a 75% employee response rate. In addition, semi-annual, all-employee forums enable everyone to learn about how the organization is performing, meet new colleagues and share how employees are putting the ESL Core Values into practice.

ESL’s commitment to the community is impressive. The bank paid out more than $25 million in grants throughout the Greater Rochester community in 2021, which is just part of the more than $65 million total since 2018. Housing is a particular focus of ESL’s efforts, including help for down payments, rent assistance and foreclosure prevention.

ESL’s leaders credit the organization’s culture for enabling the bank’s remarkable growth over the years. Just like a treasured plant that is cared for, clipped and shared, when growth has a purpose, it thrives and can benefit an entire community.

Excellus challenges employees to serve with compassion, openness, honesty

Peggy Crist is a customer care advocate for Excellus BlueCross BlueShield. Each time she answers her phone, she never knows what to expect, but her mission is unwavering—to help members of the health plan to navigate the health care system. Some days, her work is more involving, more personal.

“I received a call from a member who had recently been diagnosed with a chronic condition,” Crist remembered. “She needed to see how much her treatments and medicines were going to cost. She was scared. I was the first person she told about her diagnosis. We talked about her life and her family. We cried together. Then I looked into her medications.” Crist paused.

“With much relief to both of us, they were all covered with minimal costs. She thanked me for ‘being her angel’ that day. I still think about her,” Crist recalled.

A division of The Lifetime Healthcare Companies, Excellus BlueCross BlueShield is a nonprofit health plan with 1.5 million upstate New York members, with a mission to help people live healthier and more secure lives through access to high-quality, affordable health care. The organization’s more than 4,000 employees benefit from Excellus BCBS’ expression of its organizational culture, The Lifetime Way. It’s a commitment that’s well ingrained, thanks to the continual implementation of its 7-Block Strategy, which aims to:
• Engage our workforce
• Exceed stakeholder expectations
• Focus & finish
• Drive affordability
• Improve member and community health
• Grow profitably
• Advance provider partnerships

Using those seven strategic points, Excellus BCBS helps employees to reach operational success, and rewards those who demonstrate initiative, innovation and excellence. In fact, every employee is rated through related performance appraisal system competencies.

To recognize and reinforce its corporate values and behaviors, Excellus BCBS employees like to begin meetings with a Lifetime Way Minute. Employees are also encouraged to recognize each other when they observe co-workers exhibiting the Lifetime Way values and behaviors of passionately serving our customers, challenging and empowering each other to deliver excellence, embracing and driving change, caring about each other, being proud of what we do, having open and honest conversations, and having fun.

Each year, Excellus BCBS measures progress through an Ethical Culture Survey, which assesses employee perceptions of their culture. The Excellus BCBS Ethics Office reviews and analyzes results to plan initiatives to further improve their culture. Managers attribute the consistently strong results from the survey to continual cultivation of The Lifetime Way, along with training, education and communication.

In the end analysis, all of Excellus BCBS’ efforts toward improving its culture is to continually advance the member experience. “Passionately serving our members is part of our customer care organization’s DNA,” said Alex Levi, vice president Customer Care for Excellus BlueCross BlueShield. “We aim to provide an experience for our members that is low effort, worry free and full of compassion. Our members have a significant impact on our advocates as they help navigate the health care system, often in very challenging circumstances.”

Employees such as Peggy Crist are definitely up to that challenge.

Software developer ITX pursues perfection, settles for Mastery

At ITX, adherence to a values-driven culture paves the roadmap for success. One of the company’s values, Mastery, asks team members to embrace imperfection. As ITX President Fred Beer explains, “We pursue Mastery, recognizing that we may never truly attain it. It’s the best way to learn and improve.”

“Everything we do, every decision we make, is grounded in our values,” Beer stated. “We examine problems and solutions as being workable, rather than right or wrong. Approaching it that way allows you to have conversations when things aren’t working. We are human beings, so we make mistakes, and saying that up front creates the opportunity for people to raise up when things aren’t going right, because that’s what you have to do to live your values. You can’t fool yourself into saying that they’re always being lived, because they are not.” That attitude, Beer asserts, is the basis of honest conversation, discovery, and lasting improvement.

Founded in 1997, ITX helps mid- to large-size companies solve complex business challenges through custom software development. Headquartered in Rochester, ITX also has a globally distributed workforce of 250+ product professionals and technologists who design, develop, and support websites, mobile apps, web portals, and application programming interfaces (APIs) among their full complement of service offerings.

By “applying time-tested methodologies to help our clients build trust, loyalty, and advocacy with their customers,” the company says, “ITX connects our community by shaping the future of the digital landscape.”

