Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Speaker A: Adding the learning management system to our UKG ready suite has been absolutely fantastic. We had a dedicated team that helped us map out what our goals were going to be. What we wanted from the system implementation was easy. We went from doing things on pen and paper to doing it electronically. So being able to push that training out to our employees, it was fantastic.
[00:00:30] Speaker B: Welcome to a new episode of the what Works podcast series. You just heard from Samantha Garvey, HR safety and compliance director at Rowley's Wholesale, a Bay City, Michigan based distributor of automotive and industrial products. In today's episode, Kathy Anders, senior vice president of research and global industry analyst at the Josh Burson Company, sits down with Samantha to discuss the history of rallies spanning over a century, the challenges and successes of implementing UKG ready for the organization's HR functions, and finally, how technology is transforming their employee experience. Let's jump right in.
Samantha, thanks for joining us on the what Works podcast to get started, tell us about yourself, about your role, and about the company.
[00:01:18] Speaker A: Hi Cathy, thanks for having me. My name is Samantha Garvey. I am with Raleigh's wholesale, located in Bay City, Michigan. We are a wholesale distributor. We focus mainly in oils, lubricants, gases, and all associated automotive products that we distribute to our customers all throughout Michigan, Upper Lower Peninsula, Ohio and Indiana. We have three different locations. We have two in Michigan and we have a third one down in Ohio.
[00:01:49] Speaker B: I learned that the company is over 100 years old. How has the company grown and developed over time?
[00:01:55] Speaker A: Raleigh so we are in our 103rd year. We are currently in third generation ownership. We were started by Art Rowley and then it was passed down to Paul Rowley. Right now we're led by Paul's sons, Keith and Mike Rowley for third generation. And then we have Seth and Zach Rowley that are the up and coming fourth generation that are looking to take the reins in the future.
[00:02:21] Speaker B: Wow, what a great story of a family business that has grown through acquisitions and added headcount along the way. How many employees do you have? What kinds of jobs do people have? Tell us a little bit more about that.
[00:02:33] Speaker A: Between our three locations, we have over 125 employees. Our largest grouping of employees is based here in Bay City. That's what we consider our corporate office. We have about 70 employees that report here on the regular basis.
We have twelve down in Ohio and 15 down in Southgate, Michigan. And between those three locations, we have CDL drivers, we have equipment techs, we have customer service reps, we have sales reps, purchasing logistics. All of those different areas make up our grouping of employees.
[00:03:11] Speaker B: Fantastic. So from an HR perspective, for HRIs, for workforce management, for recruiting, talent acquisition, learning, succession management, what technology do you use? What platform do you use?
[00:03:23] Speaker A: We currently utilize Ukgready for our HRIs system. We have the entire full suite. We have benefits, we do timekeeping, payroll, succession planning, learning management and employee relations, all of those. And what's really great is we're able to do all of our HR functions within UKgready. We don't have to outsource anything. We're able to complete everything that we need here in house, utilizing all of the different options that UKG provides through this comprehensive suite.
[00:04:03] Speaker B: That's great. How has it helped you as the HLA lead of the company? How has it supported you in supporting the business on more strategic topics?
[00:04:12] Speaker A: One of the first things that comes to mind is with us being a family owned business, we put a lot of focus on what's the future going to look like. And so we've been diving into succession planning and family planning. And so we've been utilizing UKG ready succession as well as goal planning within the system to help us map that out. Look at the strengths of our existing team, see where we have any, where there may be gaps and areas for us to improve and really utilize that so that we're able to minimize our costs of using a third party service that may be doing something similar. But we're already able to use all of the information that has been inputted into UKgready to help us have those conversations. Set us up to look at hey, what is the future of our company going to look like? And how can we best meet the needs of current employees and future employees for succession planning?
[00:05:10] Speaker B: This sounds really useful and helpful. Tell us about the learning management side of things. You recently implemented the learning management system functionality. How did that work? What kind of training do people do? What's the feedback like from employees and from managers?
