What Is Employee Engagement?
The level of commitment that employees have to both their daily tasks and the overall performance of the company is referred to as employee engagement. A positive emotional connection to the business and a feeling of purpose in their work go beyond employee satisfaction in engaged workers.
Teams with greater employee engagement saw both a reduction in negative outcomes like turnover and absenteeism and a significant boost in organizational success, according to Gallup’s 2020 research on employee engagement and performance. According to the findings, companies with high staff engagement saw a 23% increase in profitability, a 10% increase in customer loyalty and engagement, and an 18% increase in sales productivity.
All of this to say: Every company would benefit from concentrating on increasing employee engagement.
What Is An Employee Engagement Strategy?
Focus on the company’s core values
All successful organizations have a strong set of core values ingrained in every business procedure, whether it involves customer-facing activities or back-end tasks.
Emphasizing and upholding your business’s core values makes sure that all employees are aware of the principles the company aspires to uphold. Core values can differ from organization to organization, but it’s critical to adopt a holistic strategy when coming up with core ideals.
Here is where the importance of the tone at the beginning shines through. Let’s say the organization’s top management leads by example and upholds its principles. If that is the case, the environment will be supportive of the company’s fundamental principles throughout the complete workforce.
Integrate Honesty
Trust is important because it has transparency. And as we’ve said, trust is absolutely essential for fostering staff engagement.
For your employees to feel more invested in their job, you should keep them informed about company events. There is nothing wrong with employees in larger companies seeing only certain areas of responsibility.
Upper management should still make it a priority to regularly inform workers of current business developments, changes, and transitions. Of course, you can still maintain discretion regarding sensitive information, but instead, focus on giving your employees a sense of inclusion.
To achieve this, you can:
- Project management systems
- Business meetings
- Official announcements
- Newsletters
Increase organizational autonomy and trust
Within any company, trust is crucial. Given that hierarchies are a natural part of any organization, it’s essential to make every employee feel appreciated and significant, regardless of their position. The confidence that their opinions will be heard and considered is essential for employees.
Employees won’t feel micromanaged if they are trusted to do their jobs well and given the freedom to do so, and productivity will rapidly increase throughout the company. Consider this: if you are left to your own devices, creativity will flow naturally, and you will be more likely to develop creative business ideas.
However, it goes beyond individual effort. You will receive a pool of ideas that are much stronger if employees trust one another and are ready to work together than if they feel ignored or irrelevant.
Related: 8 steps to choosing an employee engagement software
Strive for holistic workplace development
One of the biggest errors any company can make is to have a myopic perspective on development. If you only look at employee engagement from one angle, you’ll rapidly miss out on crucial information.
You need to pay attention to both the big image and the smaller details when trying to increase employee engagement. This could imply:
- Focusing on details like cold brew machines and snack bars; paying attention to organizational-level features like anti-discrimination laws and workplace security.
- Addressing both the minor and major aspects of employment is imperative because employees place a high value on feeling as though their requirements are being met.
Honor Outstanding Achievement
Everyone enjoys being recognized for the job they do. Without appropriate acknowledgment, it might seem as though your efforts are in vain.
You must demonstrate to your staff that their efforts and contributions are valued if you want to develop genuinely engaged workers. Excellence must be commended where it is due, and in some cases, the work must even be paid for.
This does not imply that you should always reward employees for their hard work, as this is not a long-term answer. Sometimes it suffices to merely acknowledge their efforts in passing in front of the team or even to make an effort to personally do so.
To increase staff engagement through performance recognition, middle management must be made aware of this. The value of acknowledgment will be better applied throughout the company if managers and supervisors are aware of it.
To promote accountability
For successful and effective company operations, teamwork is essential. When it comes to performing their jobs, employees depend on one another for assistance and support. Even though it may seem unbelievable, many motivated workers frequently volunteer to take on additional tasks. However, this can have a detrimental effect on workplace team dynamics.
Seeing someone go above and beyond can give other workers the impression that they can slow down because so much of the work is already being done by someone else. But the reality is that even motivated workers have their limits. They simply can’t be expected to consistently go above and beyond what is required because that wouldn’t be viable.
To address this, there must be balance within team dynamics, and everyone has to be accountable for their roles. Nevertheless, as you encourage employee engagement, you’ll also see improved teamwork, workplace dynamics, and employee productivity.
Related: Employee engagement: Ultimate guide 2023
Provide Learning Opportunities
Work experience is important, that’s for sure. But you should also invest time and effort in upskilling your workforce. Offering learning opportunities to your employees signals that you are committed to honing their talents and skills, which in turn will boost morale and motivation.
Related: Benefits of Learning and Development
Learning opportunities can come in the form of:
- Educational stipends;
- Paid study leaves;
- Regular workshops;
- Peer-to-peer programs.