Leadership expert and New York Times best-selling author, Simon Sinek, said, “Customers will never love a company until the employees love it first.”
Best Upon Request (BEST) was built on this idea.
No matter what business you’re in, you’re in the business of people. And in the business of people, there is no person more important than your employee.
If nothing else, 2019 has taught us that this remains as true today as it was 30 years ago when we started.
As a matter of fact, the idea of investing in employee wellness and quality of life is the very idea that attracted our CEO, Tillie Hidalgo Lima, to BEST in the first place.
Tillie knew what it was like to be a successful, but time-bankrupt professional. She was working as a pharmacist supporting her family, as her husband Dave, BEST’s founder, was getting the business off the ground after acquiring the contracts of an office tenant concierge firm and shifting its focus.
Workplace well-being is what got Dave started with BEST. Being entrepreneurial, Dave saw early in his career that time would be to the ’90s, what money was to the ’80s.
“The ’80s are remembered as the ‘decade of greed’ where everyone was chasing the bottom line — money. In the ’90s, the bottom line became time. People were becoming time-starved,” Dave said.
Just like Tillie, Dave was experiencing time starvation trying to get BEST on the map. Together they struggled to balance work and life in the same way most employees are today.
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After 30 years in business, people continue to be BEST’s mission. It is our highest aim, and the essence of our legacy, to create life-enriching experiences for our customers. We’ve been able to do this by creating a workplace that puts employees first.
When Tillie took over as president and CEO in 2003, she dared to make compassionate employee benefits BEST’s driving value during a time when this was considered by many to be “fluff” or “perks for the top brass.”
After all, this was the corporate world of the early 21st century, still very much clinging to the 20th century’s way of doing things.
Dave shared Tillie’s worry. “At the time, we wanted business leaders to see that investing in employees is essential to long-term, bottom-line success. Work-life benefits aren’t just window dressings.”
With BEST’s new guiding principle of compassion, the company has been growing strong ever since.
This year, BEST became Great Place To Work-Certified™, with 96% of our team members reporting we are a great place to work. At the same time, we have a 99% customer satisfaction rating, validating that employee satisfaction fuels customer satisfaction.
For Tillie, it’s simple: “We serve from the SOUL. Every customer interaction is a Sacred Opportunity to Unfold Love™. We don’t just run errands for folks; we drop off the forgotten lunch at school. We shop for the last-minute birthday gift. We drive to the nursing home to deliver grandpa’s favorite sweater. This is why our customer satisfaction rate is near-perfect.”