Treating people well and authentically respecting them leads to far better business performance. The proof is in the Profits. Jerome Dodson founded the Parnassus Workplace Fund in 2005, a mutual fund that invests exclusively in large American firms proven to have outstanding workplaces.
A journo named Milton Moskowitz told him in the early 2000’s that an investment firm had analysed the ‘100 best companies to work for’, and found their returns far exceeded the S & P Index. On his suggestion, a specialist investment fund commenced with an initial investment of $600k, and Dodson then scoured the USA for companies that had renowned reputations for caring for their employees as people, not just hired hands. He also backed his search with objectivity, looking for tangible employee benefits; health care, profit sharing, retirement benefits and support for working mothers. Some firms were amongst the highly reported ‘top 100 companies to work for’; others had never submitted the documentation for these awards. Ultimately he chose companies like Intel, Google, Charles Schwab and Microsoft.
Since the fund’s inception in April 2005 to January 2013, it’s had an annualised 9.65% return, compared to the S& P index return of 5.58% return over the same period. In the past five years, the height of the global recession, the workplace fund returned 10.81%, compared to the S&P’s 3.97%. Almost triple the performance.
The balance in the fund is now over $300m, and as reported by rating agency Morningstar, it ranks highest in shareholder return compared to 1303 other peer funds.
The prize is there. And yet we continue to see CEO’s and major companies rolling out their top 5 business strategies that focus on everything else but the people factor. The ‘warm and fuzzy’ perceived idealism of caring for and treating people well in the workplace is no longer a business ‘nice to have’. The proof is in the profits.