10 Practical Employee Engagement Steps…That Drive Results!

This extended downturn in the economy has taken its toll on your employees. Training budgets have been slashed, wages frozen and promotions delayed as employees were asked to “do more with less.” I’m projecting that we’re entering the era of the “disengaged” as many employees seek alternatives elsewhere. Companies will start hiring again soon, employees will again believe that it is OK to be someone’s low man on the totem pole and the musical chair aspect of job movement will take root. Is your company prepared?

I’m also projecting that firms will not simply return to their pre-recession turnover levels. For instance, if your traditional voluntary turnover dropped from 15% to 5%, the 10% of the workforce that didn’t leave during the past year is now in queue and will be in addition to your traditional 15% of voluntary turnover. Can your company handle turnover levels of 25% or higher? How will this impact employee engagement, client satisfaction and your bottom line?

I don’t think I’m being an alarmist. In fact, Deloitte’s September 2009 Special Report, “Managing Talent in A Turbulent Economy,” based on survey respondents who revealed the following statistics that should keep leaders and Human Resources executives awake at night:

• Nearly half (49%) of employees surveyed in August are either looking for a new job or plan to do so after the recession ends.
• 22% of surveyed Generation X employees have been actively job hunting over the past year
• Among surveyed Generation X members, only 37% plan to stay with their current employer, while 44% of surveyed Generation Y members expect to remain in their current job.

Companies need to focus on their engagement and retention strategies today to be prepared for tomorrow by adopting the following 10 engagement practices:

1. Link your engagement efforts to high performance – Employee engagement is not about employee satisfaction. The last thing you should want is a team of satisfied but underperforming employees. I define engagement as “the unlocking of employee potential to drive high performance.” I do believe that employee satisfaction will be an outcome of a great culture, but I don’t believe it should be the goal.
2. Engagement starts at the top- Most studies show that a key engagement driver is the actions of senior leaders. Leaders must demonstrate support for an engaged culture by personally living their company’s values. In today’s recessionary times, leaders have large shadows – and your employees are watching everything you do!
3. Engage First Line Leaders - The old adage, “employees join great companies but quit bad managers” is true. Based on research, the key driver of engagement is the relationship with one’s direct manager. Studies show that if one’s line manager is disengaged, his/her employees are four times more likely to be disengaged. However, we woefully under invest in supervisory training.
4. Focus on communication, the cornerstone of engagement – Successful leaders recognize the power of a robust communication plan, one built on clarity, consistency, and transparency. Learn how to leverage the various communication venues available to you (especially social media), and how to tailor communications to reach vastly different generations in the workplace.
5. Individualize your engagement – Today’s leaders must tailor their communication approaches, rewards and recognition programs, and training and development investments to the unique motivational drivers of each employee. It is no longer “treat people they way you want to be treated,” the new mantra is “treat people the way they want to be treated.”
6. Create a motivational culture – I don’t believe leaders can motivate employees’ long term. They must create motivational cultures where employees can flourish. Leaders do need to understand the different intrinsic motivational drivers of their employees. Experts agree that a key engagement driver is showing empathy towards your employees. You are more apt to get the discretionary effort of your employees when they think you care about them as people!
7. Create feedback mechanisms – Companies need to ask employees what they think. Employee engagement surveys are a great tool to check your organizational pulse. Are your employees currently engaged? Are you capturing their discretionary effort? As we slowly recover from this deep recession, some enlightened companies are beginning to ask their employees, “what do you think?” as they conduct employee engagement surveys.
8. Reinforce and reward the right behaviors – I’ve learned that employees are incredibly motivated by achievement, not money. I do believe that money can disengage if employees perceive unfairness. Because you will get the behavior you measure, I strongly suggest a blend of both quantitative and qualitative metrics.
9. Track and communicate progress – It is amazing to me how few companies have balanced scorecards in place. Employees are no different than leadership – they both want to work for a ‘winning’ organization. You need to reinforce “line of sight” by telling your employees where your organization is headed, how the company is performing, and where they fit in. These are key alignment and engagement necessities.
10. Hire and promote the right behaviors and traits for your culture – I often tell clients, they don’t have an engagement issue, they have a hiring issue – they’re hiring the wrong behaviors and traits to succeed in their culture. To reinforce this message, I share my B.E.S.T profile of staff selection. Although we place much emphasis on one’s educational background and skills (the E and S), people generally succeed or fail because of their behaviors and traits (the B and T).

I anticipate significant job movement in the months ahead. Your retention and engagement investments should not be analogous to a light switch – you shouldn’t just turn them on or off. You need to have a strategy in place that can sustain the good times, and the not-so-good-times.” Think of your engagement investments and efforts as a dimmer switch – during financially challenging times, you lower slightly, and during boom times, you elevate slightly, while continuously communicating with your employees the realities of your business challenges and successes.