Culture Secrets
Culture is what causes things to happen inside an organization - both good and bad. It's the heart and guts of a company and it is what determines is they are successful or not. Join interntional best-selling author, speaker and culture expert Chellie Phillips as she delves into what makes people-centered cultures in the workplace unique. She packs each episode with ideas, strategies and real-world learning to help you build workplaces where both employees and companies thrive.
Culture Secrets
Leading with V.A.L.U.E.: How Harry Hynekamp Builds World-Class Culture from the Inside Out
What does it take to create a workplace where people feel seen, heard, and truly valued — not just as employees, but as human beings?
In this episode, we sit down with Harry Hynekamp, former Vice President of Guest Experience at AMB Sports & Entertainment, part of the Arthur M. Blank Family of Companies — home to the Atlanta Falcons, Mercedes-Benz Stadium, and the Arthur M. Blank Foundation.
Harry shares powerful behind-the-scenes insights into how one of America’s most respected business leaders, Arthur Blank, has intentionally built values-driven cultures that last — whether on the field, in the office, or in the community.
From shifting the language from “hire” to “select” to placing storytelling and recognition at the heart of their employee experience, you’ll discover how real culture is created and sustained. Plus, you’ll learn about the “Walk In My Shoes” initiative, where leaders experience frontline roles firsthand to better understand and serve their teams.
This episode is a masterclass in activating values, building trust, and leading with empathy.
If you care about leadership, team engagement, and creating environments where people love to work — don’t miss this one.
🔑 Topics we cover:
- Why they say “select” instead of “hire” — and why it matters
- The role of recognition and storytelling in shaping behavior
- How executive leaders stay connected through the “Walk In My Shoes” program
- What it really means to build a V.A.L.U.E. Culture
- Why people may forget the event or building — but never how they were treated
✨ This episode is packed with real-world lessons any leader can use to elevate their culture from good to unforgettable.
Thanks for listening. Grab the book the podcast is based on at https://mybook.to/culturesecrets . Check out my website www.chelliephillips.com for more great content. Follow me on LinkedIn.
if workplace culture is your jam you're in the right place check out this episode of culture secrets the podcast dedicated to creating workplaces where both employees and the companies thrive so
Speaker 02:Welcome to the Culture Secrets Podcast, where we bring you real conversations with leaders shaping exceptional workplace cultures, the kind that inspire people to show up, contribute, and thrive. Today, we're spotlighting someone who doesn't just talk about culture. He lives it. Harry Heincamp has spent his career shaping the intersection of people, purpose, and performance. At the time of this interview, Harry was VP of Guest Experience for AMB Sports and Entertainment. As part of the Arthur M. Blank family of companies, culture wasn't an afterthought. It's the strategy. Whether it's the Atlanta Falcons, Mercedes-Benz Stadium, or the Family Foundation, values are more than words on a wall. Their actions lived out loud every single day. Let's dive in with host Shelley Phillips.
Speaker 01:Tell me a little bit about A&B Sports and Entertainment, the Arthur Blank Foundation, Mercedes-Benz Stadium. How does that all work together? Tell me a little bit about the business model itself.
Speaker 00:Yeah, so I think it's interesting when you take it from that perspective. If you think about Arthur, right, so he started the Home Depot and so forth, right? And when you read his book, Good Company, he really talks about kind of his approach to life. Some of the things he'll speak about. speak about, and I can still remember, you know, one of the first board meetings with him is where he spoke about a book and basically said, you know, if you haven't read it, you know, it may be time to reread it. It's Man's Search for Meaning. I think that's the title by Viktor Frankl, right? And so Arthur has taken the same core values that he started from the Home Depot along with Bernie and so forth and really utilize them, you know, for every business that he's been a part of, right? And so when Arthur speaks, he speaks from the perspective of what's our whole meaning here on this planet which is to repair the world to repair the world right and he reminds everyone of that all the time that's what we're here for we're here to do you know it's about passion purpose and profits you know it's not just about profits it's about those three things and it's about you know doing the right things for the right reasons and living with the results of those those things and so what I would say is at a heart, the foundation, all his companies are built on these core values. And I'll tell you those in a few minutes if you want. But it's this whole servant mindset, right? And so what I would say is passion, purpose, profits. Obviously, there's the Arthur Blank Family Foundation, right? So that's one of the organizations within the Blank family of businesses. There's the Atlanta Falcons football team. There's the Atlanta United Soccer Club, right? There's obviously Mercedes-Benz State There is the PGA Tour Superstores, which is the largest golf retailer, you know, in the U.S. that Arthur owns, as well as the ranches out in Montana, you know, A&B West and West Creek and Big Sky and Blue Sky ranches and so forth. All those businesses, along with the family foundation, family office. It's no accident that in all of Arthur's key business meetings, when Arthur's we are, they sit at a round table and so forth. All those businesses are represented, including the family foundation, right? And that's, you know, I think that's unique in the sense of, right, you've got a foundation that's sitting alongside for-profit businesses. And again, that's Arthur's whole connection to passion, purpose, and profits, and also the perspective of, you know, what it is that we're trying to do, which is, you know, make the world a place, right? Repair the world, do the right things for the right reason. And so making sure all of the for-purpose, you know, and profitable businesses are also purposeful, right? So, and then if you think about Arthur, he himself has, you know, made the giving pledge, which the giving pledge is, you know, you sign that and I think you promise to give at least 50% of your estate away, you know, when you pass. And Arthur's is going to be probably north of 95%, you know, and growing. All of our for-profit