白领商务英语－经典案例9：Hallmark Cards

Facing Business Challenges at Hallmark Cards

Sending the Right Message to Employees

 

One of Hallmark's sympathy cards reads "Please remem­ber that winter's darkness emerges into spring." Given the ­troubles at Hallmark Cards, it's just the kind of message that Human Resources vice¹ president Ralph Christenson wants to send to employees.

 

From the early- to mid-1990s the privately² held greeting card firm saw its market share slip from well over 50 percent to about 45 percent, as new players in the market made cards that were more attractive and up to date. Even though Hallmark sales remained strong at about $4 billion annually³, many profit measures slipped dramatically. It's hard to say just how bad things were because Hallmark profits are kept secret, even from the 20,000 employees who own part of the company. But it wasn't good news when-Hallmark's profit-sharing contributions slipped from 10 percent of salaries to about 5 per­cent. Newly arrived in the Human Relations department, Christenson needed to find ways of keeping company employees happy. After all, the company's core mission is to communicate affection, love, and friendship through the warm messages that employees dream up.

 

Hallmark started out in 1910 as a family-run business, and the Hall family's leadership continues today. Based in Kansas City, Missouri, the company has always attracted talented and creative people through its friendly and family-oriented atmosphere. Because Hallmark products are based on enhancing relationships, it stands to reason that the company would focus on keeping employees happy. For example, back in the 1950s, the Hall family set up one of the first profit-sharing arrangements for employees. Today, employees own about one-third of the company. In addition, the tuition-reimbursement program pays 100 percent of education expenses for full­time staff. Other initiatives focus on child care and alter­native work arrangements such as work sharing and job sharing. And the company's policies are flexible to meet employees' special needs, such as allowing time off to care for aging parents. Overall, the company has always done such a good job helping⁴ its employees that Hallmark con­sistently ranks among the best companies to work for in the United States.

 

But in the mid-1990s Hallmark faced declining mar­ket share and shrinking profit. Consultants⁵ suggested ma­jor cost-cutting efforts, including a merger⁶ of the admin­istrative, marketing⁷, and product-development functions for the various card brands. To save money, Hallmark threw out its old organization and the ways that employees had beep doing their jobs. With the new focus on finances, em­ployees were concerned that their family-oriented benefits would disappear. Moreover, many employees feared that their jobs would be changed dramatically or eliminated al­together. The organization was in turmoil⁸.

 

Christenson had come to Hallmark because he be­lieved the company cared deeply about its employees as people. Because of management's recent sharp focus on corporate⁹ profits, Christenson worried that Hallmark wouldn't be able to keep up its long tradition of caring for employees and their families. For the company to see its way through the current crisis, he had to inspire the employees who create and produce Hallmark products. Christenson needed new ways to strengthen the family-oriented programs and shore up morale¹⁰.

If you were Ralph Christenson, what motivational techniques would you employ to keep Hallmark operating at peak levels? During times of massive organizational change, what would you recommend to reassure¹¹ employees and help them deal with stress? How could you improve the company's communication with employees. What steps would you recommend for maintaining Hallmark's traditional focus on employee needs?

Meeting Business Challenges at Hallmark Cards

As the new vice president of Human Relations, Ralph Christenson was facing restructuring and disruption at Hallmark. Ru­mors of layoffs¹² or massive job change and loss of benefits echoed along the corridors of Hallmark's Kansas City headquarters. Employees worried that profit sharing might be cut and that other important benefits such as child-care help, tuition reim­bursement, and work sharing would be lost. Always known for its family-oriented atmosphere, the company had consistently ranked among the best places to work in America. But now em­ployees' faith in Hallmark wavered, and Christenson needed to reassure company employees that things would work out.

 

Although Hallmark Cards was a healthy company, man­agement knew the underlying¹³ cost structure was too high. More­over, the time it took to deliver new products to market was as much as three years, far too long when customer tastes can change rapidly and the competition can react more quickly. So with the help of outside consultants, Hallmark's management developed several strategies to reduce costs and introduce prod­ucts with greater speed.

 

During this time of change, preserving employee jobs and improving morale were Christenson's primary concerns. So he developed a creative solution for containing costs by looking be­yond what people were originally hired to do. To retain em­ployees displaced by the merger of three divisions, Christenson developed a program for retraining factory workers to l1andle office jobs. Yet another group of factory employees helped paint an operating plant while receiving their standard wages. When factory work is slow, employees can even choose to volunteer for community work while drawing their usual paychecks. And no employee with more than two years with the company can be let go without a case review by company executives. So with Christenson's help, Hallmark was able to perpetuate¹⁴ its special caring for employees and its history of no layoffs.

