Episode 87: Solo Cups, Secrets & Silence: The Real Risk of Hiding Money in Business 

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Written By Kerri Roberts

Episode Description:

Money isn’t just numbers - it’s trust, culture, and retention. In this fiery episode of Don’t Waste the Chaos, Kerri Roberts exposes the hidden dangers of staying silent about money inside your business. From solo cups sparking wild rumors to leaders unknowingly breeding distrust, Kerri unpacks why financial transparency is the leadership move that keeps your people engaged, loyal, and productive. 

You’ll discover real stories, research-backed insights, and practical steps to shift from secrecy to clarity - without oversharing spreadsheets. If you want to reduce turnover, boost morale, and create a culture of ownership, this episode is your wake-up call. 

Tune in now and learn how to transform silence into strategy, fear into fuel, and chaos into clarity. 

Tune in to hear: 

  1. Discover the real risk of silence - why not sharing financial context leads to gossip, fear, and disengagement. 

  2. Learn from real-world examples (yes, even solo cups!) on how small changes without explanation can spiral into chaos. 

  3. Get the data that matters - studies from Deloitte, Marks-Elliot, and Financial Times proving transparency boosts trust, morale, and performance. 

  4. Walk away with actionable steps - from open forums to cascading check-ins, learn how to communicate financials effectively. 

  5. Protect your bottom line - understand the hidden “turnover tax” and how trust and engagement directly drive profitability. 

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Full Transcript:

Kerri Roberts (00:01.826)

Welcome back to another episode of don't waste the chaos. And today I'm talking about something that number one, I don't see women talk a lot about. And number two, I don't see privately held companies talk near enough about, and that's the monies. Friends being transparent about money can feel like standing on a tight rope, especially when we're in inflation shadow, which is happening right now. But here's the real risk when it comes to talking about money in your business. And that is this.

Kerri Roberts (00:34.346)

It's silence. When you don't share, your people are going to fill in your silence with stories, and usually darker than reality. So let's replace silence with steady clarity. So let's jump in. One time I was working in an organization and they were an extremely generous organization. Candidly, I wouldn't have run the business that way, but I was, I'm gonna say just an HR director at the time.

Very strategic role, but still not seeing grace over some of these things. And I get it. A lot of people put HR in a box, ironically. So I see the way this organization is being run. And at this point, it's very profitable. And I feel like we're just giving away money. So harder times come. And what do we do? We start pulling back on some benefits. Now.

These are not mission critical benefits. I'm not saying we pulled back on medical insurance. I'm not saying we pulled back on pay or being competitive in that area. The first thing we started pulling back on, are you ready for this? Solo cups. We started pulling back on solo cups. There was a ton of waste in this company. Free fountain soda, picture it like that. We have free fountain soda and everybody's using.

a brand new solo cup every time they come up. And we've got a decent amount of people who are kind of knocking us for the waste. And so we start thinking about how we're spending and we're like, well, one thing we could do is just like stop wasting all these solo cups from a money perspective and also just like trash and waste in general. We need to be like social stewards as well. So we give out a one-time use.

Plastic cup and if you are somebody who's ever lived in Columbia, Missouri I'm gonna call it a Shakespeare's cup. Maybe a Harpo's cup. You guys know what I'm talking about It's just a plastic one-use cup. It's got a big amount of space for a good beer pour or soda Whatever you like, so we give these out. They're cute. They're branded. We're like, this is great There's gonna be a huge win. You can add your name on it We have a little area where you can write with a sharpie on it

Kerri Roberts (02:47.7)

But we didn't really tell people why. Around the same time, we also said, hey, not everybody in this organization can just go buy a t-shirt and work with a t-shirt company on a branded t-shirt. This needs to come through marketing. Also around the same period of time, we started scaling back on large company parties. Now, this was because the company was getting big and having one party was just not feasible anymore.