businesses, if you will, it's pretty easy to wake up and go to work because one, you know, you're in pretty exciting, you know, businesses, right? But the other part is, you know, that, you know, the value that we create, the profit that we can generate from creating great experiences for fans, guests, and customers, then all gets channeled back into the foundation, right? And this engine of passion, purpose, and profits continues, right? To make the world a better place, right? So I would say those are the businesses, you know, that all operate, in this ecosystem of goodness, I call it, right? Of good company, which is just a great title for his book, right? When you think about it, not only are you in good company when you're with these companies, they are good companies, right? And they try and make the world a better place and they are guided by a North Star from the family, Arthur's family, into things they feel very strongly about, whether it's the environment, whether it's youth, whether it's different aspects of sustainability, democracy, and the list goes on and on in terms of their strategic initiatives, all geared towards making the world a better place. So that's how the companies kind of fit together and are all aligned around that philosophy of passion, purpose, and profits. And the core underlying it is two things. One is all of the core values, again, which I'll share in a minute. And then this servant philosophy from a leadership perspective, taking the hierarchy of a pyramid of an organizational structure and basically flipping it on its head, right? So it's an inverted pyramid where leaders are really here to serve associates, team members, fans, guests, customers, because the circle for life for our business, based upon that passion, purpose, profits, making the world a better place, repairing the world, is that if we take care of our team members, if we take care of our associates, if we take care of each other, they are going to take care of our fans, guests, and customers, right? It's the experiences they create, whether it's in the PGA Tour Superstore or it's in, you know, at a sporting event or it's at a ranch, whatever it is, that's where we create value, you know, for our customers, fans, guests. And that's what leads the ability to, you know, determine a price for a ticket, for retaining, you know, season ticket members, not only having them as a fan, but also, you know, their kids their aunts, their uncles, right? Expanding that fan base, creating loyalty, creating advocacy, creating ability to create premium experiences, right? And drive revenues and profits. And again, that again, all circle back into making the same world a better place. Arthur will always say, we do nothing alone. We do nothing of great value alone. The only way we bring value is by working together, right? And so that's when we're at our best. So That gives you a little sense in terms of how those businesses work together. And if you want me to expand on core values, I'm happy to do that as well.
Speaker 01:Yeah, I've actually been to the website and did some reading in that. And so I've got a couple of questions about those coming. I shared with you the format for the book is kind of talking about building a value culture. And starting with the V, it is about the leadership and being able to see a vision, have a vision, and then being able to to how do I get that vision out to where everybody at every level understands where we're going and has a clear picture of where that is. Can you tell me a little bit about the process maybe that y'all go through to be able to move the vision from leadership down into the team that you're talking about? Yeah,
Speaker 00:sure. I mean, I'll give you a couple examples. I mean, so here's Mercedes-Benz Stadium, right? We We are five years in, right? Five years in. And when you think about it, I mean, five years is when we opened up, but from a, in the concrete perspective, from a design perspective, the stadium is probably eight, nine years old, right? By the time, by the time architects and designers, right? So it's not just five years, because that's when we opened the doors, it's more like eight or nine. And so now we are literally in the next generation of Mercedes-Benz stadium. Many, many stadiums will do renovations. renovations 10, 15 years after they're open and so forth. And here we've only been open five years and we're already beginning to think about Mercedes-Benz Stadium 2.0 and execute on those things, right? And Mercedes-Benz 2.0 isn't about just, you know, making, you know, a change, you know, for the next five years. It's about what over the course of the next, you know, five years, what investments are we going to make to bring, you know, new technology, new experiences to Mercedes-Benz Stadium, right? So when that whole process starts, It's similar to, you know, if you think about strategically, we know we want to, you know, create new experiences and so forth. So that's kind of the vision, right? So what's the next evolution of Mercedes-Benz Stadium, this amazing venue that is today, you know, envy of the world too. What are we going to do? And so the vision starts there in terms of, okay, we have, what are the goals that we want to achieve from that? Well, we want to create new experiences. We want to be able to drive, you know, additional revenues we want to create new activations new premium spaces all with inside the stadium etc and so that boils itself down to really sharing that across the leadership team and then each part of the leadership team being involved in that journey right and so and again it's not about like hey in five years all these things will come online what are the things we're going to continue to do each year going forward with that vision of of always leading from a venue perspective right because if you think about it so SoFi opened up in LA, what, two years ago, right? SoFi Stadium. Then you had the Raiders, you know, a year or two ago, right? With their new stadium and so forth. One of Arthur's, and if you read Good Company and so forth, any of his books, you know, one of his, he even wears the t-shirt. There's a running t-shirt where he wears it. The slogan is, there's no finish line. Like if you, you know, if you think you're done, you know, you don't even understand the job, so to speak, right? And so it's this, you know, philosophy of no finish line. And, you know, the vision is set, you know, from the top in terms of like, you know, this is what we aim to do. Then it's that cascades, obviously, to the different disciplines and the senior leadership there. And then that cascades, obviously, into specific initiatives. And then that cascades, obviously, into the budgeting and capital expenditure process