Beer cited an example from company history that involved a botched project estimate. “A number of years ago,” he recalled, “a sales rep put together a quote that left out a chunk of the estimate, then presented it to the customer, and got the customer’s signature on it. When we realized there was a piece missing, our attitude was, we treat this as a team. Our sales rep made a mistake, but that person represents the company, so we all made a mistake,” he recalled. “If anyone has made a promise, we’ve all made a promise, and so we’re all accountable to that promise.”

Today, both the sales rep and the client are still with ITX.

The company is no stranger to longevity. With an average employee retention rate of 5.1 years, ITX clearly is a leader in keeping people engaged. The tech-industry average stands at 3.0 years.

The framework of ITX’s ethical culture is defined by the company’s two related sets of guidelines:
• 5 Values—the last of which is, We thrive together, not only as a team but in partnership with our clients; and
• 5 Ways We Deliver Value—Clarity of Vision and Path, Steady Diet of Done, Stewards of Client Resources, A Smooth Journey and Pride.

The company invites its team members to begin living the lists of 5 during a two-day onboarding seminar, Life@ITX, which is led largely by their two top executives. Their involvement underlines the importance of the culture and its tenets.

Not only does ITX foster a highly ethical culture, they put everything on a permanent record. The ITX Yearbook annually chronicles client work, along with showing how team members have lived the company’s values through delivery of client value. It’s 150 pages of stories that illustrate client challenges and the ways that ITX teams confronted and solved them.

ITX’s 250+ team members may be scattered internationally, but they remain united by the strong values that are emphasized and practiced in so many ways. ITX has garnered resulting recognitions—earning Rochester Top Workplace recognitions in 2019 and 2020.

Assembling team members who fit the plan is not done by chance. “We actively look for people who match our culture,” Beer explained. “Before we extend an offer, we have a commitment conversation, with the candidate in which we share what we expect from the candidate, and what they can expect from ITX. It’s all about our values and how we live them, and we ask people to commit to that. More often than not, people say, ‘Yes, that’s where I want to be.’”

RTS puts integrity, respect, performance at the front of the bus

On a warm morning in June 2021, RTS bus operator Larry Logan arrived at a Wayne County customer’s home for a regular run to a dialysis appointment. The customer didn’t appear to be waiting, but just as Logan was considering his options, he became concerned. Something at the front door of the apartment building didn’t look right, so he left the driver’s seat to investigate. As he got closer to the door, he saw that the customer, who lives in the upstairs apartment, was severely ill and had crawled down the stairs in an effort to get the bus operator’s attention and medical help.

Logan immediately called for assistance. As he waited with the customer, her landlord arrived, and an ambulance soon followed. This was an extraordinary day for Logan, but it wasn’t a unique one. It was the third time in his driving career that he had been in the right place, at the right time, and in each instance he lived the guidelines of the RTS Way—to assist a customer in need.

As the public transportation provider for an eight-county area, Regional Transit Service (RTS) employs more than 900, and serves in excess of 15 million customers each year. To keep their team members engaged and delivering excellent service, RTS has built a strong culture of ethics and accountability. The RTS Way is one of the methods they use to guide employee behavior.

While six specific values serve as the backbone of the company’s culture, The RTS Way identifies 17 specific behaviors that are connected to those values. In the case of Larry, going about his routine on a spring morning, a number of those values apply, such as:
• Integrity—Take pride in your work and be accountable
• Respect—Demonstrate kindness when interacting with others
• Performance Focused—Act on opportunities to make a difference and exceed expectations

All of the behaviors specified by The RTS Way drive the organization’s culture and expectations of employees, who receive training focused on the specific behaviors and recognizing others when they exhibit them. A recognition process begins when employees recognize the behaviors in others and present them with an RTS Way Card, a copy of which also goes to the RTS marketing team for use in the employee newsletter, and on monitors and posters at RTS facilities.

As a provider of public transportation, RTS takes plenty of opportunity to show corporate citizenship, with an understanding that the work they do has an effect on the economy, environment, businesses, health care, education, recreation, poverty, the RTS culture and the basic infrastructure of access. RTS is one of five public transit systems in New York state that has committed to meet the goal of operating a zero-emission bus fleet by 2035.

During the pandemic, RTS has used its unique capabilities and resources to help people in the community who most need it. The company worked with United Way to deliver personal protective equipment to non-profit organizations; provided free transportation for families with infants to critical doctor visits; assisted Foodlink in delivering Summer Meals Program food to neighborhoods; and held COVID-19 vaccination clinics at the RTS Transit Center.

