“It was a terrible mistake, and we knew it was wrong while we were doing it”
Gregg Williams
Former Defensive Coordinator
Washington Redskins and New Orleans Saints
This NFL bounty story is fascinating to me. As someone who played football, I think I speak for a lot of NFL fans when I say that targeting players is nothing new–it’s a brutally competitive sport. But doing it for cash? And having the cash come from basically the top of the leadership? That’s another story.
Let me relate this to Curry’s Auto Service. Just like in the NFL, I want the team at Curry’s to be ultra-competitive, no question about it. Do we offer performance bonuses for certain achievements? Sure! But our employees know they can’t just do whatever they want to reach their goals at any cost…like doing direct harm to a competitor.
That’s because, along with aggressive goals and a competitive spirit, our employees also know Curry’s Code of Conduct–which we have taken a lot of time for formulate, communicate and train people on. We developed a code of conduct to make sure our employees–and by extension our customers–know we are different from what they may perceive as the typical auto repair shop. In fact, we’ve grown so fast because we’re different: we emphasize integrity and transparency, and the Code of Conduct and our employee hotline are important tools for us.
So as much as one of our employees wants to get a bonus, it should never occur to him or her to break the rules to get it.