[00:05:26] Speaker A: Adding the learning management system to our UKG ready suite has been absolutely fantastic. The rollout from the start when we were working with support was great. We had a dedicated team that helped us map out what our goals were going to be, what we wanted from the system implementation was easy, and then once we were able to roll it out and start building out our trainings and getting those out to our employees, we really found that completing training became less of a task and something that was easier to get done. We went from doing things on pen and paper to doing it electronically. And as I mentioned before, our employees are spread out all over, so we're not seeing each other all the time. We have different shifts, we have different schedules. So being able to push that training out to our employees, that most of this training is required, it was nice to be able to do that without relying on, here's a computer to sit down at, and here's a piece of paper for you to do that. Most of our training is compliance focused. So with dot drivers, we have a lot of training that goes with that. We carry a lot of hazardous materials, so we have hazmat training, we have GHS globally harmonization training. We have training for our managers to help them stay on top of their game and make sure they can be the best leaders that they can be and any other compliance trainings within there as well. But LMS really has been very helpful for our team.
[00:06:59] Speaker B: So before you went on the LMS, how did you track learning and enroll people? Was that all on paper? How did that work? And tell us a little bit more about that journey.
[00:07:09] Speaker A: Yes, it was definitely a very manual process, and you're always chasing people down to hope that they can get their tests done on time.
[00:07:17] Speaker B: Wow. So this is really mission critical, right? Because some of these are dangerous things that compliance things, the safety hazards and so on. And so if people are not on top of that, it can be really detrimental to the company and potentially to employees as well.
[00:07:31] Speaker A: Yes, exactly. It provided us a way to track that also. When we did have audits, we had everything right at our fingertips, and we were able to provide the documentation, show it nice and easy, and come out with passing scores, which is everybody's goal at the end of the day.
[00:07:47] Speaker B: What's the feedback been from employees and from managers on using both the LMS and the Widus system? How do they like it? What do they find easy to use? What do they find hard to use for the employees?
[00:07:59] Speaker A: We've had really great adoption rates, new employees, we get them enrolled within the very first day. So they're seeing the system, they're understanding all the different things that they have. We have probably a 97% adoption rate of the mobile app. All of our employees request time off in there. They can punch in and out on the phones for those that are available or on a kiosk. They have information that can be accessed through. Their utilization of the mobile app has been really great for our employees. They can access their pay stubs in there. They can see their hours, any important updates. So very great usage of that. And our managers have found the same type of thing that is very easy to utilize. I've built out dashboards for some of them. So as they log in, they can see all the information that is mission critical to them or is most important to them on their home screen. So whether they're looking to approve time cards or they want to view hours for the week, or who might need to complete training, any of that information is right there and available for them when they log in. So our managers also really enjoy utilizing the system.
[00:09:10] Speaker B: That's great. How about recruiting? Because I'm sure it's hard to recruit for the kind of roles that you have. We always hear about driver shortages. How has the recruiting system helped you with that?
[00:09:20] Speaker A: We utilize UKG recruiting as well. This has been very beneficial to us, from tracking the number of applicants to creating a seamless process. From when people apply to when we onboard them to when they have their first day as a new employee, that process has been very seamless. It's easy to use, it's intuitive.
I enjoy using the recruiting and it has been, like you mentioned, very beneficial for our tough roles to fill. CDL drivers, that's a very competitive field out there. So anything that we can utilize to give us an edge out in the marketplace is going to be great. And I've definitely seen that through the recruiting platform.
[00:10:02] Speaker B: So as people come on board and join the company, you're surveying them to see how they're doing. How's that going?
[00:10:08] Speaker A: Yes. Surveying has been something new that we are rolling out. And right now we do a week, one new hire check in, and just a good way to gauge how we as the employer are doing, how the new team member is doing. If they're meeting all of the expectations that we have set. That they have set. So that's been a really nice way to get that feedback. Regardless of where this new hire is at, if they're in Bay City, Southgate or Medina, we're able to get that feedback and make adjustments if necessary from there.