Each and every morning throughout the year, RTS drivers take to the byways of an eight-county region to provide transportation, backed by maintenance workers, administrators and more. In that endeavor, they are guided not just by traffic lights and road signs, but by the ethical framework of The RTS Way. That makes the road smoother for everyone.

After taking a COVID hiatus in 2020, the ETHIE Awards program continued in 2021. “We were pleased to be able to hold our ETHIE Award event virtually,” said Bob Whipple, board chair of Elevate Rochester. “Our judges identified four highly qualified recipient organizations, so we were delighted to celebrate with them, regardless of the social limitations. Each of them has built a durable, ethical corporate culture, and that deserves recognition, Whipple stated.”

2021 ETHIE Award Recipients
This year’s ETHIE Award recipients include organizations in banking, health care insurance, software development and transportation.

ESL Federal Savings Bank—ESL has set expectations for all employees to embrace five Core Values—Caring About People, Accountability, Teamwork, Integrity and Initiative—which were set forth by employees through a series of internal focus groups and surveys. Job satisfaction at ESL is high. In a recent survey, about 93% of employees agreed with positive statements about the company’s mission, vision and values, with a 75% employee response rate. In addition, semi-annual, all-employee forums enable everyone to learn about how the organization is performing, meet new colleagues and share how employees are putting the ESL Core Values into practice.

Excellus—To emphasize ethical decisions, Excellus managers start every meeting with a Lifetime Way Minute, and the company measures employee perceptions of their culture with an Ethical Culture Survey. Excellus is a nonprofit health plan with 1.5 million upstate New York members, with a mission to help people live healthier and more secure lives through access to high-quality, affordable health care.

ITX—Among the cultural guidelines at ITX Corp. is the company’s 5 Ways We Deliver Value, which include Clarity of Vision and Path, Steady Diet of Done, Stewards of Client Resources, A Smooth Journey and Pride. The ITX Yearbook annually chronicles client work, along with showing how team members have lived the company’s values through delivery of client value. Founded in 1997, ITX helps mid- to large-size companies solve complex business challenges through custom software development.

RTS— As a provider of public transportation, RTS takes plenty of opportunity to show corporate citizenship, with an understanding that the work they do has an effect on the economy, environment, businesses, health care, education, recreation, poverty, the RTS culture and the basic infrastructure of access. RTS is one of five public transit systems in New York state that has committed to meet the goal of operating a zero-emission bus fleet by 2035. RTS provides public transportation for an eight-county area, employs more than 900, and serves in excess of 15 million customers each year.

ETHIE: Small Business Category

Faraci Lange took home the ETHIE in the small business category. Founded in 1968, Faraci Lange attorneys have expertise in the areas of personal injury, medical malpractice and products liability. The firm has eleven attorneys listed in the prestigious Best Lawyers in America directory under personal injury law and twelve attorneys in the Upstate NY Super Lawyers directory. Faraci Lange is also listed on Martindale Hubbell’s List of America’s Preeminent Law Firms with six of its attorneys having received the AV Preeminent Peer Review Rating awarded to attorneys with the highest ethical standards and professional ability.

“We have a team of people who communicate with trust and respect, which has helped the firm to effectively handle any ethical challenges,” said Stephen Schwarz, managing partner of Faraci Lange. “When an ethical issue has ever arisen at Faraci Lange, our approach is to begin by discussing the matter internally, collecting as much knowledge about the incident as possible, consulting experts on the specific matter and putting into place the appropriate measures to address the issue, such as training or direct ramifications with the parties involved. At the end, our goal is to achieve the most fair, compassionate and ethical solution.”

ETHIE: Large Business Category

In the large category, for employers over 150 employees, Gorbel received the ETHIE. Gorbel is a leading manufacturer of overhead materials handling, ergonomic lifting and industrial fall protection, founded in 1977.

“Everything Gorbel does, both internally and externally, is built on the strength of our foundational values: integrity, positive people in a positive environment, extraordinary customer experience, and future orientation,” said Brian Reh, president and CEO of Gorbel. “These values are core to who we are as a company, and they’re prominently displayed in all of our buildings to remind us on a daily basis that that’s why we’re here. Those values weren’t just handed down to the company from management—they were born from company-wide employee focus groups which identified what people loved about working at Gorbel and what they wished was different.”

In addition to the two recipients, RABEF celebrated the ethical cultures of four finalists: CP Rochester, Excellus BlueCross BlueShield, JN White, John Betlem and Universal Imports. Each of the finalists had outstanding applications with outstanding examples of their ethical cultures.