You add the solo cup change and the party change and the t-shirt change. And guess what came out of that? The company's going broke. We're folding. We're not even going to be around in five years. Just the rumors were bananas. We should have shared more information. The person in charge of internal communications, which spoiler alert, there really wasn't a person who was in charge of internal communications.

had kind of been from HR, from a learning and development perspective, but there were people who had feelings about that. But then marketing really wasn't in charge of internal communications and no one was really seeing grace about it. And so we didn't have a good strategy. And then the absence of information rumors started going bananas. We weren't going broke as an organization. We were being extremely wasteful, but we weren't going broke. We were seeing things go rogue a little bit, but we weren't going broke.

Things were getting a little out of hand sometimes, but we weren't going broke. So I wanna give you permission. We're gonna get more transparent. We're not going to share every spreadsheet. We're not going to share every hard number, but we are going to share enough to anchor our employees' trust. Let's get into it a little bit deeper. I wanna talk about why transparency matters when it comes to financials, when it comes to goals, when it comes to direction.

Trust is tied directly to transparency. I was reading a research study recently done by Deloitte. 86 % of leaders agree greater transparency boosts workforce trust. So 86 % of us are on the same page here. Transparent leadership can yield up to 30 % more trust and 25 % higher morale. That was from a Marx-Elliot study that I read.

Kerri Roberts (05:09.568)

On top of trust being tied to transparency, employee engagement and productivity truly do pay the bills, even though we think sales cures are all ails. At the root of that is employee engagement and productivity. Happy engaged employees are up to 12 % more productive and companies with engaged cultures outperform others by up to 20%. I've actually seen data much higher than that, but that was the most recent study that I read. We also want to avoid the turnover tax. We all know it's expensive to replace people.

Just as a reminder, replacing someone may cost 30 % up to 20%.

Kerri Roberts (05:47.801)

My math's not math in there. Replacing someone may cost 30 % up to 200 % is what I meant to say of their annual salary. This includes hidden costs like lost productivity, morale dips and things like that, but also posting the job, the training and all of that. So many times when I'm coaching a leader in their organization, they're like, I just feel like I'm going to create mass chaos or I'm going to share too much. And then people feel like they have a say on everything. Yes, I get that.

Sometimes we do share too much as business leaders and then we do have employees that think that they need to be calling the shots in areas that's really not any of their business. So I get that, but we can share reality with calm. Context is going to beat panic any day and just like my example of the solo cups and then people thinking that the business is gonna be closing, sharing data doesn't always have to...

make an alarm bell go off if we sharing margins, trends, and immediate actions. If there's things that aren't performing well, we can share immediate actions that we're going to take to course correct. Now we've got the why. We need to explain what transparency is to our employees and honestly to our leadership teams. Clearly sharing high level financial health. I'm talking about revenue trends, margin pressures, budget flexes, not every single.

crunchy number are we going to share? A lot of times we're going to be sharing percentages. Sometimes we're going to share the actual number, but a lot of times we're going to be sharing percentages. And that's appropriate. I'm just asking you to consider what you can share because we're working primarily with a generation right now who need to be attached to the purpose of the organization. If we're sharing no data, if we're sharing no goals, if we're sharing no percentages,

How are they supposed to attach to the purpose of the organization? We can cast the most beautiful vision statement. We can roll out our values with flashy parties that have Harleys rolling up in buildings and fake tattoos like I've seen done before. But really, if we just help them understand, here is your chunk of responsibilities. Here's how these roll up to these objectives.

Kerri Roberts (08:12.183)

And here's where these objectives get us as an organization. And if you're clear with those, you're going to draw in the right people and you're going to repel the people who aren't. Let's say you're in a lean season, a time where you are needing to scale back the solo cups. All you need to say is we're in a lean season and here's what we're doing to stay resilient. And here's how you can help. Most generally employees will hop on board. Now, are there going to be a few people who are like, my gosh, the sky is falling. I probably need to look for another job. Sure.

