Limestone celebrates OAS success with popcorn

COLUMBUS, OH, UNITED STATES

12.17.2019

Story by Michelle Young 

Defense Finance and Accounting Service

If nothing else, history has shown that DFAS Limestone is a competitive force. Typically, whether it's a survey, a charity event or morale-building activity, DFAS Limestone is always in the forefront, leading the pack.

This year, as the Organizational Assessment Survey kicked off in November, Dale Sampson, Limestone director challenged his site.

The challenge was for DFAS Limestone to start strong with an OAS participation rate of 80 percent within the first week of the survey open date. A 30-minute stand down issued by the organization helped contribute to the goal being met.

Vernon Davenport, who works in business management office, helped Limestone front office come up with the OAS marketing campaigns, including popcorn and ice cream incentives for employees.

"We hit 81 percent participation by the end of the first week," Davenport said. On Dec. 4 the site celebrated their achievement with popcorn.

"We've been announcing the popcorn event for weeks and there were also slides on the digital monitors throughout the building to remind employees about the impending celebration," Davenport said.

"On Dec. 4, the director's office started popping at 9 or 10 in the morning" Davenport said. "Then public address announcements were made at 1 p.m. announcing the event, and the people started coming," he added.

"We definitely like our popcorn in Limestone," Amanda McLaughlin, executive assistant to Dale Sampson said jokingly. "But the real motivator was ensuring our site gets good feedback from as many of our teammates as possible," she added.

"We have a small movie theater style popper. Staff, including McLaughlin got in the lobby early on and made about 580 bags," Davenport said. "They popped for close to four hours to get that all done," he added.

"Each of us taking the time to provide feedback about our working community allows us to continue to develop it and turn it into a community we can all appreciate," McLaughlin said. "We spend a majority of our day, five days a week, at work, so anything we can do to make it a place we like to be, is a positive thing," she added.

"As of last week we were at 92 percent," Davenport said. "At this point we're crawling along for those last few percentages."

"The best part about the day was making the bags of popcorn and the sense of community brought along by that," McLaughlin said. "While we were in the lobby popping and scooping all that popcorn, many of our teammates passed through and it gave us a chance to say, 'hey, how are you? Nice to see you,'" she added.

Last year Limestone hit 98 percent, "we want to hit that again, and if we do, we get an ice cream sundae—it may be cold but people will still come out for their ice cream!" Davenport said.

"Not only am I excited for sundaes, but I look forward to serving my teammates again and having the opportunity to hear how they are doing," McLaughlin said.

Even before the 2019 survey opened, Limestone started out the gate on a positive note. Last survey cycle Limestone improved in all 12 dimensions. Their 13 action plans helped them to improve their workplace processes.

• Date Taken: 12.17.2019
• Date Posted: 12.31.2019 13:23
• Story ID: 357895
• Location: COLUMBUS, OH, US