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Employee Engagement Ebook
Employee Engagement Ebook
employee
What is Employee Engagement?
Employee engagement is an employee’s relative rational and/or
emotional commitment to their job, team, manager, and organization,
which results in either increased discretionary effort, or willingness to go
“above and beyond” their normal job and/or intent to stay.
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This framework, created
and performed by the HREF
To better demonstrate the framework of (HR Executive Forum of the
Human Resources
employee engagement, Leadership Council) was
the illustration below outlines the different engagement levels across applied to more than
the workforce. 50,000 employee surveys,
and represents participants
in various industries across
29 countries.
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As you can see from the framework, employee
engagement is a key indicator of performance and/
or employee retention;
Therefore it’s extremely important for companies to ensure
that their employees are at an appropriate level of
engagement. Industry analysts spent several months
gathering the research outlined in the illustration, and came
to several conclusions based on their findings.
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Highly committed employees are likely to seek ways to
20% improve the effectiveness of their work; therefore,
increasing employee discretionary effort from the lowest
level to a high level improves performance by as much as
20%.
Although those numbers may seem small in terms of one or two employees, they
would have a much larger impact on the employee population as a whole.
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Why is the employee important to your company?
A company’s employees are its most important asset;
therefore it’s vital that they are fully engaged in their jobs and focused on achieving the
organization’s goals and objectives.
If you ask the owner of any organization what kind of employee he or she would like to employ, you
almost always get the same answer.
In order for an employee to behave as an intrapreneur, that employee needs to feel empowered or
encouraged to make contributions and decisions for the organization.
They need to feel as if their voice is heard and that the suggestions or recommendations they
bring to the organization matter. That’s where the importance of engagement comes into
play.
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This graphic comes from a study
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Not only is there a 5% spread in operating margin, companies with low
engagement actually experience negative margins due to the engagement
problems. You see a similar result with net profit.
Another obvious concern is how engagement affects the retention efforts of an organization.
The percentages are very telling of what a disengaged workforce can do to an organization.
Half the population of the disengaged employees are prepared to leave the company at any
given moment, and an additional 35% would seriously consider leaving if another
opportunity presented itself.
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Employee engagement doesn’t always resonate with non-HR
professionals;
However, when you can show the relationship between engagement scores and bottom-line, financial
outcomes, everyone pays attention to the engagement index. Establishing this critical link between
people and performance help HR professionals prove that people-related interventions are indeed a
worthwhile investment.
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A recent report on the American workforce shows that nearly half of all
Americans in the workforce are not fully engaged, or what’s worse – they are
disengaged.
This phenomenon is known as the “engagement gap” and references the huge disparity
amongst those employees that are totally engaged in an organization versus those that are simply
there for a paycheck.
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What Drives Employees?
The question now is, “How do I engage my employees in the
organization?”
To answer that question, first look at the different levels of engagement. Engagement, as it relates to
the Global Engagement Gap, is broken down into 3 categories: engaged, disengaged and
actively disengaged.
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Disengaged employees view their jobs as merely a way to earn a
Actively disengaged employees are the most problematic in terms of performance, as these
employees are unhappy, disgruntled, and usually allow their negative outlook on the company and/or
position to manifest itself in their work. In addition to their own performance issues, they have a
tendency to bring down the morale of the engaged employees by constantly voicing their discontent
and poisoning the minds of those employees that are otherwise excited and happy with their jobs.
Although actively disengaged employees usually only account for a small percentage of the
population, they can have a disproportionate effect on the positive influences of engaged employees.
Think of it this way – disengaged employees place themselves on
auto-pilot. They add little value to a company; yet they aren’t
destructive. Actively disengaged employees act out their displeasure
and seek to find allies to jump on the bandwagon. It’s important that
this type of behavior is ended before it begins.
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What Drives YOUR employees?
Employee drivers have changed dramatically in the last decade to reflect a
changing set of work demands and the mentality of the new age workforce.
Expectations have transformed on both ends of the spectrum.
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Extrinsic Rewards
Are those tangible rewards (historically monetary) given by employers
such bonuses, pay increases, and benefits. These are the rewards
that employees want and appreciate, but usually only provide a temporary
satisfaction and fail to encourage long-term retention.
Intrinsic Rewards
Are more relevant in today’s workforce, and are those psychological
rewards that employees get from doing meaningful work and
performing their jobs well. Most of today’s workforce is given the
autonomy to self-direct to an extent, which means that they use their
intelligence and rely on their professional expertise to make decisions.
Making decisions, problem solving, and innovating are all huge motivators
to the current and future workforce.
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Employee
Engagement Model
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Cultures of engagement combine the factors along the left side of the model and
foster an environment for happy, fulfilled employees.
Each piece plays an integral role in fostering such an environment.
Managers can do an excellent job of constructively criticizing and mentoring their direct reports;
however if the employee is never allowed to voice his/her opinions or concerns about that manager or
the organization, the feedback aspect of engagement is lost. That’s why it is extremely important to
have frequent town hall meetings, employee satisfaction surveys, and various open forums so that the
employees have a sense of inclusion in the on-goings of the company.
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The only way employees will build a trust in their leadership team is if they are
communicative and keep employees informed on upper level decisions.
As we discussed earlier, employees’ mindsets have changed drastically over the last few decades.
Employees have become more and more driven and are constantly thinking about their career tract
and the next step in their career. This is why it’s so important that employees understand their role
and how it affects the company; they want to ensure that what they are doing is
meaningful and therefore progressively develops their career.
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How can managers and employers turn those
intrinsic rewards into a more engaged, more
dynamic workforce?
Direct managers are in the best position to increase employment engagement.
Managers are the closest to the employee, and serve as the link between the employee and the rest of
the company (in terms of organizational hierarchy).
