Successful organizations build ownership among their stakeholders.  I’m not talking ownership as in stock options, profit sharing or 401Ks – although those are nice. I’m talking about creating a sense of personal investment in a cause so that people are empowered to take charge and move their organization forward.

Take Lansing’s Old Town, for example.  Old Town has transformed itself from a dilapidated neighborhood of abandoned buildings into the hub of Lansing’s arts and cultural scene. This didn’t just happen overnight or at random. Old Town was revitalized because a small group of business owners, artists and community activists worked together to rebuild the community. They fought back against graffiti and vandalism, planted flowers and created community events to draw people to the area. Those volunteers took ownership in their surrounding community and today Old Town is a model for the nation.

Just as Old Town did not succeed simply by choice, Truscott Rossman did not become Lansing’s top public relations firm solely because our staff is amazingly talented and hard working. Success requires more than that. It’s about finding a way to leverage those attributes and getting your team to work together.

Truscott Rossman is Lansing’s top PR firm because every single person on our staff, from office assistants to account executives to interns, has a clear understanding of how he or she contributes to the firm’s success. With that knowledge we are constantly encouraged to come forward with fresh ideas and innovative strategies to improve our clients’ communications and our own internal operations. Kelly’s and John’s doors are always open and they value staff input.

In other words, we all have a sense of ownership in the company. It’s that environment that allows our staff’s talent and hard work to thrive, and it makes it easy to love what we do. Everything else flows from there.

We work with our clients to create that same sense of ownership among their staff and/or volunteers. It makes all the difference in their success – and ours!