Jody Thompson

CultureRx was started as the embodiment of Cali Ressler and Jody Thompson's passionate belief that there is a better way to work.  They began their work together at Best Buy where they are credited with revolutionizing the workplace through the creation of a Results-Only Work Environment, ROWE. Driven by an intuitive notion that results-focused work environments foster productive employees and have a positive effect on overall performance, they are now taking their idea outside of the Best Buy workplace to help you find new ways to energize your workforce.  

The ROWE experiment started quietly, when Cali Ressler, who manages Best Buy's work-life balance programs, helped a troubled division of the retail group in Minneapolis deal with sinking employee morale. Ressler encouraged the manager to try flexible scheduling, trusting his team to work as it suited them. "He said, 'Well, trust doesn't cost me anything,'" she recalls. The innovation was that the whole team did it together. While the sample size was fewer than 300 employees, the early results were promising. Turnover in the first three months of employment fell from 14% to zero, job satisfaction rose 10%, and their team-performance scores rose 13%.

When Jody Thompson, Best Buy's "organizational change" guru, heard about Ressler's work, she pushed the company's management to make total flexibility available to everyone. No one is forced into it; teams sign up when they're ready. Best Buy expects that ROWE one day will apply to the whole company. At the moment, it is working on a version for the 100,000 retail employees in its stores, a much more difficult task because most of those employees are hourly, and their work is regulated by federal law.  

CultureRx has grown to offer customized consulting services tailored to the needs of their clients - companies committed to challenging the status quo for the benefit of a healthy workforce and ultimately, a healthy bottom line, but the Results-Only Work Environment remains the core of the CultureRx philosophy. A Results-Only Work Environment is one where your talent will show up energized, disciplined, fluid, flexible, and focused - always ready to deliver the results necessary to drive your business.

ROWE is a bold, cultural transformation that permeates the attitudes and operating style of an entire workplace, leveling the playing field and giving people complete autonomy - as long as the work gets done.  In a ROWE, people do whatever they want whenever they want as long as the work gets done.  In the park, in a coffee shop, in the shower.  At midnight or 3am or on Sunday.  Whenever and wherever.  

Cali and Jody have often been featured in the press for their contribution to this workforce revolution. Most recently, they can be found in Fortune, BusinessWeek, and TIME Magazine articles, and on-the-air in segments on 60 Minutes, ABC World News Tonight, and NBC Nightly News.

Cali Ressler and Jody Thompson's presentation is provocative and their ideas are innovative. They will show you how trusting your employees to get their work done helps your company retain talent, expands your business and brings solutions to problems your company faces every day.