Best Workplaces, Employee Experience, Leadership & Management
A leader in people companies that care, Camden Property Trust puts people first, and that results in higher profits and retention—and a company employees love.
Care in the workplace is not a line item buried in an initiative.
It lives and breathes in behavior; the sieve through which all business decisions are made. It’s often in the things you can’t see, but feel—woven into the employee experience at every level.
Welcome to Camden Property Trust.
Prioritizing care is what the Houston-based, multifamily company attributes to its 15-year run on the Fortune 100 Best 카지노 커뮤니티 추천 to Work For® list, becoming a 2022 Best Workplace in Texas℧, and repeat appearances on the ® list.
Its emphasis on care as a business imperative drives employee retention, pride and longevity—all measures of a great culture. That culture and its business success—1,621 employees in 73 cities, 170 properties, and recent induction to the S&P 500—draws the curiosity of some of its peers.
“They’re trying to figure out what that secret sauce is,” says Ric Campo, CEO and board chair. “We have very competitive markets and people always shook their heads. [They asked], ‘What is it that allows you to do as well as you do?’ I say, ‘It’s just the culture. It’s about the people, it’s about creating that opportunity for somebody to do really well.’”
Case in point: Camden has acquired failing properties, across the street from its own, that were underperforming by 20% because of poor cultures.
“Put a smiling, happy, caring culture in that property and the revenues go up,” Campo says. “The people are happier, the customers are happier. It has a major ripple effect. No. 1, it’s the right thing to do. But we also know, guess what? It makes money and it creates value.”
The inspiration to lead with care began years ago when Campo and Keith Oden, Camden’s president and executive vice chair, worked together at a company with a bad culture. The two, then mid-level managers, left to start Camden in 1981.
“We left that company and basically said, ‘What would company X have done,’ and we just did the opposite,” Oden says. “One of those things was being genuinely caring about your employees. It’s ingrained in who we are at every level of our organization.”
“It’s not an initiative and it’s not something that you say, ‘This comes from HR,’” adds Campo, who often quotes management guru Peter Drucker: “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.”
Passing the ‘care’ test
Camden’s executive team vets all business decisions through a care filter by asking–no matter the circumstance—“Is it fair, reasonable and responsible?”
“When people set out their values of fairness, trust, care, how do you display them?” Campo says. “And when you make decisions, even in tough times and in good times, does it flow through accurately on them? It’s filtering decisions you make every day through that value set.”
In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Camden gave millions back in the form of grants to residents through its on a blank piece of paper.
“카지노 커뮤니티 랭킹 rule was really simple, we wanted to build an organization that is a place that we would want to work at forever,” Oden says. “If you keep that perspective, then you have a little bit of a different view of who you invite to join the team.”
“What happens over time is, everyone sees and knows that it’s different, and they have this incredible desire to protect it because they view it as something precious. It’s fragile and it’s perishable, so you have to work at it every day,” Oden says.
“You get enough people who understand the benefits of that for everyone in the organization, and magic happens.”
Do you have a culture you're proud of?
To find out how your company can become Great Place To Work-Certified and apply to our Best Workplaces lists, start here.