[00:10:42] Speaker B: Yeah. Especially because your employees are all in different places. They're all mobile, they're all driving, they're all not in an office. It's especially important to get feedback online because you can't be with them in person. You won't be able to get them and talk with them. They won't come into an office. So you can kind of get their feedback that way. So that's why it makes it even more important to get the feedback online in a system.
[00:11:08] Speaker A: Exactly. Yes. That's really nice to be able to provide that same information out to all of our employees, regardless of if they're in the same physical location that I am, or if we're on the same shift or hours, anything like that, I can make sure that they have all the information at their fingertips, whether it's announcements, important benefit documents, 401K information, looking at their pay stub, their w two come year end, that's all available through UKG for the team members.
[00:11:39] Speaker B: So the online app, almost everybody is using that, right? Because everybody is on their mobile all the time.
What's been easy on that? What's more challenging, and any lessons learned you could share with our listeners on how that transition has gone?
[00:11:54] Speaker A: UKG is so good at helping to piece all of the middle pieces together in their vision. So we have our starting point and our end point, and they're really great at all of the, the middle parts along the way. So when we were doing the learning management system, I knew what I wanted at the end, but we only had a starting point. So working together through that, that was a really nice rollout. Any challenges? I would really just say in working to continuously adapt the system to meet our goals, and I think that's the same type of challenge for any company out there is making sure, hey, are we on the cutting edge of technology? Are we doing what's the best for our employees? And if I make a change here, how does that affect the end user? So I think that that's always important to take into consideration when implementing or changing anything.
[00:12:50] Speaker B: So you have lots of flexibility with setting up the system. Did you get employee input as you were configuring it and setting it up? How did you make sure that it met all the needs of your workforce and of your managers as well?
[00:13:03] Speaker A: So I always try to touch base with a few employees in different areas and have them test things out, see how it looks, and really get that honest feedback, because coming from somebody that's in it all day long, that's where the majority of my time is spent. How I might use it may be different than the end user. So I always try to get feedback on that and adjust from there as to whether it makes sense or are there any steps missing or things like that or what they might like to see change. So that's been something that I try to get feedback from others before the final version is pushed out.
[00:13:39] Speaker B: That absolutely makes sense. Can you give us some examples of changes you made based on the feedback that you got?
[00:13:45] Speaker A: Yeah. So recently I was working on some automated HR actions for changes to employee information, and I set up any initial HR action, and I asked a coworker to go in and update their address and see if it made sense, if the flow worked for them, if they had all the right permissions, different things like that. And then after talking with her and getting her feedback on what worked well and what didn't, we ended up adjusting it. And then now we have our final version that's pushed out to everybody. So even little things like that, because at the end of the day, UKG is there to make employees lives easier and making sure they have a say in that is important. Otherwise, I don't think people will adopt the technology, adopt what's out there and use it regularly.
[00:14:36] Speaker B: Wow. I commend you for involving employees in that journey. That's a step that's sometimes forgotten, because we think we know what employees need, but we really can't because we're not living their lives, we're not drivers, we're not working in call centers. So really getting their input because otherwise doesn't work for them, that's really, really important. What's next for you on the UKG ready journey?
[00:14:58] Speaker A: So I know what UKG is working a lot with AI, as we've been hearing that in the HR world, really all over the place. So that's something I'm definitely interested in, and that pairs very well with their people insight. So what that kind of does is it looks into monitoring workforce fatigue, burnouthen upskilling of existing employees. So a lot of these, I feel like, play into some of our existing goals. So focusing on retention, focusing on succession planning. So those are some new areas in the next six months, year that I would like to dive into more and really utilize those new platforms to get the most out of what we already have within the system.
[00:15:44] Speaker B: That's fantastic. Especially the kind of jobs that you have in your company. Fatigue, stress creating well being are really key considerations. And I imagine it can be a key attraction factor too. If you could tell the candidates that you're paying attention to that, that you're going to support them on these topics, it will make it even easier for you to attract and retain the talent you need.
[00:16:06] Speaker A: Yes, I definitely agree with that. And UKG allows me to have already completed all of the basic day to day things, and it gives me then the time to focus on those bigger scale ideas that we are wanting to focus on, such as fatigue management. Stress management. Yes, exactly. Very exciting.
