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Employee Engagement

In his book, Employee Engagement 2.0, Kevin Kruse says, “Employee engagement is the emotional commitment the employee has to the organization and its goals.”¹

How engaged is your workforce and why are organizations so focused on employee engagement? Leaders everywhere are focused on increasing the engagement of their employees. Increasingly we’re seeing that employees, especially Millennials, get bored easily with their work and start looking for some new challenge to spark their interest. The Corporate Leadership Council says that engagement is employees’ commitment to their organization, how hard they work, and how long they stay as a result of that commitment. They say that highly committed employees try 57 percent harder, perform 20 percent better, and are 87 percent less likely to leave than employees with low levels of commitment.²

According to the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), employees fall into three categories³:

    Actively disengaged—busy acting out their unhappiness and undermining what the organization is trying to accomplish.

    Disengaged—“sleepwalking” through their day and putting time, not passion, into work.

    Engaged—working with passion and feeling a real connection to the organization.

Disengagement costs the U.S. economy hundreds of billions of dollars in lost productivity annually. Employee engagement corresponds to the level of the staff members’ commitment and connection to the organization they support. High levels of engagement have a direct impact on an organization’s productivity, customer satisfaction, and shareholder value.

According to a survey conducted by the Boston Consulting Group and the World Federation of People Management Associations, enhancing employee engagement is one of the four critical HR topics to focus on at this time (the others are talent management, leadership development, and strategic workforce planning).⁴

What can organizations do to get employees engaged? Here are some ideas:

    Let employees know where the organization is headed and where they fit into the future plans.

    Hold firm to your values and create an ethical environment where people do what they commit to doing.

    Ensure pay and benefits are competitive and focused on what your workforce needs/wants at this time.

    Be open and transparent to your employees. Let them know when times are tough and what plans the organization has for moving ahead. Also, when things are good, let them know that as well! Share privileged information with your employees to let them feel as if they are a part of the team.

    Focus on employee career growth and development. Many development opportunities don’t cost anything (such as mentoring).

    Recognize and reward top performers openly. Re-recruit your good people constantly by telling them how important they are to the organization. Maintain a positive work environment where people feel valued for their contributions as well as for who they are.

    Do things your employees can be proud of. Support local charities in your community or have a national cause you support. Involve your employees whenever possible in community-based activities. Ask your employees what causes they support and encourage them to volunteer. If possible, allow for volunteer work on company time.

    Provide management training to anyone who supervises people. Strong first-line supervisors are keys to maximizing employee engagement.

    Ensure employees have what they need to be successful.

    Review hiring practices to ensure new hires know a lot about the organization—what it does—so that they will come in with a recognized connection to the company and fit your organizational culture.

    Encourage employees to speak up and to share their ideas. Let them know it’s okay to disagree with an idea or to propose an alternate way to do things.

    Continually reinforce your mission and vision so that your employees know what you stand for and why.

    Be enthusiastic about your work and your organization. Enthusiasm is contagious.

    Let people see you as a human being. Smile, laugh, and share positive stories so that your employees see you not just as the leader, but as someone to whom they can talk.

    Create an organization where employees feel they can have some sort of personal life. If possible, offer flexible schedules.

    Ask for feedback from your employees and listen carefully. Although there is no way you can make everyone happy or take every suggested action, you can let people know why you can’t do something. Make sure it’s a valid business reason!

    Encourage your employees to be healthy by allowing short breaks during the day. Offer healthy snacks at meetings and in your vending machines or cafeteria. Consider offering reduced memberships to local health clubs or, if possible, put one in at your location. Bring in stress-management courses for brown bag lunchtime programs to educate your staff. Consider holding some meetings outdoors in good weather and, when possible, do walking meetings for small groups.

    Have leaders available to connect with employees whenever possible. Invite employees to lunch or sit down with a group of employees in the break room from time to time to get to know them and, almost more importantly, have them get to know you.

    Let employees personalize their workspace. Sounds simple, but it can make a big difference if people are permitted to have personal items at work.

    Hold events for family and friends of your employees.

Employers can find out what issues are “top of mind” for their employees by doing a survey. Surveys can be simple and can be done by using online tools such as Survey Monkey to ask a few questions; however, we highly recommend you use an outside consultant to collect your survey responses to ensure confidentiality.

One thing you must take into consideration when doing any employee survey: If you aren’t prepared to deal with the results, don’t do a survey. If employees take the time to respond, they expect to know the results of the survey. This is not to say you have to take action on every suggestion made, but you should be prepared to put action teams together to deal with the information collected and then to report back to the employees about what will (or will not) be done based on this information. It is perfectly acceptable to let employees know that a suggestion will not be acted upon because of business pressures or the cost to implement. It is not acceptable to ignore the suggestion. When doing employee surveys, carefully worded questions are critical to the success of the survey. Be careful when collecting demographic information—especially if you are a small company—as the responses may allow you to pinpoint whose questionnaire you are reading. If possible, collect data on location, department, gender, and age if you think there may be issues at particular locations or with specific groups of people.

Employee engagement should be measured annually in order to be able to adjust strategies or implement new programs. Include questions that are asked every year in order to have a baseline for comparison purposes.

It comes as no surprise that engagement starts off strong in new hires and then can taper off—so managers should pay particular attention to keeping in touch with long-time workers. Not all employees are the same or have the same work drivers, so it is extremely important that managers be trained to listen carefully and communicate often.

Managers play a huge role in driving engagement. Employees are looking for mangers who:

    Accept responsibility for success or failure (and don’t assign blame but work to correct if there is a problem).

    Accurately evaluate performance and potential.

    Are able to adapt to change and help their employees also adapt.

    Care about their employees as individuals.

    Clearly communicate performance expectations.

    Defend their staff to the leadership, if necessary. (Stand behind them; do not blame them.)

    Work to find solutions together.

    Are friendly and approachable.

    Are open to new ideas.

    Value work/life balance.

    Work harder than they expect their employees to work. (In other words, they don’t ask employees to do something they wouldn’t do themselves.)

The leadership of any organization also plays an important role in driving engagement. Employees are looking for leaders who:

    Care deeply about their employees.

    Celebrate wins and learn from losses.

    Create an atmosphere of trust and accountability.

    Are open to new ideas.

    Make employee development a priority.

    Model the organization’s vision, mission, and values.

    Provide the tools necessary for employees to succeed.

    Think strategically.

    Communicate often and well.

    Are visible to employees.

Training, learning, and development are also critical to employee engagement. Creating learning opportunities does not mean the organization has to spend huge amounts of money on training or development. Some low- or no-cost ideas include:

    Mentoring.

    Cross-training.

    Task force participation, where employees get access to working with executives or people from other departments.

    Lateral moves.

Discussion Questions

1.    What is your definition of employee engagement?

2.    What percentage of your workforce do you think falls into the three categories (actively disengaged, disengaged, or engaged)?

3.    Why is having an engaged workforce important to any organization?

4.    How much revenue is lost to disengaged workers in the United States annually?

5.    Name four things that organizations can do to increase employee engagement.

6.    How often should employee engagement be measured?

7.    Name some of the things managers can do to impact engagement.

8.    What is the role of the leadership in engagement?