As a result, his employees are “fully vested” in these processes. Perhaps even more crucial, Carpenter made it easy to instigate further improvements. “If an employee has a good idea for improving a procedure, we will make an instant modification—with no bureaucratic hang-ups,” he explains.23 He takes this employee involvement so seriously that he now requires his service representatives to submit at least a dozen proposed improvements before they qualify to receive their annual performance bonus.