 

Then to speed up the time it takes to develop and intro­duce new card products, Christenson helped Hallmark create cross-functional teams. Before these changes, Hallmark artists, designers, printers, and financial staff were working as much as a city block apart even though some of them were working on the same card design. With the new team concept, these em­ployees have been brought together into one room to create, de­velop, cost-justify, and produce new cards. This approach cut the overall time to market from three years to about one year and helped Hallmark compete more effectively in the rapidly chang­ing greeting card business. Employees quickly adapted to the idea of working together in teams, and they embraced the opportu­nity to learn more about the company's overall operations.

 

Next, Christenson addressed employee benefits. Al­though workers were generally happy with the existing benefits package, Christenson wanted to offer even more solutions to keep Hallmark employees satisfied. He needed to build a two-­way communication channel that allowed him to hear employee concerns firsthand; he set up a series of feedback sessions in which employees could tell him what was on their mind. As a result, Christenson reorganized the human relations depart­ment to focus on a number of themes important to employees.

1 vice   

n.坏事；恶习；[pl.]台钳，老虎钳；adj.副的

参考例句：

• He guarded himself against vice.他避免染上坏习惯。
• They are sunk in the depth of vice.他们堕入了罪恶的深渊。

2 privately   

adv.以私人的身份，悄悄地，私下地

参考例句：

• Some ministers admit privately that unemployment could continue to rise.一些部长私下承认失业率可能继续升高。
• The man privately admits that his motive is profits.那人私下承认他的动机是为了牟利。

3 annually   

adv.一年一次，每年

参考例句：

• Many migratory birds visit this lake annually.许多候鸟每年到这个湖上作短期逗留。
• They celebrate their wedding anniversary annually.他们每年庆祝一番结婚纪念日。

4 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

5 consultants   

顾问( consultant的名词复数 )； 高级顾问医生，会诊医生

参考例句：

• a firm of management consultants 管理咨询公司
• There're many consultants in hospital. 医院里有很多会诊医生。

6 merger   

n.企业合并，并吞

参考例句：

• Acceptance of the offer is the first step to a merger.对这项提议的赞同是合并的第一步。
• Shareholders will be voting on the merger of the companies.股东们将投票表决公司合并问题。

7 marketing   

n.行销，在市场的买卖，买东西

参考例句：

• They are developing marketing network.他们正在发展销售网络。
• He often goes marketing.他经常去市场做生意。

8 turmoil   

n.骚乱，混乱，动乱

参考例句：

• His mind was in such a turmoil that he couldn't get to sleep.内心的纷扰使他无法入睡。
• The robbery put the village in a turmoil.抢劫使全村陷入混乱。

9 corporate   

adj.共同的，全体的；公司的，企业的

参考例句：

• This is our corporate responsibility.这是我们共同的责任。
• His corporate's life will be as short as a rabbit's tail.他的公司的寿命是兔子尾巴长不了。

10 morale   

n.道德准则，士气，斗志

参考例句：

• The morale of the enemy troops is sinking lower every day.敌军的士气日益低落。
• He tried to bolster up their morale.他尽力鼓舞他们的士气。

11 reassure   

v.使放心，使消除疑虑

参考例句：

• This seemed to reassure him and he continued more confidently.这似乎使他放心一点，于是他更有信心地继续说了下去。
• The airline tried to reassure the customers that the planes were safe.航空公司尽力让乘客相信飞机是安全的。

12 layoffs   

临时解雇( layoff的名词复数 )； 停工，停止活动

参考例句：

• Textile companies announced 2000 fresh layoffs last week. 各纺织公司上周宣布再次裁员两千人。
• Stock prices broke when the firm suddenly announced layoffs. 当公司突然宣布裁员时，股票价格便大跌

13 underlying   

adj.在下面的，含蓄的，潜在的

参考例句：

• The underlying theme of the novel is very serious.小说隐含的主题是十分严肃的。
• This word has its underlying meaning.这个单词有它潜在的含义。

14 perpetuate   

v.使永存，使永记不忘

参考例句：

• This monument was built to perpetuate the memory of the national hero.这个纪念碑建造的意义在于纪念民族英雄永垂不朽。
• We must perpetuate the system.我们必须将此制度永久保持。