Elana Augustine, communications committee member, added to the discussion with the following on ethics in the office.

Employees go to the office to do an honest day’s work for an honest paycheck. We contribute our talents and knowledge to help the company succeed; there’s a working relationship between what we’re giving and what we’re receiving. However, as personal relationships can deteriorate over time if not properly nurtured, so can our working relationships if not ethically maintained by management; this includes both our direct supervisors and the overall company leadership. Here are a few key tips to foster a professional and ethical office environment that allows for best practices and, in turn, profits to flourish:

1. Base your leadership on trust, not fear. “I love being micromanaged and heavily scrutinized,” said no employee ever. Fear-based management leads to employees with high stress and anxiety along with reduced productivity due to worry of making a mistake, being lectured for petty matters, receiving a reprimand for voicing an opinion, etc. Trust-based management leads to confident employees that have pride in their work – and their company. The choice is clear!
2. Don’t lie. Honesty really is the best employment policy. Keeping your promises about starting pay, raises, PTO, and other important items shows that you consider your employees to be valuable people, not replaceable objects. Likewise, if you tell an employee to do a specific task that another manager discovers yet doesn’t like, don’t let your employee take the blame; be an advocate for the person (and your reputation).
3. Good ideas weren’t made to be stolen. Good ideas were made to be implemented. Instead of being intimidated by smart team members and taking credit for their ideas out of insecurity, be the manager who celebrates your team’s knowledge, insight, and willingness to voice opinions.
4. Retaliation is ridiculous. It’s a sad reality that some businesses are more focused on protecting bad managers instead of their professional integrity. Many companies promote their open-door policy, ethics hotline, and other tools for employees to voice their concerns. Many managers also terminate and/or passive aggressively intimidate good employees who speak up about bad behaviors, such as a manager acting unethically and/or being verbally demeaning to subordinates. Rather than punishing honest employees that have the courage to speak up at the right time, managers should reward them for having strong principles and the desire to do the right thing.

Don’t let the culture define you. Be vigilant, stay true to your core values and encourage the right behaviors.

We’ve all witnessed incidents in which someone of higher stature belittles someone in a lower position.  It could be a boss yelling at a subordinate; a first-class passenger screaming at an airline agent; a well-heeled customer berating a sales associate; you get the picture.  It’s bullying, plain and simple.  Except, instead of in the schoolyard, the bully is pushing around the weaker individual at work, at the airport, or on the sales floor.

It makes me wonder how someone so obnoxious could achieve a position in which they feel they have the right to treat others so badly.  Dacher Keltner a Social Psychologist at U.C. Berkeley has dedicated much of his career to this, and from his research, he claims the answer is simply…power.

Power gives people the feeling that they have certain rights and privileges over others.   Power creates what Keltner calls, “empathy deficits,” or a lack of consideration of what others are experiencing.   As a result, power leads to beliefs of exceptionalism and manifests itself in acts of incivility and disrespect.

He has a lot of research to back this up.  In lab experiments in which he asked subjects to match facial expressions to emotions, he found that subjects who had higher social status were less able to correctly match the expressions with the appropriate emotions.  In other words, they were less empathetic to the expressions.

In another study conducted on public streets, he found that drivers of more expensive cars were less apt to obey normal traffic rules. For example; at a four-way stop, drivers of Dodge Colts would cut in front of other drivers about 8% of the time.  Drivers of Mercedes Benzes cut in front 30% of the time.  Similarly, Mercedes Benz drivers ignore pedestrians in crosswalks about 46% of the time, whereas older Ford Taurus drivers ignore pedestrians only about 29%.  Using cars as a proxy for power, the better the car, the less the driver feels they have to honor the rules of the road.

The irony to this is that Keltner argues that powerful people weren’t always this way.  In fact, he suggests that before people reached positions of power, they were probably attuned to others better than most people.  Their empathy was one of the reasons they were able to rise in social hierarchies.  However, once they achieved some semblance of power, their empathy for others diminished, and they felt so special that normal rules of society no longer applied to them.

In the late 19^th century, Lord Acton wrote, “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely,” which succinctly captures Keltner’s research.

Fortunately, Keltner acknowledges that not every powerful person is an obnoxious bully.  Powerful people who have maintained their empathy and don’t expect the world to treat them exceptionally, have what he calls enduring power.   Enduring power is stronger, more respected, more permanent, and much more effective than the power that merely corrupts.

Chairman of the Board Bob Whipple said, “On behalf of RABEF and the Rochester area business community at large, we welcome these finalists to our growing roster of strong, high integrity companies. We are extremely proud that companies like these, who exemplify the highest degree of ethical conduct in the workplace, call the Rochester region their home.”

