It all started with a question: Why? As you might have discovered over your career, ‘why’ is a question that goes unanswered at many companies, and asking it can get you labeled as ‘defiant’ or ‘not a team player’. Things work a little differently at DEG.
A few years back, Inc. Magazine recognized DEG as one of the 25 Companies Changing the World. For a growing agency in KC, this recognition was and still is, quite remarkable. Even more remarkable was that we were not singled out because of our work (which is fantastic) or our leadership (who have done an amazing job of guiding our company). It was DEG’s culture that set us apart. The team at Inc. understood how deeply the idea of entrepreneurialism is ingrained in our company, how essential it is to our ethos, and how it manifests almost daily in the running of our business.
Related: DEG Makes Ingram’s List of Best Companies to Work For
And so when Brenna Hawley-Craig, a longtime DEG associate, approached me last year and asked why our maternity and paternity policies were falling behind, I didn’t brush her off with a simple, “It’s just the way things are.” We talked about it. The longer we talked, the more questions Brenna raised: How long had the current policy been in place? How does the way we support new parents measure up against our competitors in the area? And perhaps most importantly, How does this policy align with our core values, number one of which is ‘Doing the right thing’? If we were truly doing the right thing by our associates, wouldn’t we want to take better care of them through this important life stage?
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