White paper
Developing a Positive Company Culture for Frontline Workers

1

Culture Eats Strategy for Breakfast

As pointed out by Austrian-American management consultant, educator, and author, Peter Drucker, even with the most fantastic strategy or talent, an organization's success is likely to be below potential if the culture isn't right. In fact, people do not just quit companies or leaders… they quit organizational cultures.

Company culture is among the key differentiators between good and great companies. Still, the majority of organizations fail to build the right culture. This lack arises mainly due to an insufficient approach and limited commitment to widespread ambiguity around fostering a great culture in the first place.

This page examines the relevance of building a company culture for frontline employees. It also explores actionable ways to create a robust company culture for frontline workers.

Want to read this white paper offline or share it? Download it here!

2

What Is Company Culture?

According to Forbes, a company's culture includes anything related to the customs and norms that naturally form within an organization. It includes
the sum of all spoken and unspoken beliefs and behaviors that drive employee motivation, productivity, and retention in the organization.

3

Why Focus on Company Culture for Frontline Employees?

Today, 88% of organizations depend on a frontline workforce. This includes all individuals acting as a link between the company and its end customers, who may or may not sit out of the main office.

Frontline employees often operate across dispersed locations, with significant responsibility and contribution toward value creation. However, there's often disproportionate value creation for them that's evident with the following facts: 

Despite the present-day economic disturbances, this concern around frontline employee turnover remains alive, with company culture as a solid answer to attracting and retaining talent.

Why Domino’s Puts Company Culture at the Core of Internal Communications

A recent interview with Head of People and Culture at Domino’s Germany, Dennis Batbayli, highlights how the world-renowned pizza brand engages
its frontline workers – most of which are from the younger generation –using company culture.

“Just because there’s a Domino’s logo on the wall, that doesn’t necessarily mean our franchise partners can relate to the brand. And if our frontline employees, who engage with our customers every day, don’t relate to or feel good about Domino’s, then it’s bad for business.”

Dennis Batbayli,
Head of People and Culture at Domino’s Germany

Here are some of the things Domino’s did to strengthen their company culture:

4

How to Build Excellent Company Culture for Frontline Workers?

Reprioritization of frontline workers runs on creating and improving their life at work. As they fight against various challenges, such as being away from family to ensuring a 100% on-site presence, introducing the following measures can help:

Elevating the value perception 
of employees

Research suggests that 51% of non-management frontline workers feel undervalued as employees. Providing flexibility and enhancing safety are ways to instantly make them feel more valued.

According to the mindset of today's millennial-dominant workforce, the expectation is that employers assist in achieving work-life autonomy. According to CNBC, workers appreciate the freedom of choosing their schedule as much as they enjoy a 10% pay salary increment. What does that mean? They prefer to work with employers who accommodate their desire for flexibility by investing in procedures and technology that increase their alternatives for mobility and self-service. Frontline employees need to be empowered with such flexibility.

When it comes to safety, organizations must make it a point to include a company culture of safety at both physical and psychological levels. Companies with frontline workers can ensure physical safety with proper training and investment in safety programs. Rewarding good safety practices is another excellent option to create a safe and employee-centric culture. Simultaneously, investing in psychological safety is also essential, as employees must feel safe, secure, and courageous to take risks. Research confirms that teams that facilitate psychological safety tend to perform higher.

Providing networking and mentorship opportunities

80% of frontline employees say that their company provides limited connection opportunities at work. However, when asked about how frequently they network, almost 66% report that they network less than once per month or never since the start of 2022. Moreover, 72% of frontline workers have reported that they feel they have low sponsorship, and 69% report a concern around low mentorship. Overcoming these is another great way to boost the spirit of culture in the organization.

While most frontline workers regularly engage with their immediate managers and coworkers, only a limited few seek career advice or engage in social activities with their colleagues. By building a community and an interactive network for frontline workers, engagement and company culture can be increased. This is possible by investing in resources that support accessible, candid communication, irrespective of the employee’s location.

80% of frontline employees say that their company provides limited connection opportunities at work.

With technological innovations, it's an efficient practice to advance people, upskill and develop them. However, as frontline employees are often geographically dispersed, they typically get limited opportunities to exchange information with their colleagues. This results in the buildup of knowledge silos. It’s clear that cultivating a knowledge-sharing environment is necessary for building a healthy and progressive company culture.

Practically speaking, knowledge-sharing can become a hassle if the frontline workers don't have a company computer or email address to receive and share important information. They’re also often out and about due to the nature of their work. Statistically, 37% of companies still need communication and collaboration tools for their frontline workers. Less than 30% of companies don't even use group chats and team collaboration tools for frontline workers.

Overcoming this issue is possible by facilitating simplified communication and experience sharing for frontline workers. With proper technological adoption, leaders can support building a suitable knowledge base. However, this effort needs to align with a frontline worker's schedule and is possible by ensuring the communication mode is mobile-first, easy to use, and supports different information formats. At the same time, it's vital to ensure that the workers are trained formally to adapt to and use the new technology. Statistically, 55% of frontline workers have had to adapt to new technology without formal training.

In Short:
Excellent Company Culture Starts With Facilitating

Frontline employees play a crucial role in how businesses run. Thus, their well-being and satisfaction are essential for brewing motivation and navigating success. To that end, harboring an efficient and enthusiastic frontline workforce is only possible with a strong company culture. 

Building a company culture for the frontline workforce boils down to facilitating smooth two-way communication and engagement. This can range from organizing seminars and training, team-building exercises, and regular surveys to address genuine concerns. While there are several ways to approach this, providing a solid and simplified communication infrastructure is a simplified means to engage effectively.

Using Speakap’s mobile-first employee app, companies are able to securely connect their frontline and office workforce. It’s user-friendly and can double up as a single, efficient communication source for exchanging all your company information.

Successful deployment of Speakap has notably elevated employee satisfaction by over 32%, productivity by over 21%, and employee retention by over 14%, with an 80% adoption rate within the first months.