and so forth. Right. So anything from a vision standpoint, just like, you know, real estate is location, location, location. Vision is about communication, communication, communication. communication, right? And then aligning resources to what we decide, what Arthur decides is our biggest priorities and so forth, right? So, yeah, that's basically how that happens, right? Again, once the vision is kind of clear in terms of what it is that we want to go after, that's where each leadership and each discipline, again, working together so the right hand and left hand knows what each other is doing, begin to stand up work tracks that, again, complement each other, but also make sure that they're sequenced in a way that that we're not outrunning supply lines, so to speak. So if you think about it, we've started with this frictional entry outside the stadium, coming in through the gates. Our next piece is we're testing facial recognition at the ticket scanners, which would remove those. Our next piece is food and beverage, concessions and bars, where we remove the need for you to pull anything out and so forth. And same thing at retail. So step-by-step, whatever vision element it is, that's how we approach it.
Speaker 01:That's amazing. I said, I was sitting here thinking about that would be an awesome experience just to leave everything and not have to worry about it. You've cast a big vision and you have big things coming on track. So the next part of that is having the people in place to be able to do that. And like I said, I know I went online and I read some of your core values. Tell me about the process of those values coming to life. How did you settle on that set of core values?
Speaker 00:Yeah, so there are authors and Bernie's from back in the day of Home Depot. Arthur's brought those and made them part of who we are in every business that we are. We all live and breathe those core values. It starts with selection in terms of who we bring into our business and so forth. We are definitely selecting whether it's an event day team member who's a game day host or someone who's going to lead our ticketing team and so forth. Do they have the right attitude, you know, not just the aptitude and so forth, the attitude in terms of fitting into our culture and so forth. You know, you hear a lot of businesses say, you know, and I hate the word hiring, hiring, hiring. So we select, you know, we intentionally use the word select. And even for event day team members, we call it draft day. We call it draft day, right? Because we are making picks, you know, in terms of who's going to join our family and so forth. And we have, you know, questions and our interview, you know, processes is all around that as well, right? to those core values. But those core values, it's not just what I would say is training and so forth. They're a part of kind of the guidance, the rails, so to speak, on whatever it is that we're working on, right? So if you think about frictionless markets or frictionless entry, that's about innovating continuously. That's about how can we be the leading venue to offer this latest and greatest technology, right? Which I just learned so far is just catch up on today with Evolve. We were the first ones out there with that technology. It's also by leading by example. So not that there's anything wrong with being a fast follower. Personalities all across our business, like we're very much the same in terms of, you know, we don't want to take a second position on anything. Like we are our own worst critics and so forth. And so no matter what it is that we're doing, we want to be in a leadership position, right? And so for example, our food and beverage program, right? across the NFL still today, number one, since we opened the doors. Number one, quality, you know, cost, speed of service, all the attributes you can think of from a food and beverage perspective, number one across the NFL. Our team members experience, again, voted by fans, guests, and customers from all different NFL clubs. You know, we're number one in that category as well and a whole bunch of others. So it's this old, you know, this mentality of leading by example, right? So give back to others. Remember I mentioned earlier just this whole point of, integrating passion, purpose, and profits. And so, like I said, I'll give you an example for each one of these. So give back to others. Last Tuesday in the Home Depot backyard, we gave away 1,500 turkeys. Those turkeys were not funded by Arthur or the foundation. They were funded by team members, just like me, giving $15 or $30 by our offensive linemen and so forth. And we gave it away to families in need on the West side, as well as event day team members who may know family, friends, or someone, a neighbor who may be in need. And so we stood up, you know, what was once an idea to give away 30 turkeys from a few associates turned into giving away 1500 turkeys. Listen and respond. So we're constantly listening to the voice of our fans and our guests and our customers and so forth. And they are driving not only the things that are innovations and so forth, but also things where we can just, you know, do better. So for example, if we have a concert and let's say you know where we put a specific you know concession stand if our fans are telling us that hey instead of having this you know menu on that stand it really would be this and you know there's an overwhelming amount of feedback that way we'll take a look at that and we'll respond and that's just another example of that value include everyone so when we're thinking about something that we're doing if you know it's only going to benefit you know a small group of our associates or a small group of our fan base, that's really not the scale we're looking for, right? We're looking for something that's scalable and really does include everyone from the perspective of giving a benefit or opportunity and so forth. And all of that for us really blows around putting people first from the perspective in all that we do. So what I would say about the core values is that they fundamentally are kind of that guiding post in all the decisions we make and the great part about it is that they're so well known they're so entrenched no matter what meeting you're in as soon as we're not living up to those in some way you know a team member will call each you know each other out right so wait a minute wait a minute this is all great but if we're really including everyone how will you know this group you know benefit from it if we're going to approach it this way oh you're right you know so that's what the core values do it just helps us hold ourselves together accountable because we know ultimately we're going to be held accountable to those core values.