[00:16:28] Speaker B: So you mentioned AI. I know it's still new, somewhat new, at least for everybody. How do you think the workforce will respond to that? How will your managers respond to it? Do you sense that they're ready for it, or they may be a little bit cautious or maybe a little bit kind of taken aback about using it in the HR area.
[00:16:48] Speaker A: Yeah, I think, and rightly so. I think everybody's a little cautious to begin with. But I think if it's explained and rolled out their correct way and people understand what we're actually using it for and how it can streamline our existing processes, not changing so much what we're doing, but helping to enhance what we're doing, then people will see the benefit of that. Even looking into areas of safety, we're already starting to see that a lot. And so some of our team is exposed to that. So I think it's the next correct step for us in order to grow.
[00:17:25] Speaker B: I think it's so interesting because we've been using AI for many years. Your drivers, for example, they've been using Google Maps, and of course, AI is part of that. So I think it's just the next step of us using it in other areas too, right?
[00:17:39] Speaker A: Yes, definitely.
[00:17:40] Speaker B: And the more we can relate to it, the more we're using it in our private life, the more we're ready to use it in our work life, too. So I think that's all part of the journey as well.
[00:17:49] Speaker A: I would agree. Definitely. Just presenting it the correct way and helping to get everybody on board.
[00:17:56] Speaker B: Wow, what an exciting journey. And so much opportunity, additional opportunity. And you've said it way in such a positive way for your employees and for your managers and your leaders to be ready for all of that. So any last words of wisdom or advice for other companies? Maybe smaller companies, but also enduring companies like yours that have been in existence for a long time to give on the journey to success here.
[00:18:20] Speaker A: I would say the biggest thing is don't be afraid to try new ways. All too often we get caught up in this is the way we've always done it, and that might not be the most efficient, the most effective for your team yourself. So utilizing systems that allow you to be more efficient and spend time on other priorities is huge. If I spent all my time just on paperwork, I'm not focusing on anything else that helps put push the company forward, help our employees, different things like that. So I would say to small businesses, long businesses, don't be afraid to try new things. And you'd be surprised how employees managers are excited when you do that, because it shows them, hey, this company wants to continue growing, and we care about the company. We care about our employees and our success in the future.
[00:19:19] Speaker B: Wow. Fantastic. I love that. So don't be afraid to look for new ways of doing, especially for companies that have been around for a while. Because sometimes it's hard to think outside of the box.
[00:19:29] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:19:29] Speaker B: It's something that has been successful for a long time as well.
Anything else that you wanted to share with us before we wrap it up?
[00:19:38] Speaker A: I'm excited for this opportunity to share how well UKG ready has worked for us and how it's made our company as a whole more successful.
[00:19:49] Speaker B: Wow. Making the company as a whole more successful. That is amazing because I think sometimes it's kind of the HR systems are seen much more of back end systems, but they're there to support the entire company on their success.
Amazing. So thank you, Samantha, I really appreciate your time. Very excited to share your story.
[00:20:10] Speaker A: Thank you, Kathy. I appreciate the time.
[00:20:15] Speaker B: So there you go. This was an example of how a smaller company can support growth through an easy to use, simple and streamlined HR system. Rowley's wholesale has been in business for over 100 years and it's currently in its third generation of ownership. So it's what we call an enduring company. It's built on a foundation of trust, a great culture and care for employees, and that shows in all of of their HR practices. The company uses yokg ready across many different areas like benefits, timekeeping, payroll, succession planning, and learning management. Listening to employees through the platform allows Samantha, who is an HR team of one, to stay close to the pulse of a distributed workforce. The company is now looking to explore AI and people insights to address topics like fatigue, improve stress management, and increase retention. Samantha's advice applies to any company, regardless of size or industry. Don't be afraid to try new ways to improve the company's performance and make employees work better. I hope you enjoyed this episode of the what Works podcast. Tune into the next one and let us know what you think. Thank you.