But are those the people that you want in your organization, the people who are, can't manage their stress, who are jumping off a cliff? I don't think that that's really what we want. So sharing that trans, that transparency, we're in a lean season, but here's what we're doing to stay resilient. And here's how you can help as our employee population. It's beautiful. It's a beautiful place to be. It is a sharing reality with calm. So.

Let's talk about how to crowdsource this efficiency essentially and get your entire population, your entire employee population involved. You need to lean into a high involvement culture. Organizations with employees that have information and decision-making power see stronger commitment, retention, and even higher organizational performance in general. I've seen this in a report in Financial Times. I saw something that cooperates from Marks Elliot. So,

If they have the information and they've got decision-making power or autonomy, you're gonna see a stronger commitment from them, stronger retention rates and higher performance. That seems like a no-brainer, but I see so many organizations that do not share with their employee population. Let me take it to a personal level. I've seen CEOs who share virtually nothing about their personal life, but yet they'll...

they'll chat it up with an employee about that employee's personal life. But when it comes to like reciprocating that, they don't share. If I'm an employee, I'm thinking this person doesn't really like me. They're just checking a box from a relational perspective with me so they get what they want out of me. Or worse, that employee is taking their HR director to Coldplay concerts and making out with them and doesn't want anybody to know they've got something to hide. mean, employees are gonna fill in the blank. And am I saying...

Kerri Roberts (10:35.267)

that we have to worry about that all the time because employees are filling in the blank. mean, as a leader, kind of. We do need to be thinking about that. I'm not saying you have to go share how many times you're sexually active with your partner at home. Like, please hear me on this. We've got a level of transparency that we're sharing. We're not necessarily sharing what our EBITDA is. We're not necessarily sharing the last time we took a shower. We're sharing.

what is helpful to the employee population so they can feel known, so they feel like they have some information about their role, their job, the company they work for. They feel like they have some decision-making power, some autonomy. Therefore, they're going to have a stronger commitment to you, higher retention rates, and higher performance. Active listening also unlocks solutions when it comes to this area. When leaders listen and act, morale, innovation, and retention all rise. So if an employee is saying,

And maybe they're not gonna say exactly, wish that I could see more data. Or maybe they are saying, we feel like we don't trust our leadership team. I've had a client before that their satisfaction and engagement survey results showed that, that employees felt like they didn't trust the leadership team. And the leadership team, they were like, my gosh, we have so much integrity. That's total crap. They started getting a little bit frustrated. Under that, I dug down and saw employees just felt like they didn't know.

if there were job openings or how roles were being filled or how they could make more money if they wanted to make more money or what the future direction of the organization was and if the goal was to grow and scale into more cities or not. If somebody gets hired that's offshore, is the philosophy to hire everyone offshore and we're all going to be cut? I mean, just communicate to your employee population. If you hear them saying that they need more information, don't be like, my gosh, these people want to know everything.

listen to them and then act and you will see morale and innovation and retention all rise. So here's some practical moves that you can take. You could do some open forums and if that scares you, I guess I would say that's valid. If you've never done it before and you're gonna do your first town hall, diverse open forum, do it on Zoom, do it on person, I don't really care and just say, know, ask me anything, AMA, right? Ask me anything.

Kerri Roberts (13:01.017)

This is the time where you can come in and ask questions to me and I will give you whatever information you're looking for. As a leader, we know that if somebody says, why was someone so fired? We're not gonna be like, well, here are the exact things that happened. But what we can share is, let me walk you through a typical process. I can't share with you if this is the exact process that happened with this employee, but in general, our process is to always, if somebody is out of line in our organization, whether it's,

not connecting with the values or lack of performance. What we're going to do is we're going to first share it with the employee. That employee's leader, the team lead, the manager, the supervisor, the director is going to share with them, hey, this is where we're out of a line. Please do something to correct it. Here's what we're asking of you by this time. And then that leader is going to sit down at their desk after they had a person to person conversation and they're going to type a little email.

