The latest episode of the USPS video series “Engage” highlights a postal plant where supervisors and employees have learned to work better together.
The Dominick V. Daniels Processing and Distribution Center in Kearny, NJ, faced a morale problem when Jacqueline Thomas became plant manager in 2017.
“When I first got here, people didn’t want to come to work or they came and they were not happy,” Thomas says in the episode.
She met with employees at the 1-million-square-foot facility, listened to their feedback and made changes, including providing supervisors with training on how to better communicate with their team members.
Other efforts included appointing employees to serve as “captains” who oversee certain aspects of the plant’s operations. Employees also received regular recognition for their performance.
Within a few months, attendance improved, sick leave and accident rates dropped, and productivity increased.
Darvis Whately, a mail processing clerk, credits the plant’s managers and supervisors for taking the “initiative to making the wrong right and then move forward with the right.”
The five-minute video is the 11th episode of “Engage,” which is part of the Postal Service’s broader efforts to engage, empower and equip employees, a core strategy.
Says Thomas: “If you want to change anything, everybody has to feel like they are part of it.”