A Sense of Higher Purpose

Among the most e-mailed recent articles listed by The NY Times was a piece on Apple’s store employees titled, “Apple’s Retail Army, Long on Loyalty but Short on Pay” ( http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/24/business/apple-store-workers-loyal-but-short-on-pay.html?_r=1). 

As someone who covered retailing for more than three decades, I learned very little from the extensive reporting. It was not news to me that Apple, like most retailers, pays its store staff little more than minimum wage despite counting on them to rack up among the highest, if not the highest, sales per square foot among chain store retailers. 

Buried deep in the article was the following paragraph which explains to a large degree why Apple can get away with low hourly wages: “The phrase that trainees hear time and again, which echoes once they arrive at the stores, is ‘enriching people’s lives.’ The idea is to instill in employees the notion that they are doing something far grander than just selling or fixing products. If there is a secret to Apple’s sauce, this is it: the company ennobles employees. It understands that a lot of people will forgo money if they have a sense of higher purpose.”

That last sentence—”It understands that a lot of people will forgo money if they have a sense of higher purpose”—really got me. It brought me back several decades to a presentation by then CEO and founder of Crate & Barrel Gordon Segal. Asked by a Wall Street investment analyst to explain the success of his home furnishings chain, Segal attributed much of it to the dedication of store associates, men and women often with a degree in art or design or teaching. They had a talent for connecting with people and for feeling good about their work. That transcendent feeling, Segal said, allowed Crate & Barrel to keep salaries low because the staff received inner fulfillment from their work in lieu of demanding higher wages.

That’s the same management philosophy that for years buttressed the belief that public employees—firemen, police, social workers, sanitation workers, teachers, nurses, even the military—could be hired at low starting salaries. The tradeoff many of these workers, and government officials, accepted was better health care and retirement benefits. Now slash and burn governors, mayors and their legislative henchmen are trying to balance the books on the backs of government workers. 

Sure, there were and are some malingerers among them. What industry doesn’t have its share of goof-offs and people who take advantage of the system? But do we seriously believe teachers are not among the most important members of society and thus should be valued and paid appropriately? Does anyone seriously want to haul trash—even if it’s just their own trash— in the frigid dead of winter or the blazing hot summer? How about running into a burning building to save someone who might not even be inside the inferno, but firemen go in anyway because a family member or friend suspects a loved one is inside? How many of us are ready and willing to put our lives on the line each time we don a uniform to protect our cities or to safeguard our nation from attack in foreign lands? 

Perhaps what we need is a little more introspection about the good government workers bring to our standard of living. 

Human Infrastructure

His $447 billion plan to pump up the economy deflated by Republicans in the U.S. Senate, President Obama now is trying to reignite our fiscal health in piecemeal fashion. He’s pushing parts of his overall program one at a time, starting with a $35 billion package to keep teachers in the classroom and put more policemen and firemen on the streets. Though it might seem a laudable, even bipartisan goal, the GOP already has said it will vote to block its passage.

Which leaves me wondering, when did we as a nation turn against the public sector workers who are the foundation of our society? When did it become acceptable to strip away essential jobs in our communities while letting fat cats accumulate wealth beyond reason? When did we begin to demonize the very people to whom we entrust our most precious commodity, our children?

How would you like to leave your family every day for a job that puts you in jeopardy each work shift, that could cost you your life or could leave you injured for life because you were protecting society? Isn't it worth something to you to know others are ready to risk their safety for yours?

Sure, some cops are bigoted. Some overreact, are abusive. Some have behavioral problems. Haven't we learned anything from all the cop shows and movies about their tension-filled lives? How many of us would want to truly trade our daily routine for that of a policeman or fireman, knowing that around the corner on a mundane patrol or one alarm fire bell response death lurks? It might sound exciting for one day, even two, but as a constant condition of employment it would be hard to accept.

The infrastructure of a country is measured not just by the length and quality of its roadways, bridges and tunnels, but also by the soundness of its educational system. Teachers are its foundation. Sure, there are bad teachers, just as there are bad accountants, bad lawyers, bad doctors, bad truck drivers, bad waiters, bad you-name-it. Even bad bloggers. Tenure has been abused.

Let's reform the system but let's not abuse the teaching profession. If our children are our most precious asset, why wouldn't we want to pay the person who spends more daytime hours with them, the person who can influence their thinking and development, an above average wage? Aren't teachers doing a job at least as important as lawyers, as accountants, as stock brokers?

When it's my grandson Finley’s reading time, the books he chooses invariably depict heroes of the young—firemen, policemen, construction workers, teachers. Nary a computer wizard or Wall Street tycoon or lawyer or legislator or regulator or hedge fund trader in sight.

We are kidding ourselves if we believe society will be better off with fewer and lower-compensated teachers, policemen and firemen.