Hey, so and so, we just talked about X, Y, and Z, and I just wanted to shoot you a quick email to make sure that we were clear, and on the same page, I want to set you up for success. So by X date, we're expecting X, and Z. Let's say that that employee could not rise to that challenge. Then we're going to put them on a written performance plan. Now, inside of your organization, it might look different. I recommend an employee performance improvement plan as a third step. So maybe we're going to have a written warning, and we're going to say,

This has to change in the next 15 days or 30 days, whatever your time cycle is. And if that doesn't happen, then we're going to give them that EPIP is what I call it, employee performance improvement plan. Or you could call it a final written warning. I don't love final written warning because it sounds like do this or you're out. An EPIP or performance improvement plan is going to walk you through. Here's the specific behaviors. Here's exactly where they're out of alignment, values, performance, results, whatever it looks like. Here is what we need you to do to get there.

here's the exact timeline, here's when check-ins are going to occur, here's how the feedback's gonna get back to you, and here's what happens if you don't hit it. It's a full plan. It's not just knock it off your out of alignment and you're gonna get fired or not even telling them what's gonna happen. And in this case, the employee in question, something along those lines happened with them so they were not taken off guard. And if any of you...

Kerri Roberts (15:25.719)

Stumble down this path where there's a lack of performance or a values misalignment, we're going to treat you the exact same. We care about an equitable workplace. That's a lot of information. But here's a little tip for you as a leader in an organization. If you want to shut something down, so if you've got an employee who's always overstepping their bounds or thinks they deserve more information than they should really have and they should really be focusing on their role,

Give them so much information, not anything like they could get you down to a defamation claim or something like that, but give them so much information like what I just said, here's how our process looks, literally walking them through it. Don't be general, be specific, because then they're going to say, they've got a plan. It's very clear. They don't mind communicating it. And they're gonna hold everyone accountable to that. They're probably not gonna ask that question ever again.

because you were so clear. You shared so much information. You took time out of your day. You took three to five minutes to give that answer that everyone's clear on that, that you're not hiding from anything. You might not be telling them exactly what they want to know. They want the deets, right? They want the juice, the tea, whatever you want to call it, but you're giving them so much information to show that you are so thoughtful in this process. They're not going to ask that question again. So it's a win-win. The employee gets what they want. And as a leader,

you are being transparent enough to let a person know you are a very intentional leader. And if you're a leader that's like, well, I can't do that because I'm not that intentional, I would challenge you to get that way. Get your processes in order. Get the standard operating procedures written. Get your documents in a row. As an employer, we have certain things that we are responsible for. And we've got an employer responsibility checklist.

If you want to join our HR in a Box program, we share that with everybody who's in that program. You need it. Every employer, as a business owner, no one's probably told you. Here's exactly what you're responsible for. Now, you can Google it. You can go to business school. There's a lot of different ways you can ask AI. But inside of our program, we've developed all of these tools to give you very clear, actionable information that you can go apply right now. And you need that.

Kerri Roberts (17:44.686)

Because when you are that strong and that ironclad in your business, you can answer the questions and you can kind of shut it down. People aren't going to do that anymore to you. So do the open forum. See how it goes. People might ask you stuff that you're like, wow, I had no clue employees even cared about this. It might be very informative to you. I'm assuming that it will be. I would also say you need to have check-in meetings. And it needs to be cascading, right? Like if you're the CEO, I'm not saying you need to have check-in meetings with your frontline employees.

But you need to have a structure in place and expectations set that you as the CEO, you're meeting with your direct reports and you're not pushing those off the calendar just because you're busy or they're busy. You're taking the time and you're giving them feedback and information that would actually be helpful in their role. And then you set that clear expectation. We prioritize this, now you go prioritize this with your people. So your VPs or your directors or your leadership team, then they are having sit downs with their employees.

going over their job and their expectations, helping them remove obstacles and barriers, but then also sharing critical information about the organization. And then I would say once a month, once a quarter, I'd like to say at a minimum there, but maybe you're doing it biannually or annually and it's that effective. An employee engagement satisfaction survey would tell me, but however you're doing it, do it with consistency so they know this is when we get the information from the senior leader of this organization. Have the check-in meetings.

