Mattress Firm set out to be a different kind of mattress retailer; focused on creating a unique shopping experience for the customer with a large selection of quality, brand name bedding products, competitive pricing and knowledgeable, well-trained associates. Mattress Firm cares deeply about their employees and sees the value in investing in them. They seek to become the “go-to” mattress retailer in America.
Problem Statement:
Mattress Firm came to WinShape Teams because they had recently acquired another major mattress store called Sleep Experts. The company was in the middle of the merger and wanted to welcome the new company and spend time creating a new culture together. Mattress Firm understood that often the realities of a merger can leave the incoming employees in difficult place, or skeptical. They wanted to take the time to introduce Sleep Experts to the Mattress firm culture in a safe environment. They also used that time to set new goals and cultural norms and to break down any walls that might get in the way as the team moved forward together. The merger as a whole was called Integr8, (Integrate).
Mattress Firm team members walked away with concrete pieces of knowledge about their organization, a better knowledge of the people they would be working alongside and game plan to continue their development.
Experience:
To best facilitate creating new culture, WinShape Teams prepared a program that guided the new participants through multi-day experience that would help them understand the components of a high performing culture. The group dove in with a mix of classroom sessions and low elements. The first objective was to experientially discover what parts of the new combined culture were worth keeping. Once the group developed these new norms, they could then work on figuring out the best way to develop them. WinShape Teams used low and high energy elements to help create a place for challenge, learning and deep conversation. The retreat ended with each team member was given the opportunity to verbalize both the fears and excitements of moving forward.
Results:
Mattress Firm team members walked away with concrete pieces of knowledge about their organization, a better knowledge of the people they would be working alongside and game plan to continue their development. Ultimately, they had created goals for themselves that they could now feel confident about working towards. The retreat as a whole expedited the time it would take each team member to grow comfortable of their new environment. This helped them to be able to jump more quickly into their work.