Employee Engagement Magic

The question of how to engage employees is one of the biggest challenges facing business owners and business leaders today. According to?Gallup research, before the pandemic,?engagement?and well-being were rising globally for nearly a decade -but now, they're stagnant.

"Living for the weekend," "watching the clock tick," "work is just a paycheck." These are the mantras of most global workers. With only 21% of employees engaged at work and 33% of employees thriving in their overall well-being, most would say that they don't find their work meaningful, don't think their lives are going well or don't feel hopeful about their future.

These scary statistics will often result in the leadership team of the organisation implementing activities that they believe will bring higher engagement scores.?They start ticking all the boxes by giving people more autonomy, letting them take ownership of the work they do and the way they do it. They bring in consultants, organise team building events and company retreats, all in the name of engagement.

Whilst these are great initiatives to implement, they don’t address the foundational element of engaging people with the work they do. That is, they don’t answer the question of “why”.

A central construct in performance and being motivated to work hard is the belief that the work we do matters. Not just on a micro level with the work we do personally, but that our work is interwoven with achieving the larger goals of the organisation. In 1962, during a visit to the NASA Space Centre, President?John F. Kennedy?saw a janitor carrying a broom. He interrupted the tour, walked over to the janitor and asked what he was doing. The janitor stopped and responded, “I’m helping put a man on the moon.”

In a Harvard study of companies with aggressive growth strategies, Leaders were asked to identify the factors most important to the success of their?Growth Strategy employee engagement made it to the top three with 71% stating that employee engagement as critical.

Over the past few months, many of the business owners and business leaders that I have interacted with are talking more and more about this ‘magic ingredient’ and how employee engagement is a viable business proposition.?And who can blame them when all the research proves that employee engagement:

• Increases profitability and productivity
• Reduces costs and staff attrition
• Yields higher sales and customer satisfaction results
• Guarantees more engaged and satisfied colleagues

So, what exactly is employee engagement??To answer this question, perhaps it is easier to first understand what Employee Engagement is NOT!

• Employee Engagement is not employee satisfaction! Being ‘satisfied’ is a good start, but engagement goes way deeper than that. Somebody can be satisfied doing a ‘nine to five’ day and doing what they are paid to do. They will be satisfied but they will not be engaged!
• Employee Engagement is not employee happiness! Somebody can be happy at work but that doesn’t mean that they are productive or even slightly engaged. They could be happy because they have a lenient ‘boss’ or happy sitting doing nothing.

There are a number of descriptors of what employee engagement, however I personally like to describe it as:

The extent to which?employees?feel passionate about their jobs, are committed to the organization, and put discretionary effort into their work

Employee Engagement, from an employee perspective, can be broken down into 4 distinct contributory areas:

1. What I Know – Why we exist as an organisation (Vision and Purpose), what we believe in (ethics, culture and values), what success looks like (goals), how we achieve our goals (strategy)
2. What I Feel – Informed, trusted, appreciated, supported and recognised
3. What I Believe – ‘I make a difference’, ‘I am listened to’, ‘My contribution is meaningful’, ‘I am a valued team member’, ‘I am proud to be here’, ‘I have a good future here’
4. What I Experience – Clear line of sight between my efforts and organisational goals, inspiring and ethical leadership, motivational and encouraging management, clear role and performance expectations, an environment and tools to support me to do my best

Each of these areas is fundamental in driving engagement across any organization. They are indistinguishably linked and if even just one is lacking, then the others simply do not work.

Taking this into account, I have found employee engagement can then be broken down into the following key areas:

Vision and Values - Engaged employees understand the big picture and how they fit into it. A clearly communicated vision, core values along with clarity of goals and how to achieve them gives employees clear line of sight between their own efforts and organisational goals

Culture - A positive culture and the code of ethics of the organisation results in engaged employees who want to come to work every morning and give discretionary effort

Leadership - Employees are desperate to have meaningful relationships with their leaders. They need to feel trusted, well informed and supported through inspiring, ethical, motivational and encouraging management and leadership

Communication - Communicate that is open, honest and often.?Clear and consistent communication of the good, and the bad news grows trust and belief in the organisation

Recognition - A well-defined recognition program consisting of both formal and informal ‘rewards’ and directly linked to the behavior that matters for the success of the organization ensures employees feel appreciated, recognised and a valued member of the organisation

Personal growth – Employees want clear role and performance expectations along with the opportunity to develop new skills and capabilities.?Employees want to understand how they are performing through effective feedback mechanisms and know that they have a good future with their organisation?

Community - Successful companies are deeply connected with their communities, committed to social outreach, and they encourage employees to participate in worthy causes that make the world a better place.?Employees want to make a difference

Over the coming weeks, I will delve deeper in to each of these key areas of employee engagement and share insights on how you can leverage them to?to increase business success.

“Employee engagement is an investment we make for the privilege of staying in business”

Ian Hutchinson

What thoughts do you have on employee engagement??What does it mean to you and your organization? Please do share your thoughts and ideas below so that we can all benefit from them.

About Philippa Mathewson

Philippa Mathewson?is an Employee Engagement Specialist and International Leadership Facilitator and Coach. With over 40 years global experience, she is highly passionate about creating cultures of engagement and works tirelessly with Business Owners and Leadership Teams to ensure that their employees literally ‘fall in love’ with their organisations to create increased profits and productivity, reduce costs and attrition and the achievement of business goals.?

You can reach out to Philippa via LinkedIn, at?[email protected]?or on +91 9873314149