Also, solicit ideas, but frame it positively. So, feedback box I'm not really big on, but like where do you see smarter ways to stretch what we currently have? Or, where do you see ways that we can be innovative inside of our current processes and look at them in a new way? Sometimes people in other departments are gonna see things in a new way. Now, if you have a bunch of insecure department heads, this is going to wreak havoc. And I would tell you,

If they're insecure department heads, this is your fault. As a senior leader, you either hire the wrong person or you're not giving them the autonomy that they need in their job. So they're insecure and they're acting all protective. And then they're not going to share information with their employees because they're viewing employee information as power and they want to have the power. And those are completely different issues that I'm recommending that you address. But if you are in a secure environment where your leaders feel well, well resourced and then they feel resourced to empower their employees.

Kerri Roberts (20:07.811)

then they're going to feel comfortable to say, where do you see smarter ways for us to run? Any process, nothing's off limits. Get the feedback from your people. Most of them, it's not their first job. And even if it is their first job, maybe they just came out of school and they learned some information. Or maybe you don't know this, but this brand new frontline employee that's working for you has a dad or a mom that owns their own business and they've taught them about it and they're just making their...

son or daughter get some real world experience before they come back and run their business. You've got diamonds in the rough, get the feedback from them. Everyone's brains work differently. You need to get the feedback from your people. Open up these forums and see what you get. By being transparent with your people, by being open to these open forum meetings, you're reinforcing a commitment to your people and this is going to give you, it's gonna pay back in huge rewards. It's like morale insurance.

Transparency isn't just about the numbers, it's about the connection with the people. It says, matter here, even when the budgets are tight. You matter here, even when this is hard. You matter here, even though we're navigating something difficult. I would recommend you use authentic language. So use phrases like, we're navigating this together, to reinforce that shared mission. And also it's gonna build trust and give them that ability to speak into the process. Because,

If I'm an employee and the senior leader says, you know, we're trying to figure this out between me and two other people and we'll let you know how it goes, like, I don't know, you got us into this mess, so can you get us out of it? There might be a little breach of trust there, but maybe rightfully so. So share with them that you're open. You want to live out your brand. I'm curious what your brand would say about this. My brand says humble efficiency. So both of that, humble and efficient, is going to mean I'm going to let people weigh in.

despite a lean margin or whatever issue you're facing, your loyalty to your people remains unwavering. For me, that's humble efficiency in action, but whatever your values are, if you tell people that you value them, which you kind of have to if you're gonna recruit and retain people, then live it out in the way that you're communicating to them. So let's go a little beyond finances. Throughout this whole episode, I've been trying not to just focus on the financials because yes, we wanna be transparent when it comes to the financials, but

Kerri Roberts (22:30.101)

anywhere where you go quiet. So think about a strategy shift or a staffing change or upcoming changes. Silence breeds bigger stories. So your transparency can anchor culture no matter the topic. So let's kind of jump into some of these. You've got a strategy shift. We're just going to share with our people. I was thinking through some things. I had conversations with these people. I got feedback from my business coach, whatever it is.

and I'm thinking we need to pivot in this way and this is what I'm navigating or you wanna go a little bolder and these are the decisions that I've made and why. Here's why I've made these decisions without your input and I'm asking you to buy in and here's how you can make an impact. If it's a staffing change like the example I used earlier, I had a firm that hired their first offshore person but they didn't tell anyone until the person was hired. You can imagine the ripple effect.

people who were in the exact same job that were stateside, they were like, they're probably gonna offshore everyone in this position. Well, first of all, they were just testing it, but they had no desire to replace the current workforce. But to scale, they were struggling with recruitment. And by the way, they had asked their people to help them recruit. They had offered referral bonuses and it just wasn't happening. So they found this offshore firm. And so they were beta testing it to make sure it works. So by the way, give us feedback.

