Robert Martichenko has spent much of his career advising businesses on how to improve their supply chain processes, with an emphasis on cutting waste and implementing “Lean” operational strategies. But these days, he’s more focused on the third—and what he sees as the most important—factor in the people-process-technology equation: people.
That interest in workplace culture and workforce development led Martichenko to launch TrailPaths Inc. in 2022. Billed as “a people and technology company,” TrailPaths specializes in developing assessments, training modules, and digital platforms to help businesses create what he calls “meaningful employment environments”—environments where people can grow and thrive.
TrailPaths wasn’t Martichenko’s first business venture, however. In 2005, he created consulting and training firm LeanCor Supply Chain Group, where he spent more than 15 years as CEO before LeanCor was acquired by logistics service provider Transplace (which later merged with Uber Freight).
In addition to his day job, Martichenko is active in various industry organizations. He was recently named chairman of the board of the relief organization American Logistics Aid Network (ALAN) and sits on the board of the Association for Manufacturing Excellence (AME). He is a regular speaker at industry events and the author of five business books, multiple articles, and one novel, Drift and Hum. He received the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals’ (CSCMP) Distinguished Service Award in 2015.
Martichenko recently spoke with DC Velocity Associate Editor Diane Rand about workforce trends, the importance of being a “human leader,” and how to make work meaningful.
Q: Why is it important to make work meaningful?
A: There’s a workforce revolution going on in our industry and other industries, including hospitality and health care. It’s happening for three big reasons. First, I know [from my past work] that to build a culture of operational excellence, you have to focus on people, process, and technology. But the people part can get left behind, and that’s a part that cannot be left behind. In fact, it needs to be the most important part of the business.
The second part of this perfect storm is the demographic dynamics that are in play. We have a shrinking workforce due to a combination of things—like aging populations, reductions in birth rates, and immigration policies. This shrinking of the workforce is happening now and will continue into the foreseeable future, which means that people will be competing for talent at all levels.
And then third, there’s been a rapid change in attitudes toward work and workplaces. And there’s a distinction between those two things—the work itself and the actual work environment.
So, if we factor together those forces that are creating this perfect storm—that culture and people are the most important things for operational excellence; that the workforce will continue to shrink, forcing us to compete for talent; and that peoples’ attitude toward work is changing and they’re no longer willing to [stick with jobs] in environments where they don’t want to work—that means that as industry professionals, we need to create what we’re calling a “meaningful employment environment.”
Q: How has the nature of work changed in the past five years?
A: I think attitudes have changed. A lot of people like to have this discussion relative to different generations—this generation thinks this way and that generation thinks that way. I struggle with that conversation, because anytime we stereotype an entire group of humans and lump them together into something like a 15-year bracket, I think we can miss some things. Maybe there are traits that are stereotypical, but it’s an incomplete picture at best, right?
What we’re recognizing, though, is that people want to thrive no matter what they do for a living. No matter where they are—whether it’s on the front lines as an hourly team member or as the CEO of an organization—people want to work in some form of purposeful environment. People want to know that their time has a value, and they want to be working toward some greater end.
Now it’s easier for some of us than for others. It’s maybe a bit of a different world for front-line workers than it is for people who are a little more stable in their salaried positions. So our focus at TrailPaths is mainly on the front-line worker.
Q: You spoke about “human leaders” at the CSCMP Edge conference last year. What does it mean to think and act like a human leader?
A: We’re really trying to apply a science-based model to work, and so we’re gathering data from organizations that are inviting us in and then applying some fantastic tools. The first thing we’ve learned is that people are in one of four places in their work environments—they are either declining, surviving, growing, or thriving.
People who are declining are, by definition, employed right now. But they may leave at break time and not come back. They just know it’s not going to work for them. By contrast, people who are just surviving are going to stay because they have bills to pay. They have life pressures, but there’s no joy for them in going to work every day. They’re simply surviving, and for a whole bunch of reasons, they have to remain in their positions.
And then you have the workers who actually start to grow. And from growing, they’re beginning to thrive. They’re saying: “This is working for me, this job is giving me everything I need, and I see myself here for the long term.” And that’s what we want to see.
As human leaders, we need to know where people are today. Are they declining? Are they surviving? Are they growing, and are they thriving? We need to know this to be able to interact with them. For instance, the ways in which we need to show them that we care are very different for somebody who’s in decline mode versus somebody who’s thriving.
The second thing we’ve learned is that the needs people have within the environment we create really do form something that looks like Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs [a classification system often depicted as a pyramid with the basic universal needs of society at its base, topped by progressively smaller layers of physiological and psychological needs].
This is the part that’s really exciting. Because if we can describe this hierarchy and can determine where somebody’s needs are, then we, as human leaders, can specifically address that with the individual. We stop treating our 100 people as if those 100 people are all the same. They are not the same. They are individuals. They’re human beings, and they have their own needs, depending on where they are on the “decline-survive-grow-thrive” index.
We’ve learned that fundamental needs, such as financial needs, must be met. Physical safety needs to be a priority, and the environment must be free from fear.
We see organizations whose leaders think that if they offer training and development and maybe career coaching, that’s somehow going to help with turnover. But it’s not going to help because if somebody’s fundamental needs aren’t being met, they’re not even thinking about training, they’re not even thinking about their career path; their eyes are glazed over. If the brakes go out in their car, they’re going to be in a world of hurt because they don’t have $300 in the bank to deal with that. Or they may not think they’re in a safe work environment and don’t have the courage to speak up and tell their leaders how they feel.
Q: How can this concept be applied to supply chain jobs? For example, how do you make picking in a warehouse more meaningful?
A: That is the question, right? I don’t have the answer yet, but we’re getting close. So the heart of the question is, how do you take a job that 99.9% of the population would look at and say there is no meaning in that job and turn it into a job that is meaningful? The real answer—and I’m not happy that this is the answer—but the real answer is maybe you never make it completely meaningful. But maybe we get closer than where it is today. Maybe we can advance it a little bit.
For example, let’s take a picking job where somebody’s spending eight hours picking up parts or products and putting them in a box. Do they even know who the end-user is for those parts and products? Do they even understand the importance of that?
A good friend of mine, Kevin O’Meara, tells a story about the time he spent in an aftermarket parts distribution center. People there never realized that the end-user might be a single mother or someone else living in difficult circumstances whose car or some other appliance had broken down. And as soon as the people realized that when this part [that I’m picking] gets to the customer, their thing gets fixed, and it actually makes a real difference in their lives, their attitude changed. Do people even understand the importance of their role and the value of the job? Or is it just a cardboard box going to some unspecified destination?
And then the second part is, are we going to make every job absolutely meaningful? Maybe not. But you know, we sure can make them a little less miserable than they are today. And that’s because a lot of these jobs are task-oriented jobs. They are repeatable, do-it-again jobs that are riddled with obstacles, and the leadership hasn’t taken the time to remove those obstacles. This is incorrect from a leadership point of view because the team member didn’t choose the technology, they didn’t pick the scanner or choose the lift truck they’re using. They were invited into this environment that was completely designed by leadership, and then they’re asked to participate in it. Meanwhile, leadership isn’t maintaining that environment.
So these poor people are doing these tasks for which you inherently have to struggle to find the meaning, and then on top of that, their tasks are riddled with obstacles. It’s just incorrect, and it shows a lack of respect and a lack of regard for human dignity. And this is what we’re getting to with respect to meaningful employment environments—that the core leadership behavior that must be in place is treating people with respect. Treat people like human beings for no other reason than they are human beings. And that’s just the starting point.