Speaker 01:Accountability is the A in the value piece of building a value culture as far as I'm concerned. And I don't remember if I read it or if I was watching one of the videos where I was talking about one of the things that came across when I was saying it's like demonstrating this in action, not just in word. And I think that's a very important side for employees of all levels to be able to see the leadership also taking part in it. It's not just some words on a wall, you know, like Everybody's got that corporate vision and mission, and then it gets faded over the years after the sun's hit it, and everybody's like, oh, what was that? So give me a little example. I know you talked about it being brought up in meetings and that kind of thing, and everybody calling each other out if you're not following those kind of things. How do employees, how are they holding themselves accountable to forwarding these core values in the workplace as well?
Speaker 00:Whether it's a briefing or a huddle, the core values there's usually a core value of the day that we share, right? And we focus on, and they constantly change all throughout the year and so forth. So we're constantly reminding ourselves about it, but not only just, you know, what the core value states, but giving examples of them, right? So a couple of things I'll share with you. One is we have a values in action program that, you know, recognizes team members, right? For living our core values. And it could prove a lot of different things. We also have something called the heroes of hospitality wall. It's inside the stadium. I don't know if you've seen that, but it's, But most, you know, most organizations, they have their employee recognition wall in the back office, right? Old cardboard, you know, pegboard or something like that. Well, ours is sitting right outside Arthur's suite, the going suites, the first thing he sees. And we have a ceremony once a quarter where we induct entire new team members into that, right? So again, that's just, we hold the examples extremely high. And I use the recognition example because that demonstrates like, that's what great and excellent looks like to us. in terms of these examples. And all these stories, you know, whether they're a hero of hospitality story or a value in action story and so forth, they don't have to be like inventing the new mousetrap, you know, because these are simple things that anyone demonstrates. These are simple things anyone can do to drive value, to create value for themselves in terms of being, feeling like they're alive in the role that they, you know, play inside our business and so forth, or the impact they have on the business or a customer or a fan guests and so forth, right? The important part of that is, you know, if folks only think, you know, climbing Mount Everest, that's kind of like achievement. That's how we get, you know, recognized. That's how, that's what excellence looks like. Then we're sending the wrong message, right? Because I'm not climbing Mount Everest. I'm going to buy the t-shirt, but I ain't climbing it. That's only for a select few folks who've got the physical characteristics to be able to go and do that, right? So, but on the accountability side, the other things I would add to it is, you does an old phrase of like, you know, six degrees of Kevin Bacon, right? So one of the ways an organization can go sideways very quickly is when they're separated from their customer. And so we make sure that never happens. And so all of our associates participate in something called walk in my shoes. And so they'll walk, they'll work a concession stand, food and beverage on event day, they'll work security, they'll work ticketing. So you know exactly what it's like to be on the front line, serving fans, guests and customers, right? And so you're not allowed to just sit in the corporate office, right? And so I think that accountability from the standpoint of we are very visible with all of our team members. We are accessible to all of our team members from a leadership perspective. We are side by side, arm in arm with them, you know, when we are working events and working, you know, our business and so forth. And we lead by example. There's, again, another core value coming integrating with this, right? Which is, you know, if we see something on the floor and pick it up, you know, then, you know, team members see it as well. So we lead by example through everything that we do. But the accountability is from the standpoint of we are really good at after-actioning every event. So after-action reviews, every event we do that so that one, how can the next event, which might be just a week later, be even better than the last one? But also to see if we're seeing themes in terms of the next innovation we need to make or the next investment we need to make to improve the experience for our associates or for the businesses Tell
Speaker 01:me a little bit. I'm assuming you have a mix of like seasonal, part-time, and then full-time employees as well. So when you're bringing in your seasonal or your part-time, how do you incorporate them into the overall feeling so that they feel like they're part of the organization from the get-go when they don't maybe have six months with the whole team before something's getting started?
