Employee Morale

Employee Morale
Employee morale is important to the performance of a company. Higher employee morale can lead to better employees, since happy employees tend to show up to work more than disgruntled employees. “Studies have proven that the morale of a company's workforce is directly linked to profitability. This is because workers who are happy in their job and with their employer perform better, resulting in higher and improved productivity and profitability.” (Levine, n.d., ¶2). The further illustrate the issue of morale; a case study of Nordstrom and Wal-Mart was conducted displaying the differences of company with high employee morale and a company with poor employee morale.
Nordstrom
One company with high employee morale is Nordstrom Inc. “Nordstrom is one of the leading fashion retailers of the US offering apparels, shoes, cosmetics and accessories serving high end retail customers. The company sells apparel, shoes, accessories, jewelry, cosmetics and fragrances for women, men and children.” (Nordstrom, 2007, p. 5). One thing that is uncommon and can be considered one of the foundations as to why Nordstrom employees have high morale is the company handbook. According to Spector (2000), “Each new employee receives a copy of the Nordstrom Employee Handbook. It consists of one page, which contains 75 words.” Of those 75 words, Rule number one is the most potent statement. “Nordstrom Rules: Rule #1: Use your good judgment in all situations.” (Spector, 2000). With that rule begins the empowerment of Nordstrom employees who is the cornerstone of employee morale. Nordstrom is an unusual company in the fact that it a company that a person you would hear the word “no” very infrequently. One of Nordstrom’s policies is to hire nice, motivated people. According to Spector, Nordstrom would rather hire a nice person and teach them to sell rather than hire a salesperson and teach them to be nice. Nordstrom has early morning rallies several times a week before the...