{"id":327,"date":"2014-07-31T06:47:03","date_gmt":"2014-07-31T11:47:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/truthinaddison.com\/?page_id=327"},"modified":"2014-07-31T06:50:13","modified_gmt":"2014-07-31T11:50:13","slug":"sustaining-the-addison-way-with-exceptional-staff","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/truthinaddison.com\/?page_id=327","title":{"rendered":"Sustaining the Addison Way with Exceptional Staff"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0Employee Compensation
\nand <\/strong>Sustaining the Addison Way<\/strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/h3>\n

We keep hearing this mayor talk about sustainability in relation to the employee compensation issue.\u00a0 He misses the point entirely.\u00a0 The sustainability he and the Council should be worried about is sustaining an exceptional, creative and dedicated staff.\u00a0 It has been the hard work of Addison\u2019s staff that has allowed Addison to distinguish itself as a unique place in which to live and work.\u00a0 We have been blessed for years by extraordinary staff leadership \u2013 and Council cooperation with that leadership \u2013 that has attracted exceptional employees, and has maintained an innovative environment that convinces these employees to stay with us.\u00a0 Without our amazing staff, Addison would be just another North Texas community.\u00a0 And that isn\u2019t what Addison has ever been about.<\/p>\n

Sustaining the kind of employees who provide the level of service we\u2019ve come to expect in Addison means we have to compensate those employees fairly.\u00a0 It is one of the most important investments we can make in Addison\u2019s future.\u00a0 And, we know from experience that we will receive more than a fair return on this investment.\u00a0 Look around our Town.\u00a0 What you see didn\u2019t just happen, and it sure didn\u2019t happen overnight.\u00a0 It took years of dedication by Addison\u2019s employees, supported by policies set by past Councils, that built Vitruvian, the Conference and Theater Center, the Town\u2019s extraordinary park and trail system, our health club, and the other beautiful and extraordinary development projects you see around Town.\u00a0 The proof is in the pudding, as they say.<\/p>\n

We could all agree that sustaining our community of employees requires that Addison provide fair compensation.\u00a0 Indeed, if we want superior employees, then we need to provide favorable compensation that incents the best candidates to apply and the best employees to stay.\u00a0 How do we gauge that?\u00a0 We compare ourselves to nearby towns and cities, because we compete with them for employees.<\/p>\n

So here\u2019s the problem: Addison\u2019s compensation is not even as much as the average compensation paid by the nearby towns and cities against which we compare ourselves.\u00a0 <\/strong>That means that Addison will have trouble competing for the best and the brightest, for the experienced, for the innovative and for the forward-thinkers, all of whom can make more money in the benchmark cities we compare ourselves with.\u00a0 \u00a0It also means that Addison\u2019s employees have every incentive to leave and seek employment on more favorable terms in nearby towns and cities.\u00a0 And that\u2019s a policy that makes no sense whatsoever.<\/p>\n

At the July 8, 2014 Council meeting, the City Manager made recommendations for moving forward to address this serious and fundamental issue.\u00a0 They were rejected by this mayor and his supporters, with the expected 5-2 vote.\u00a0 Once again we heard about sustainability.\u00a0 And once again, this mayor entirely missed the point.<\/p>\n

The key here is sustaining a superior staff.\u00a0 Fixing the problem is imminently affordable and we\u2019ll discuss that issue next.\u00a0 In the meantime, the next time you hear this mayor talk about \u201csustainability,\u201d ask him what he and the Council he now unquestionably controls are doing to keep and grow our staff.\u00a0 And remind him that if he and his Council continue down the road they\u2019re on now, the one thing that will become unsustainable is life as we know it in Addison.<\/p>\n

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