Speaker 00:Sure, sure. So, well, one, they're involved in all, so there's onboarding process, right, for, you know, for sure, for new or higher orientation. There's shadowing and all that kind of stuff. There's training. There are events that they're invited to, right? So for example, Falcon's Feast, you know, event day team members could have been out there with us, you know, handing out turkeys and so forth. Recognition events that we do that they're involved with. We actually have our executive team go into huddles and briefings at 6 a.m., you know, with different teams, whether it's food and beverage and so forth. forth. We make sure we provide everything that's going out to associates in terms of communications and so forth, sharing that with them. So I'll just give you one example. So on the guest service team side, and for the Falcons, let's say, we can have 4,000 to 5,000 event day team members on a Falcons game, right? And so we have a newsletter that goes out monthly, and we also have a weekly what we call guest service insider. And in there's a little bit of everything, obviously information- for the upcoming event. But like in the newsletter, we have wellness programs, right? Social, mental, physical, you know, lifestyle, eating, you know, et cetera, messages from frontline executives and so forth, the latest training initiatives we have. So what we try and do is, again, make sure we're communicating, we're collaborating, that we're providing opportunities for training, you know, with them, you know, alongside all of us. So, and, you know, Then on an event schedule, I guess the one great thing about Mercedes-Benz Stadium is we are so busy. With private events, we probably have 200-plus private events. On major events, which is like 50,000 people or more, we could have 50 to 60 in a given year. So it's not long that we're separated from all of our team members, but we do a great job communicating, collaborating, including them in different opportunities. When we do give-back opportunities, they're invited to join us as well, right? So that's how we make sure we're connected.
Speaker 01:When you were talking about the recognition wall and everything about the stories that come from the team members and that kind of stuff, I was talking with Gary Ridge, the CEO of WD-40, and he was talking about the power of stories. And then Rich Sheridan was talking about how they use it at Menlo on how everybody can see themselves as part of the journey and part of the successes. And I thought it was interesting that you mentioned story also. How important do you think stories are And maybe from the grassroots being that the story gets told by the employee and not just the leadership.
Speaker 00:So on the Heroes of Hospitality, most of those stories will come in from like a fan guest or customer, which is pretty amazing. Right. So, I mean, it takes something for someone to set about set aside some time and send in a note. That means we definitely impacted them. Right. I know some people may roll their eyes when they hear a story and they might think of storytelling and so forth. But stories are just facts with emotions. Right. That's that's what it is. Just because I'm telling you a story doesn't mean I'm making it up. It means this is just facts with emotions. But at the end of the day, we are all just human beings. We are just a collection of memories. Those memories are usually formed by really strong emotions, really good ones or bad ones. They reside with us, right? So the stories are important from the standpoint of, one, we share our stories each and every event. So in the meetings, the huddles that I'm in with with all these folks at the beginning of the huddle and leadership briefing. At the end of the leadership briefing, there is a value in action story. It's about how someone impacted a fan guest or customer. And if you see the quote over, over that heroes of hospitality wall, it's Arthur's quote that says, I'm going to probably butcher it here, but it's something along the lines of the people will come here and they'll see the amazing, you know, architecture design. They'll see the halo board, the amazing technology, right? But they're going to forget all about that. The lasting thing that they are going to remember is how they were treated You know, how someone made them feel, right? It's that Maya Angelou quote back out there. So the stories are really important to, one, define what, you know, excellence looks like, demystify what excellence looks like. Like, it doesn't have to be climbing Mount Everest or creating the greatest new mousetrap. Make it really understandable that that's something I can do, or that's what Harry did, or that's what Sheila did. I can do that. I can do that, right? And translate it in a way that, you know, we are recognizing folks for going above and beyond. Because in the world today, right, we all need an attaboy and attagirl. We all do. I don't care if you're the CEO of the biggest company in the world, you still report to a board. And you as a human still want to be valued and appreciated, you know, and recognized, right? So whether it's, you know, Steve Cannon, who's our CEO, or Arthur Blank, everyone likes to be, needs to be appreciated and recognized. And I think we all know what it means when you recognize and appreciate someone, right? You know how it impacts them. For some, it's literally like rocket fuel. Rocket fuel. You breathe air. You breathe life into people by appreciating and recognizing them, right? You can change the course of an entire day, right? And so again, for us, it's not just about the feel good. It's about demonstrating our core values. Because at the end of the day, once you recognize someone, you're putting people first because you're you're recognizing someone. You clearly are listening, responding because you either saw something, heard something, or someone sharing information about that one. You are including everyone because you're sharing that single story with everyone for everyone's benefit. You're trying to demonstrate that you are leading by example because here you're holding it up high in terms of what that story's impact is. And you're trying to demonstrate this is how you can innovate even on yourself, right? In terms of, I didn't know that's what takes to just, you know, kind of to create that great experience. It took just, you know, that little effort and so forth. And so, you know, the power of storytelling is huge, huge for us in terms of many different aspects, coaching, developing, recognizing, appreciating, and also learning from one another, right? Which also can lead into, you know, after action and review points, right?