If you see issues with this person's performance, we're open to it, but this is a way that you all can all keep your jobs, but we're not putting pressure on you to help us recruit because I'm assuming you don't have anybody to refer to us because we didn't get any, even though we gave you a great referral bonus opportunity to make some extra side cash. So we're using this offshore firm and we're gonna do this for three months, six months, 90 days, whatever it looks like.

And then we're going to make a decision moving forward that might look like X, Y, and Z as we continue to scale. And here is how we know that we need more people when and why. Giving them the information. Does it slow you down a little bit? I mean, sure, you have to think through your strategy, but shouldn't you be thinking through it anyway? And then you have to take the time to communicate to your people. Well, shouldn't you be communicating with them anyway? So these are just reinforcers. And it's going to build trust.

Kerri Roberts (24:48.671)

and it's going to positively impact your culture. So good. It's so good. So if you've got a team that's anticipating layoffs because of an offshore person, shut that down. If you say there's a hiring freeze, don't just tell people there's a hiring freeze. What's that mean? Is that because of budget cuts? Maybe it's because our HR person is bogged down with this other project.

And so for right now, we're not hiring or we've got our leaders working on a different project strategically. And so right now we're not hiring or we're looking to invest in this technology. So right now we're not hiring. Like just give the final 10%. And I don't mean the nitty gritty that's going to scare everyone. Just help them to understand the intentionality behind your direction. Because I know you didn't get to where you're at as a leader without some intentionality. We're just asking you to share it. We're reviewing these options. We're going to communicate by X date.

Now, does that mean that no nosy Nancy is not gonna go around? Well then address that. If someone's going around and being toxic about your culture and you shared appropriate information and gave the timeline and the why and the purpose behind all of it and then when to follow back up and then you've got a person who's running with that, deal with that person. They are an issue. They might not be a cultural alignment. They might not be a fit for your organization. But don't not share for fear of that happening.

Share, give your people the chance to react and respond well, and then deal with any issues that come across with that. Listen, people don't need certainty. They need honesty with context. You can't give them certainty. I can't give my team certainty. I literally just this morning before recording this episode had one-on-ones with my team and said,

I know we've been promoting X, Y, and Z, and we've been trying to fill X, and Z, but I wanna go all in on this one area in my business. It's a little bit of a pivot. I gave them the Y, and you know what a couple of them said? This gives me so much clarity to know what to do. I've got a little bit of back work to do because of the change, but it gives me so much clarity. Transparency transforms fear into fuel.

Kerri Roberts (27:04.419)

And that fuel can be used for creativity, for connection, and for collective ownership. And if you are the type of business owner, like most business owners I talk to that say, it's hard to get anybody to work around here, or they just don't have owner mentality, well, here you go. Let's start with transparency and see how it goes for you. I'm telling you, the appropriate amount of transparency is gonna turn fear or gossip or whatever that is into fuel for creativity, for connection.

and collective ownership. Today, I'd like to challenge you to share one insight with your team. I'm gonna say a financial insight if you don't usually do that. And let clarity invite creativity into the process. I know that being more transparent with your team can feel a little chaotic inside, especially if that hasn't been something, that hasn't been your practice as a leader. Even just letting them maybe into your personal life, just a smidge, and let them know a little bit more about you.

They're giving a lot to you. Give a little bit to them. Let that chaos kind of settle in. Give it a shot. See how it goes. Iterate. Address any issues. Be agile in the process. connecting with our people, allowing them to speak into the processes, giving them more autonomy this way, this work is worth it. So don't waste the chaos. Embrace it. Until next time.

Kerri Roberts https://saltandlightadvisors.com
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Episode 86: Is Your Company Culture Failing You?