This year, two LBM operations—one born in the Great Recession with 240 locations primarily across the eastern U.S., the other a 96-year-old operation on Hawaii’s big island—won an Excellence Award in the Education category for their comprehensive leadership programs.
US LBM and HPM Building Supply saw the need to develop leadership in-house. While the programs are similar, each reflects the requirements of its situation.
US LBM, a $2.9 billion operation with an extensive portfolio of companies, worked to expose the participants in its PULSE program to operations in different regions for a true perspective on the scope of the company, and help them develop the skills to comprehend and address US LBM’s needs going forward.
HPM Building Supply, a $105 million company with eight locations on four of Hawaii’s islands, shaped its Leadership Foundation program to embrace Hawaii’s culture and its people’s deep relationships to their families and their communities.
Central to both PULSE and HPM’s Leadership Foundation is a blend of classroom learning, mentoring, presentations from outside experts, and team projects. The success of these two programs can be measured by the promotion rate of the participants. In the US LBM PULSE program’s first three years, 45% of the 57 participants were promoted. In HPM’s newly minted 18-month-long program, four of the 15 participants were promoted within the first five months.
US LBM’S PULSE Program
The PULSE program got its name because participants are seen as the heartbeat of US LBM. The program is designed for employees on succession plans who are seen by leadership as having the skills and aspirations to grow another two levels in the company.
As US LBM started to develop a leadership plan in 2012, program developers identified four key areas to focus on: leadership and teamwork; strategy and innovation; negotiation and conflict, and risk-taking; and how to identify opportunities, says Amy Brown, the company’s director of learning and development. Brown is one of the program’s creators, along with Wendy Whiteash, US LBM’s vice president of culture.
There are particular areas where higher-level folks fail, says Whiteash. They include moving from a line leadership role to strategic planning, failing to see how the needs of customers change or identifying where waste exists in processes, and building a team and holding people accountable. These are areas that PULSE was built to address.
“It’s a multifaceted program. There is not one size fits all,” says Brown, who regards PULSE's variety as one of its strengths. “It meets people where they are.”
Participants attend working sessions during the year, with time designated to tour a US LBM location. They also attend the company’s annual meeting, where they can network and schedule time with people who can help with their projects.
“We let them self-direct,” Whiteash says. Participants have flexibility in how much they travel, and they can Skype and set up conference calls to keep on track. Employees make their team presentations at a final meeting with corporate and division leadership.
Mentors are a big part of PULSE, and that has always been a highlight of the program, says Whiteash. In selecting the mentors, she says, “We looked for a track record of success; we wanted the ‘wow’ factor. We wanted people who would be willing to share their network and help others learn.” All of the mentors are high-level employees of US LBM.
In PULSE’s first two years, each participant had one mentor; in its third year, developers gave each team group mentors, a change that received positive feedback. As Whiteash explains, “If you got a mentor in the first year that you didn’t like, you were stuck.”
“We are constantly looking at ways to make this as impactful as possible,” says Brown. “This year, we are going to have three sessions instead of four, with more time to work on their project, and we are introducing the project in the first session.”
HPM’s Leadership Foundation
“When we came out of the recession, we realized we needed to invest in our people as much as our facilities,” says Tracie Foglia, HPM’s talent development coach, and creator (with executive coach Ken Wilbanks) of its brand-new leadership program.
Since HPM is employee-owned, it was natural to open participation to all. Foglia says the company made the application process purposefully rigorous to ensure that those who entered were serious. Along with a resume, personal essay, and references, applicants were asked to make an in-person presentation about a challenge they saw in the company and how it could be changed.
“I was afraid no one would apply,” Foglia says. “But 27 people did. I was so elated.” Applicants came from all sections and levels of the company. The 15-member cohort was winnowed from that group.
Foglia and the team wanted to inculcate a sense of leadership in the participants that would benefit not only the company, but their families and the larger community as well. “You can’t start talking about leadership until you talk about self-leadership,” Foglia says. “Then it becomes paired to team leadership, then organizational leadership and community leadership.”
The program provides academic studies with weekly assignments posted on a web forum. Foglia calls the forum “our greatest success, because it keeps the participants engaged with each other.”
Assignments carry on from two-day, in-person sessions held every other month, which kick off with leaders from within and outside the company sharing their personal leadership stories. An assignment might have Foglia ask participants to read an article and watch a TED talk on a particular topic; then, she will pose a few open-ended questions.
The participants are paired with mentors from inside and outside HPM who have volunteered four to five hours a month to support them. It’s the participants’ responsibility to get in touch with their mentors, which Foglia says has been a stretch for them.
To add experience to the academics, in the latter half of the program, participants will learn the scope of the business by spending one week a month working in each of eight key areas such as finance and yard operations. It’s easy for people to be siloed in their divisions, Foglia says, and “we want to produce leaders who have a global view of all areas of the company.”
Members were also asked to tackle a merchant project. Divided into small groups, each team will analyze one of five underperforming product lines and show how it can be improved.