Speaker 01:I come from the world of communications too. And so I know I'm partial to storytelling, but it really does, you some of the best professors that I sat through. They actually literally stood in front of the room and told the story. I mean, I remember, I can remember a Western Civ professor right now. He never cracked a book the entire run there. He'd come in, sit, and he would just tell stories about what was happening in the world. And I remember those to this day. And, you know, I sit here and think and go, I probably would have never remembered that, you know, like 30, well, we might not go say exactly how many years, but 30 plus years later now that this was happening. And so, yeah, I do think they have a huge impact on people being able to see and learn and put themselves in those shoes and really get an idea of what's going on. In your put people first value, one of the things that you have in there is build rapport and trust. Trust between employees and their employer, trust between teammates, trust between everyone is vital today. And it's one of the things I think the world's kind of lacking right now. And so I think that's why companies that focus on on that are so much stronger. Give me maybe two cents worth on how do you help instill trust and how do you help grow trust inside the organization so that employees do feel like they can take the reins and run with it?
Speaker 00:Yeah, I mean, you can come at this from so many different angles, right? So I'll just start at the top, right? So obviously from a culture, overall culture perspective, right? Culture eats strategy for breakfast, lunch, dinner, you know, Peter Drucker, although, you know, that's 100% true. You know, Great culture is founded on trust, right? That's what it's founded on. It's founded on trust. And great cultures just don't spontaneously combust overnight. Culture is something that you really, really have to work out over and over and over again, right? So from a trust perspective, I would say, you know, we, lots of organizations do the, you know, an employee survey, right? And we do our listen and respond survey and we survey everyone and we've got high participation. We're a great place to work. You know, there's no doubts about that. But even in an amazing culture, and again, I worked at Mercedes-Benz for 18 years, and we had an amazing culture. What I would tell you about the Blank Family of Business, it's at another level, even above that. It's the best that I've been a part of in my career. From a trust perspective, think about the Listen and Response Survey, the cultural survey. If leaders in the organization just did the survey for a check the box and cursory review and talk about a little bit here and there and probably be more cynical and dismissive and try and come up with you know that's why they said it or who said it and all that kind of stuff obviously that would build a lot of mistrust right so demonstrated since the five years I've been here is extremely candid with the results extremely candid with the feedback in terms of yes these are things that we need to do better at these are things that you know we disagree you know like in other words you know this in terms of you know not necessarily an issue for us to you know focus in on but top three focused areas would be these three things and then demonstrated management and leadership action around those things along with teams, right? And so what I'm really proud of is, and again, if you think about on event day, we have five or 6,000 team members on top of, you know, all the full-time, part-time folks with our most recent one. You know, we had not only the listen and respond survey, but then we had individual teams, you know, breaking up and defining what their action plans were for their teams from an overarching organizational perspective, the executive committee defining these are the three things we're going to focus in on? And then everyone coming together to kind of review that, right? And say, okay, is this all aligned? Including the CEO sitting down for hours with all these teams and then following up months later and saying, okay, how have we done? How have we done, right? And this relentless pursuit around culture. So to me, that's the first leg of trust, which is you asked, team members responded, okay, so now what are we going to do about it? And so that's very transparent and it's very alive, you know, and it's on ongoing, right? And so it's that relentless pursuit of culture, right? And trust building. The second part I would say is outside of the cultural survey is in our business, especially in live entertainment or sports in general, whether it's PGA tour, superstore, or even the West Creek ranches and so forth, you're operating in the now as much as you are always planning strategically for the next and so forth. But day to day, there's a lot going on now. And so if, and just think of a game day for all those pieces to be working without worrying what the other one's doing, right? Boy, there better be a lot of great communication, a lot of great collaboration, a lot of great information sharing, a lot of good premortem and postmortem discussions, premortem about, hey, if it rains, what are we going to do, right? What if, you know, what if the power goes out? What are we going to do, right? During the event, you know, okay, this is not going right. I need three people to jump in and help me over here, right? So who do I go to? And then post-event, to be honest enough to sit there and say, these are the great things we did, but here are the things where we absolutely need to get better at. And so because of the nature of the business that we're in, we couldn't operate if there wasn't high levels of trust. I compare it to corporate America and so forth, where silos can be built very, very quickly and the walls can be very thick. There just is so much speed and movement here. If there was someone who was not a great collaborator, someone who wasn't trustworthy or a department or area and so forth, that would raise its head so quickly, you know, amongst everyone as, you know, it's almost like an engine with eight cylinders now fighting, you know, firing with only seven. Everyone would notice that there's something wrong with that cylinder, right? That to me is, we prove it every day, every event. We have to because the speed of our business is we're live. We are live, you know. It's not recorded. It's not pre-taped. It's, you know, we're in the moment, in the now.
