Loyalty is a Two-Way Street

Five Questions to Show Your Commitment to Employees

In our industry, there has long been a competition for customers, but in today’s marketplace, competing for reliable, loyal employees can be even more of a challenge. It’s critical for employees to feel like loyalty is a two-way street if you want to attract and retain the best of the best. To develop a culture of loyal employees, we have found it helpful to share our vision of the organization’s future with employees and continuously measure our progress. We demonstrate our loyalty by answering the following five questions and sharing the answers with our employees.

• What is our vision? Your vision statement should be inspirational and serve as a guide for you and your employees. For example, our vision states that “Westfield Steel will be the vendor of choice for our customers, the employer of choice for our employees, and a strong supporter of our communities.” Including your employees in your vision statement lets them know that they too are a priority.
• What is our purpose? Your purpose, or your “why” helps align your team with the main reason you do what you do. For example, our purpose states, “Westfield Steel supplies products and services that meet or exceed our customer expectations as a value-added metals service center and manufacturer.” It’s extremely helpful for employees to understand what outcomes your organization has enlisted them to help create.
• What are we now? It’s important to put your vision into context. By talking about where you are now, you are acknowledging that you have not actualized all your goals. It also allows you to set a benchmark to look back upon as you improve so you can measure your progress. Our answer to what we are now is, “We are a family-owned, steel service center with a small manufacturing arm, focused mainly in the Midwest. Our employees, customers, and vendors are part of our family. We have three locations, each with unique challenges.” Parts of what you are now may never change, but some things should and will change over time.
• What will we be? Setting goals is an important part of growing and scaling your organization. Be as clear and specific as possible when answering this question. For example, our answer to this question is, “We will be a family-owned steel service center and manufacturing company with an increased focus on production and manufacturing. We will expand our geographic footprint to better serve our manufacturing customers and add product offerings for equipment, welding and other markets. We will embrace industry challenges as opportunities.” You can see a clear difference between what we are now and what we are determined to be. Providing this clarity for your employees will enable and encourage them to participate in the change.
• How do we get there? It’s essential to chart a course for achieving your vision and to set measurable, actionable benchmarks along the way. While this requires some extra thought, breaking your plan down into smaller areas of focus will help you make sure you have a path forward. For example:

Focus on company values: 

• • • Safety. We will continuously work to improve workplace safety through ongoing initiatives, training and incentives.
    • Accountability. We will be accountable to our customers, each other and the company overall.
    • Quality. We will commit to quality in the products and services we provide to our customers, as well as the quality of our own character, conducting ourselves with ethics and integrity.
    • Effort. We will put forth our best effort every day we come to work.

We hope this post has been helpful and also gives you insight into who we are as we scale and grow. Whether you are working with or for us, we realize that commitment is a two-way street.

About Westfield Steel 

Westfield Steel has a deeply-rooted midwestern history. We were founded in 1977 as a family owned company and have grown over the years to encompass not just steel fabrication, but also distribution and light manufacturing. Headquartered in Westfield, Indiana, we also have facilities in Terre Haute, Indiana and Springfield, Ohio.

Just-in-time steel delivery

Our distribution arm, Westfield Steel Express, is an authorized-for-hire common carrier that provides affordable, on-time delivery for a wide range of cargo, including lumber, cement, steel coils, heavy equipment and building materials.

We’ll come through for you, every time, with just-in-time delivery of production-ready steel through our distribution arm, Westfield Steel Express, (MC-648035-C and US DOT No. 1735506.) Westfield Steel Express delivers steel to: Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Arkansas, Kentucky, Ohio, Minnesota, Missouri, Wisconsin, Michigan, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and North Carolina.

Our products and value-added services

Our value-added services include: burning, laser, machining, forming, punching, notching, drilling, rolling, sawing, shearing and welding. We also carry a large inventory of steel products to serve your steel needs, including angles, steel bars, steel beams, steel channels, steel pipes, steel plates, rebar, steel sheets and steel tubes.

Some of the industries we serve include the automotive industry, material handling, construction and concrete.

Our Industry Affiliations 

Westfield Steel’s industry affiliations include: The Metals Service Center Institute (MSCI), the North American Steel Alliance (NASA), the Precast/Prestressed Concrete Institute (PCI), the Indiana Fabricators Association (IFA), the American Welding Society (AWS), the Canadian Welding Bureau (CWB) and the Ohio Structural Steel and Architectural Metals Association (OSA.)

Back