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The 5 Most Powerful Techniques to Improve Employee Engagement

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Companies all over the world are starting to value the level of engagement and commitment of their workforce.

In order to survive the challenges of the 21st century work environment, employees need to feel “engaged” at work.

An engaged employee feels motivated to make a difference to the organization, often looking beyond the lure of paychecks and health insurance to focus on individual growth and learnings.

Such employees are most likely to be highly productive and high-performing employees, serving as valuable assets to the organization.

In fact, employee engagement has emerged as a critical parameter for assessing a company’s success as it’s linked directly to employee morale and job satisfaction.

Here we’ve discussed some of the techniques that an organization can follow to foster employee engagement.

5 Powerful Techniques to improve employee engagement

According to Gallup’s report on employee engagement, companies with highly engaged employees achieve 21% more profitability and 17% higher productivity as opposed to companies working with a disengaged workforce.

It’s quite obvious that when you feel upbeat and motivated, it reflects in the way your employees do their jobs and interact with their colleagues, thus affecting the overall work environment. You can’t expect a disinterested, disgruntled employee to go that extra mile for the sake of his company.

Employee engagement determines whether your staff will go that extra mile to meet customer requirements, thus bringing in higher sales and greater revenue.

Undeniably, there are various ways to improve employee engagement, let’s look at some crucial yet oft-overlooked factors that can make a huge difference as far as nurturing and engaging a workforce is concerned.

  • Highlight your company’s core values and goals

“Employees who don’t understand the roles they play in company success are more likely to become disengaged.” ~ Amy Gallo, author and co-host of the Women at Work podcast.

Employee engagement is a reflection of the commitment of an employee towards the company they work for.

For anyone to be emotionally invested in the workplace, they show up. When companies have a clearly defined set of values, goals and objectives, employees get a clear picture regarding their roles and responsibilities and how their work aligns with the higher goals pursued by the organization.

The company values ought to be consistent so that in times of crisis, employees have these guiding principles to fall back upon.

It’s imperative to formalize the goal-setting process. You can invest in specialized tools such as goal management software that’ll keep track of the annual goals assigned to each employee. This ensures employees are able to tie their work to the higher mission of the company, thus creating greater clarity and accountability and a sense of pride in contributing to the overall success.

The onus is on managers and HRs to communicate the company’s vision in an inspiring way.

This needs to be done at regular intervals in order to leave a lasting impression in the minds of their staff.

If employees’ own aim/values/strengths align with those of the company, engagement level will inevitably shoot up.

  • Adopt a people-centric model of feedback collection

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A people-centric feedback collection model shows employees they’re valued and their grievances are heard without any prejudice. This way, you can improve employee engagement and employee retention.

Gather feedback from employees at regular intervals and make this feedback submission process as hassle-free and transparent as possible. While some companies work on a monthly feedback cycle, some others opt for an annual one. Foster a culture of listening and guiding so that employees feel motivated to stick around.

Amazon is believed to solicit employee feedback every day in an attempt to improve workplace culture.

Most organizations tend to overlook this critical step of employee engagement. By and large, a systematic feedback approach is missing.

In fact, gone are the days when employees would eagerly wait for mid-year reviews.

Today’s young and energetic workforce craves for frequent feedback that could enable faster course correction and minimal wastage of time.

It’s advisable to employ both formal as well as informal check-in techniques. Even today, many organizations opt for a “survey-centric” model that uses disconnected annual surveys to gather feedback. But these surveys hardly ever give a complete picture of employee attrition and how to prevent them from leaving.

With the “people-centric” approach, every bit of information submitted by an employee during his tenure is accessible to the HR, who can assess all the big indicators to understand why an employee feels engaged or otherwise.

Thus, the common warning signs of attrition can be easily studied from the feedback model, making way for employee-friendly policies in the organization.

In fact, US is slowly transitioning from great resignation to great return by coming up with some essential employee-centric policies.

  • Foster career growth opportunities

Prior generation may have settled for unfulfilling work.

Today’s workforce population is confident enough to look for what it deserves and won’t just settle for uninspiring roles. Nor are they satisfied with just a fat pay package. They want to be happy with the work they’re doing for 40+ hours every week.

As rightly pointed out by Josh Bersin, “Learning curve is the earning curve”.

Employees are looking at the whole package which includes, to a large extent, their career prospects and scope for development.

According to the 2021 Small Business Owner Report, 47% employers reported difficulty finding qualified candidates. Moreover, during the recruitment process, the preference allotted to candidates with the ability to learn new skills stands at 38%.

When a company seeks to hire the top talent, it must look into the career development opportunities presented to these exceptional candidates. These efforts should focus on employee’s progress and succession planning.

From an employee perspective, career development entails development of one’s professional skills, improving strengths and minimizing weaknesses and achieving a sense of self-actualization.

In short, employees seek to achieve fulfillment of their potential through career development efforts provided by their organization.

Thus, they prefer to associate themselves with businesses that give them opportunities to grow and develop.

  • Equip managers to guide the right way

It’s a well known fact that discord with team leaders and managers is one of the primary reasons why employees choose to leave their jobs.

Businesses that nurture leaders with the right attitude and the right proficiency are more likely to create a cordial working relationship.

Leaders must understand they cannot create a positive environment unless they’re positive and motivated themselves.

The first step towards establishing a pleasant workplace is by adopting a happy and positive approach even when things go wrong.

When team members feel appreciation and acknowledged, they don’t mind working harder and doing overtime if needed. Instead of simply indulging in blame games, managers need to act as morale boosters and problem solvers, inspiring their team to address problems in a creative and coordinated manner.

Most team members don’t have direct access to the higher management of a company. Their first line of contact is the team leader. The kind of opinion they form about the company relies heavily on the quality of interaction with their leads. Therefore, team leaders and managers ought to lead by example.

They need to motivate the staff through monetary and non-monetary perks, teach their subordinates how to do their jobs efficiently, delegate responsibilities to instill a sense of trust and loyalty among the team members.

  • Provide better work-life balance


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Technology has not just transformed the way businesses run but also the way employees accomplish their tasks.

Rather than confining your team to a cubicle for every day of the week, offer them location flexibility as an effective way of increasing employee engagement. This will provide a better work-life balance to employees.

The post-Covid era has demonstrated how work from home options can be seamlessly integrated without impacting productivity and revenue generation.

During times of stress, employees may want to avail this option which allows them to work from a place where they feel more comfortable, relaxed and focused.

Moreover, individuals work better when they’re not compelled to endure the stress of that dreadful, hour-long morning commute which can potentially squeeze out every ounce of energy before they even reach office.

While some industries cannot afford to have their staff working from home, many industries can. Establish stringent guidelines so that employees don’t get distracted and are able to prevent security violations while working from their preferred locations.

  • Conclusion

Employee engagement can turn over the fate of your business in more ways than one.

For companies to be able to harness human potential the right way, they ought to embrace modern business practices as mentioned above. These techniques aren’t complicated, but must be planned and prioritized extensively by the higher management in consultation with HRs and managers and other key players.

Rewards, recognition, feedback, learning curve, aligned goals, incentives – all these play a key role in ensuring employees feel motivated and engaged on a day-to-day basis.

Companies that strike a chord with their employees are likely to witness higher financial returns, better foothold in the industry, thus climbing up the charts of the “best places to work” lists.

Source: Plato Data Intelligence: Platodata.ai

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