Speaker 01:Going back to something you said in the beginning about having a purpose business. Like it's all about the purpose and all of it kind of plays in. We're seeing more and more research, especially with this new generation coming into the workforce, where values and purpose really, they want those to align with the companies that they choose to work for. How are y'all using that as far as recruiting and trying to bring people to you? How are you putting that out there so that people can recognize if these things are important to you, this is the place that you want to work?
Speaker 00:A couple things. So one is is explaining to folks what is the Blank family of businesses, right? So you are part of, you know, Arthur Blank's, you know, vision and so forth, right? The second is we obviously share the information about Arthur's giving pledge, Arthur's videos and how he speaks to it, especially how he speaks so eloquently to this whole thing about repairing the world, right? And making the world a better place. And then the foundation's work, and Arthur's pledge to that foundation, right? And part of the giving pledge. And then knowing the foundation, it's really focused on, you know, the environment, you know, focused on youth, which is the future and so forth focused on education. Right. So the strategic pillars of the, of the family, of the family, the kids and Arthur, his whole family, what that focuses is nothing but doing, you know, good, good and wellness in the world. Right. So, you know, sharing the fact, okay, you're going to be working at the PGA tour superstore, but just know, yes, we're a for-profit business, but all of that goes to the foundation, which helps then Arthur make the world a And so that's the overview connection. And then inside the connection is whether you're at the PDJ tour superstore or you're working for the Falcons or you're working for the stadium and so forth, we have an opportunity to share all the different ways that we give back together, right? So whether it's working in the community or it's working, you know, some of the things that we're doing inside of our businesses, for example, Mercedes-Benz Stadium, you know, true zero waste, you know, pre-certified, a lead platinum, you know, so again, the environment is very important. to many folks, our Home Depot backyard being an open park, right? And I think just two weeks ago, we actually had all your soldiers bring their dogs in and so forth, right? And so it's trying to make that connection with, you know, a younger team member base, because as Arthur would put it, they are asking a lot more questions. They're asking a lot better questions. They're asking a lot of smarter questions and, you know, are not putting up with generic responses that they can see through that, you If an organization says, yeah, we're into sustainability, right? But quickly you can see it's greenwashing, so to speak, right? That's going to turn a potential candidate off. Whereas we can back it up with facts. We can back it up with facts through everything that we do. It makes it easy for someone to be part of and want to be part of this organization.
Speaker 01:So how much input do employees have? How do they bring some ideas to the table to say, hey, this is an area I think we can make an even bigger impact
Speaker 00:in? Yeah. So I'll give you the green team as an example, right? So that is a collection of, you know, associates, right? That are just interested in sustainability and so forth. It's a passion of theirs. Any associates able to join that, right? Any associates able to join those meetings and so forth, share and contribute. And it's a reason why today I think that we have, you know, three beehives, you know, at the stadium today, right? It's a reason why we have a charm recycling center, right? For all those difficult to recycle at home, you know, items that folks have trouble disposing of and so forth. So again, whether it's giving back. So right now we have two clothing drives that are going on, all generated by associates who basically wanted to start something where we could come into the administrative office and drop off toiletries or old gently used coats or whatever it is. Associates can get involved in so many different ways by connecting with our community relations partners, connecting with the family foundation. We have a number of associates led giving funds you know whether it's on veterans whether it's soccer in the streets and youth and so forth so all those exist people just have to raise their hand and we're never short of feedback because whether it's you know feedback through our surveys and so forth or their skip level meetings you know the CEOs does and all the executives do as well we right now are doing something this is pretty cool culturally we're doing what's called a lunch lottery so So you as an associate would get a scratch off. It would have my name on it and actually did. It had two scratch off spots. So I had to scratch it off. Now I see our two other new team members from entirely different parts of our business. And now it's my responsibility to contact them and have lunch. And we go to the press box. I show the press box card. Our lunch is paid for by the organization. And it's us just to get to know each other better to, again, open up those channels of communication and so forth. Right. So and then we do. Hours of power, which are just meeting hookups, you know, with, you know, for an hour and a half, two hours on a Thursday or Friday where all team members are invited just to hang out. Um, and basically usually after a specific theme, right. It might be at, uh, about, you know, what the security team is doing or the HR team is doing 20 minutes there, but then the rest is pretty much, you know, food, food and beverage. You know, uh, we do associate huddles last week. Um, our GM for the Falcons came in and, you know, kicked off a huddle, you know, um, talking about the team. We talked about core values. We talked about Falcons Feast and giving back during this time, right? So there's so many opportunities to create connectivity with folks. If you're interested in something, it's pretty easy to raise your hand and get involved.
Speaker 01:I love that. So my last question is kind of playing off. You were talking about the quote, there's no finish line.
Speaker 00:Yes.
Speaker 01:So there's no finish line for the stadium that's always improving and growing. But what about the culture of the organization? how important it is for an organization not to settle and say, we've got the best that we can have. How important it is for them to continue pushing forward and say, we can always improve our culture a little bit.
