The research is out there showing that UK organisations are less productive that other G7 countries and it makes sense that in this time of economic hardship organisations are concentrating on employees providing the increase productivity levels, rather than investmenting in technology.
Creating an environment within the organisation where employees want to give more to the organisation and choose to do so, can greatly impact on productivity. But can an organisation provide a climate where employees can start to take ownership of their own employee engagement without a big budget?
‘A heightened emotional connection that an employee feels for his or her organisation, that influences him or her to exert greater discretionary effort to his or her work’
Of course they can…
Employee engagement is all about the relationship an employee has with their organisation; managers and leaders can greatly influence engagement and are typically some of the biggest factors in driving employee engagement. Treating employees with respect and considering them to be an equal partner in the employment relationship can go a long way and is an area often forgot by managers and leaders. When an organisation approaches all of its interactions with an employee in a respectful and inclusive manner they can begin to foster productive employment relationships. This costs noting but a moment for the manager/leader to think about how they approach a situation.
Identifying your engagement opportunities
Each organisation is different and within organisations different groups may require different approaches to encourage them to become truly engaged with the organisation.
In the following example one of our clients demonstrated engagement with different perspective across length of service. In this particular case, senior management where concerned to discover that employee engagement levels reported in their engagement survey fluctuated with length of service and were keen to discover why.
The organisation set out to examine key issues in order to identify the root causes of the scores and to analyse whether or not the different length of service cohorts held different opinions, they also examined the links between generations and length of service.
The organisation then created a short quantitative survey based upon key areas that were identified as areas of to develop. The qualitative survey was addressed during a number of confidential focus groups divided along length of service cohorts. We prepared a report detailing strengths and development areas – including recommendations for actions and strategies for improvement, many of which were identified by the staff.
The feedback (both qualitative and quantitative) that was gathered from these activities reflected a need for change in the culture. There were gaps in the initial perception of the organisation upon joining and the reality of employment within the organisation, this experience was different depending on your length of service. Surprisingly, the leadership learned that the mid-length of service cohorts felt that their work had little to do with the organisations goals and objectives and as a result were feeling less valued.
These results allowed for greater focus on key areas improvement in employee engagement across all groups of length of service through focused activities and solutions that addressed this organisations individual employee’ needs.
Jaime Johnson The Survey Initiative