The 2018 ETHIE Award Finalists are:

Breast Cancer Coalition of Rochester: A coalition made up of survivors, supporters, a caring staff and a passionate community that has helped hundreds of women (and men) who have been diagnosed with breast cancer. The Breast Cancer Coalition of Rochester’s mission is to provide support to those touched by a diagnosis of breast cancer, to make access to information and care a priority through education and advocacy, and to empower women and men to participate fully in decisions related to breast cancer.

Broccolo Tree & Lawn Care: A customer-focused approach to commercial and residential lawn care, landscaping, storm water management and a full-service Garden Center. Broccolo knows it matters whom you choose to care for your lawn, trees, shrubs, plants, and gardens and Broccolo has a passion to create the best looking yards in the neighborhood.

CP Rochester: CP Rochester supports individuals of all ages and abilities to determine their own pathway in life. We partner with the individual, their family, and the community to fulfill the individual’s right to live a productive and rewarding life. CP Rochester provides a wide range of quality health, educational, and support services in the greater Rochester area to assist individuals in achieving their goals. CP Rochester envisions a community where people of all abilities lead rewarding lives. Meaningful partnerships are nurtured to ensure all doors are open and opportunities are available for everyone

Faraci Lange: Founded in 1968, Faraci Lange attorneys handle all types of personal injury cases. In addition to having twelve attorneys listed in the prestigious Best Lawyers in America directory under personal injury law, Faraci Lange also has eleven attorneys listed in the Upstate NY Super Lawyers directory. The firm has repeatedly been named as a Best Law Firm in both Rochester and Buffalo for its expertise in the areas of personal injury, medical malpractice and products liability. Faraci Lange is also listed on Martindale Hubbell’s List of America’s Preeminent Law Firms and was selected as the 9th fastest-growing privately held company in Rochester in 2014 by the Rochester Chamber of Commerce and KPMG.

Jewish Senior Life: Serving people of all faiths and ethnic backgrounds, Jewish Senior Life is a Continuing Care Retirement Community (CCRC) guided by the values of honoring family and aging in place. Jewish Senior Life offers all levels of care on a single campus, from independent living to skilled nursing care, along with a variety of programs and services for people living outside its campus. Consistently recognized for its high-quality care, customer satisfaction and for being a great place to work, Jewish Senior Life is CARF accredited and was named a 2017-2018 Best Nursing Home by U.S. News & World Report as well as a 2018 Top Workplace by the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle. Jewish Senior Life is a member of the Alliance for Senior Care of Greater Rochester, Leading Age, Leading Age New York, and the Association of Jewish Aging Services.

Ontario County: The government of Ontario County has a vision to be “a vibrant community where every citizen has the opportunity to be healthy, safe, and successful.” Their mission is to provide strategic and responsive public services that are fiscally responsible and sensitive to the diverse and changing needs of the community.

An independent panel of judges carefully and impartially analyzes the completed ETHIE Award entry forms to determine the finalists, which then undergo a site visit by a member of the judging committee. The committee then names recipients of the annual awards.

To purchase tickets for the October 22 ETHIE awards celebration, please go to https://elevaterochester.org/programsevents/award-celebration/

We encourage you click here to read a six-step guide for ethical decision making provided by Michigan State University to help understand ethics and build trust in your organization.

Barbara Brooks Kimmel, CEO and Cofounder of Trust Across America-Trust Across the World.

RABEF is proud to endorse the new initiative of Trust Across America-Trust Across the World, the Million Taps Campaign. The campaign is designed to raise awareness, start a dialogue, and provide solutions to elevate organizational trust.

Read the full press release:
https://www.newswire.com/news/trust-is-the-new-currency-for-business-success-20436511

Stephen M.R. Covey, who spoke at a joint meeting in Rochester in 2008 is on the list as is Bob Vanourek, who spoke here exactly two years ago. Also making the list is our own Bob Whipple.
“The Trust Ambassador,” Bob is CEO of Leadergrow Inc., an organization dedicated to growing leaders. He is an international speaker on the topics of trust and ethics. Bob is a member of the National Speaking Association and is a certified Vistage Speaker. He has produced four books, over 600 articles, and over 100 videos on various topics of trust and leadership. Bob was awarded the Trust Across America Top Thought Leader in Trust, Lifetime Achievement Award, and Inc. Magazine named him as a Top 100 Leadership Speaker for the past three years.

To read the full list view the link below:

http://trustacrossamerica.com/trust-council.shtml