Amtec Unlocks How to Preserve Company Culture in the New Normal

Ben Kiblinger

February 18, 2022

The Key to Understanding Worker Retention and Team Performance in 2022

The 2021 labor market post mortem by data analyst company, Visier, shows about one in four people quit their job. This happened as employers attempted to bring everyone back to in-person work to restore company culture back to normal. Company culture defines how people work together. It’s glue, and supports developing high-performing teams. With tenured team leaders quitting in droves last year, the foundations of company culture are being tested and some companies have fallen. Through its work with hundreds of companies and its own in-house workgroup experiments, Amtec has found the key to unlocking how to preserve company culture in the new normal. 

More of a lock picking set than a key, preserving company culture in 2022 requires responding to new concerns. With over 60-years in the business of recruiting and retention, Amtec’s research has found its people perform best with the stability that comes from its workers being engaged in meaningful work. When their career path aligns their interests with the company, work engagement soars. 

However, companies who stay true to only these core values, of meaningful work and aligned career paths, still experience a surprising number of departures. This is due to a freshly heightened drive to achieve work-life balance while staying ahead of the cost-of-living. Both of these are challenged by the instability of in-person education for children, supply-chain issues, delays from “out-sick” absences, rising living costs, and a high demand/low inventory housing market. Companies that offer their employees greater stability coupled with greater flexibility are more likely to have the best team member retention rates.

Before the pandemic, Amtec had in-person policies similar to most of its direct hire and contract hire clients. Employees were hired for positions available at specific Amtec locations. Team members were expected to show up for work in-person. While remote team workgroups did exist, it was an exception rather than the rule. This exception was only available for unique situations and hard-to-find skillsets. 

Beginning in 2020, the lockdowns and restrictions initially created a sense of isolation that was difficult for workgroups. Early in the 2020 lockdowns, Scott Kuethen, Amtec CEO, expressed in a company message, “I think our team has and is suffering from being apart”…“Community and culture have been an important part of Team Amtec (FAmtec) for many years. Working in isolation, with little more than a zoom team meeting in the morning, has taken its toll. I miss seeing you all.”

The challenge of preserving FAmtec was on! Over the next 18 months, Amtec developed better work routines and collaboration methods using stronger communication and web tools. The transition from in-person to remote for its entire multi-market team was complex. Everyone was committed to making it work. For the first time, Amtec achieved performing all of its work functions with a fully distributed team. Recently Amtec celebrated beating 2021 revenue goals and fully expected everyone to be excited about returning to in-person office locations.

While the excitement was there, it was offset by something bigger. As team members were invited to return to their in-person, Monday – Friday schedules, many team members expressed new concerns. Amtec responded by digging into these concerns and then pivoted its expectations. Beginning in 2022, Amtec is providing all team members the option to choose to work in the office or work remotely – as they like, based on what works best for them. 

“Replacing pandemic restrictions with new freedom has been very well received. As measured by revenue – it’s working for Amtec too! Beyond 2021 being a banner year of growth, we’re happy to report FAmtec is still alive and well. Our team members are a part of our company family because they experience the mutual care, respect, and camaraderie that makes a family real.” – Scott Kuethen, Amtec CEO.

In addition to strengthening team member retention, companies embracing location flexibility find larger candidate pools of qualified talent and increased speed to fill open positions. 

The approach of preserving company culture in the new normal includes:

• Addressing team member concerns caused by the current social realities at home.
• Redefining how we work together to achieve more meaningful and rewarding results.
• Achieving greater team-building with a more distributed, and more remote, workforce.

ABOUT AMTEC: Amtec is a professional Direct Hire Recruitment and Contract Staffing company based in Southern California, providing services nationwide. Additional service offerings include Executive Search, Recruitment Process Outsourcing or RPO, and Payrolling Services.