Speaker 00:As I think I mentioned before, right? Culture doesn't spontaneously combust and you've got to work at it all the time. You got to work at it all the time, right? So you have to create new and different ways. ways, you know, to connect amongst your team members, right? Not only listening and responding to them, but also listening to what would make it a better, a greater place to work, right? So we actually have a fun committee and that's the title of it. It's called the fun committee. It's got probably 20 or 30 associates from all across the business involved. And what they do is they decide for the whole year, what are the things that we can do different this year besides all the great stuff we have already, right? What are new things that we can do this year, connect one another to a common, you know, purpose, understanding, as well as create the space, right, for people to share their perspectives, their opinions and so forth, right? The lunch lottery example is just one example that I gave you of like how we did something different, right? Bringing, letting the associates bring their pets in, that came from the fund committee, right? We had our give back day and we partnered with Hands on Atlanta where all of the associates celebrate Arthur's 80th birthday, we all, you know, volunteer across Atlanta to do something on that day, right? And there's a whole list of other thoughts and ideas that are out there. And what we've already done, I guess, in the last 10 months, I would say, each month there's something different or new that we haven't ever done before to kind of, you know, kickstart, you know, our culture in a different way. Walk in my shoes, will always be a staple of our culture, right? Skip level meetings will always be a staple of our culture. Huddles with the executives will always be a staple of our culture, right? Our recognition appreciation ceremonies, always a staple of our culture, right? Discussions and sharing openly about our listen, respond, our cultural survey and hearing live feedback, as well as sharing the feedback that associates provided to us, always a part of our culture. What I would say is there's foundational elements, you know, that will never go away. But what we've been really good at is involving associates to come up with new things like lunch lottery to do something different. And those goals were around, hey, how can we connect, you know, more of the new folks on different teams with, you know, some of the folks who have been around here for a while. Lunch lottery, you know, we'll have a lunch lottery and we'll line up, you know, folks who are, who've been here a while with folks who haven't been here a while and we'll create new neural connections, right, so to speak. Look, you have to actively work at culture and Culture is embedded in everything you do. Culture is defined by the policies and processes that you put in place. It's in the written words and documents all over the place. Culture is slightly different from team to team. That doesn't make it bad, right? Finance folks probably have a slightly different cultural feel if you're sitting in that room, right, than a marketing culture and so forth. That doesn't mean they're misaligned. It just means they're a little bit different, right? Everything in the business is a reflection of your culture and what your associate communications email looks like, how your town hall meetings are structured. I've been around the block enough to see bad cultures. So the point is, I think it's really well understood, right? If we take care of one another and our associates, we're going to be able to take care of our business, right? Because they're going to take care of our fans, guests, and customers, right? That's kind of the platinum rule.
Speaker 01:It does really come down to relationship, doesn't it?
Speaker 00:It does. It does.
Speaker 01:Anything I should have asked you that I didn't that you want to make sure you get out there for people to know about it?
Speaker 00:No, I think what I wanted, what I would want to... First, I hope this has been helpful.
Speaker 01:Very much so. Thank
Speaker 00:you. Yeah, I think... I think for me, again, and so my background is accounting finance. Just to give you a perspective, I think this will make a little bit more of my point. So my background is accounting finance, CPA, MBA. So I started off primarily a numbers guy in my career with Mercedes-Benz North America before it was, it only sold about 40,000 vehicles at the time. Then I went into the music business for about 10 years and in New York City, working with major labels and artists and stuff like that. And then I took a sabbatical because I was working probably 110 hours a week for 10 years straight. And I went back to school, started taking some pre-med courses, actually went to State Police Academy and wound up running with paramedics and EMTs for a while. So I found my calling, which was not numbers, which was actually people. Then someone remembered me from Mercedes-Benz from probably 15 years earlier. And I went back there, ultimately went back and became the chief learning officer. Then I became the chief customer experience officer. So again, all focused around people, right? And now I've been here for five years with the Arthur Blank family of business. And what strikes me most is Arthur from the perspective, and I started with you today about that. Man's Search for Meaning was the first book he raised. And he said, if you haven't read it, if you have read it, you better reread it. He really epitomizes passion, purpose, and profits all coming together. That's how his business operates. The definition of his book, you know, his book, Good Company, so, so appropriate and so many lessons in there. And just this man who has been driven to heal the world. And he really, he really is serious when he means he's there to heal the world, make the world a better place, always do the right things for the right reasons and live with the outcome. So very unique when The actions follow the words across an entire organization led by a man who's created core values and core principles that, you know, if there's a young entrepreneur there, they better look at them and read that book real well and look at all those core values because it is the secret to success.
Speaker 01:Well, thanks so much, Harry. I really appreciate your time. You
Speaker 02:can learn more from Harry and other amazing leaders in the Culture Secrets book. It's available on Amazon or through your favorite bookseller. Find out more at shellyphillips.com.
