Approximately 70 percent of Butler Tech’s 380 employees took part in the survey.
“You didn’t hire me to win a popularity contest,” he said, “but you did hire me to come in here to do the best I can to create structure that would be successful in the long run.”
Much of the backlash, he said, was the result of a restructuring of the school’s upper management, and that the survey results may have been skewed by some people taking it several times online.
He described the results of the survey as “ripples in the water” that will dissipate as people adjust to some of the changes he has implemented.
“I wish I could wave a magic wand to get people to trust me, but trust has to be earned and confidence has to be earned,” he said.
He summed up the survey’s “primary opportunities for improvement” in three areas:
• Leadership: Confidence in leadership has declined dramatically, especially from the perspective of the administrators;
• Culture: Lack of openness and transparency in decision making, leading to perceived unfairness and a questioning of ethics.
• Trust: Trust has been lost, and now the challenge is how to restore this foundation.
To address the leadership issue, Smith said that he has already formed a Leadership Task Force to look at some of the issues brought out by the comments of the survey.
Smith said that many of the other issues have resulted from a lack of communication, and so he has instructed Bill Solazzo, the school’s director of marketing and communications, to come up with a Communications Plan that he will present to the board when it is completed.
Smith also presented the board with a 23-page set of strategic objectives, goals and targets. Although still in draft form, the document presents a plan to improve operations in four key areas, including to “develop and support passionate, engaged employees” with a target of improving the participation rate of the Employee Engagement Survey as well as achieving more positive results.
Contact this reporter at (937) 820-2188 or rjones@coxohio.com.
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