They should understand how to tap directly into the contribution that the employee
makes and ensure that the value from that contribution is apparent and relevant.
No one wants to feel as if they’re just going through the motions. They need to
understand the bottom-line effects their role has on the corporation. For
example, an AR clerk may feel as if they are merely a paper pusher when
Make sure they know
in reality they are the ones that ensure that funds are received and
how important their
properly allocated. If not for them, there wouldn’t be money for future
work is and that they
projects, paying bills, or even funding payroll!
are appreciated.
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Employees need to know how their work impacts the company’s success.
They need to understand that the work they provide aligns with the goals of the organization.
Managers can ensure this happens by making certain that the vision and mission of the company is
apparent, and is incorporated into each project or task their employees are performing. Reaffirm the
values of the company; building a cohesive team is more valuable than many may realize.
One of the biggest mistakes managers make is assuming that employees know
that their work is appreciated; or conversely, assuming that employees know that their current
work performance is sub-par. Don’t make that mistake –
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Managers shouldn’t downplay the affects formal
mentoring or coaching can have on an employee’s performance.
If there is something a manager sees in an employee that they want to foster and grow into that next
corporate genius, he or she should spend the time to take that employee under their wing and do
what they can to encourage that employee. Knowing that you have one person that believes in you
and wants you to succeed speaks volumes.
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What can Companies do to Promote Employee
Engagement?
While managers play a huge role in ensuring the employees are engaged, the actual employer or the
organization as a whole is also responsible for making sure that the environment is such that
employees are happy and want to come to work each day.
Employers should provide their employees with various avenues that assist them in understanding
how the company operates as a whole. In theory, this is covered during the initial employee
orientation; however as an employee grows with an
organization and begins to understand how some things
come together, it would be helpful if there was something
available that tied everything together.
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This type of training course is helpful because it brings together employees that may have
otherwise never interacted while it also proves to be a wonderful learning experience for
everyone involved. It’s usually a lot of fun too – often presented in the form of a game show where
employees guess pricing models for products and services the company offers, or something similar.
It’s generally culminated by each “graduate” receiving a t-shirt or some symbol confirming that they
are now a Student of the Business. Although the t-shirt or whatever item provided is usually a very
small token, employees respond well now understanding that they have an integral part in the success
of the company.
Another critical thing to consider is how the executive team sets the culture of
engagement.
employees are keenly aware of the Senior
Many employers don’t realize this but
Leadership staff and how they interact with the various levels of a corporation.
Whether they take the time to involve themselves with the lower level employees, or whether they
have an “us versus them” mentality, it doesn’t go unnoticed.
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Innovative corporations have learned that creating an open atmosphere proves
to be much more effective in engaging employees.
Take for example RaceTrac Corporation – RaceTrac has adopted the Fishbone seating arrangement
throughout their entire corporate office.
This seating arrangement supports the idea that although there are varying levels of positions within
the company, no one person is more important than the other. There are no offices, only meeting
rooms to be used by anyone that chooses to book the room. Even the Senior Vice Presidents sit at a
desk, in the same area as an entry-level employee.
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What Can HR Do?
Human Resources has a complicated role in employee engagement.
HR is there to assist and should have ideas to increase employee engagement. However, because HR
has no direct link to employees, it’s important that they have a strong working relationship
with the various managers and departments so that the engagement efforts are not lost.
The HR department should make itself available and be able to provide resources to
those managers or departments that request information on how to increase engagement.
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HR needs to set in place a mechanism to gauge the levels of employee
engagement and keep the motivation levels high. This can be accomplished through periodic
surveys and/or town halls/meetings. Surveys should be simple and straightforward which
can elicit the honest opinion of employees on various issues ranging from work satisfaction to coffee
quality. Trying to hide real issues in the survey will get people to give inaccurate
opinions and this will have a negative impact on the future policies that the
management wants to implement.
Engagement encompasses so many different aspects; it’s easy to get overwhelmed when
starting from scratch. Just keep the following tips in the checklist below in mind and you will be well
on your way toward having a fully engaged workforce:
• Build a Business Case for employee engagement: Build the business case that shows the financial
benefits. Do your research and go to senior management with tangible, quantifiable findings.
• Survey your employees: Establish a benchmark by conducting an employee survey that measures
what matters to your employees. Also, remember when conducting an employee engagement
survey, commit to act on the results or don't bother spending the time and money conducting the
survey.
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• Make it personal: Ask people how they perform when they are not engaged versus when they are
engaged and consider the implications for the organization. Then dig deeper to determine what
contributes to that engagement.
• Incorporate the vision of the company: Create a mutual vision of what an engaged culture can look
like. It is key to acknowledge that each department or function may have different engagement
drivers, so build in flexibility.
• Create a strategic framework: Building from your vision, create a document that is easy to
understand and that aligns the organization vision, values, aligns desired behaviors with results
• Make Managers a priority: If the middle managers don’t go for it, your employee engagement
program is destined to fail. Spend extra time ensuring they understand and endorse the program.
Build engagement into their performance reviews.
• Recognize desired behaviors: Build your recognition programs around desired results -- both
behaviors and business results.
• Communication is key! This cannot be over emphasized. Make sure that communication is
consistent and ongoing, and this isn’t just a one-time thing that falls by the wayside.
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Successful organizations understand the importance of
engagement.
Now that you’re ready to start putting measures in place, you’re one step
closer to ensuring that your company is staffed with fulfilled, fully engaged
employees. It can be overwhelming but it’s definitely doable. Just remember to
take advantage of the resources you have available. In addition to the
checklist, there are lots and lots of case studies online that you can reference
to determine what will best fit your corporate culture.
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