Defining Practical Employee Engagement

The term Employee Engagement has been prolific over the past few years but what does it really mean? How can we use this to really make a difference?

This question was asked of me by a writer I have been in discussions with for some time, and she was surprised that we do not have the definition clear on this site. Well it was buried, but here puts it into context.

There are several definitions on the web including:

The Work Foundation’s definition:

Employee engagement describes employees’ emotional and intellectual commitment to their organisation and its success. Engaged employees experience a compelling purpose and meaning in their work and give of their discrete effort to advance the organisation’s objectives.

The Best Companies’ definition:

Engagement can be defined as an employee’s drive to use all their ingenuity and resources for the benefit of the company.

Kahn (1990:694)

defines employee engagement as “the harnessing of organization members’ selves to their work roles; in engagement, people employ and express themselves physically, cognitively, and emotionally during role performances”.

Indeed there are many academic attempts to define engagement, the Gallup approach was different in that its research started with identifying high performing/ productive departments in organisations and looked at the management and culture provided for people working there. The result was call “engagement as people were more productive than other departments/ functions.

For the team at RapidBI, we are not “academics” but pragmatists, when working with a range of “ordinary” businesses and organizations and in developing the EESS we wanted to look at employees from a practical standpoint.

Our practical definition of employee engagement

Engaged employee – an active “gear” in the organization that does more than just turn, they add humanity and value to all they connect with.

Our initial definition, a working definition of employee engagement, and one that continues includes:

Engaged employee – An engaged employee is actively or fully engaged or occupied with their work, that like gears or cogs, they know their role and the impact it has on the people around them, and much like marriage between two people, an engaged employee “does that little bit more” because they are committed to the team and the idea in which they are delivering. We use the term “gear” rather then “cog” as a cog implied static rotation, where as a gear can be step “upped” or “downed”, to react to the situation or needs.

A mechanical business is one where “people” deliver the policy and procedure, however a business that people “want to do business with” is one where the customer can see the humans, and can relate. We all remember that train journey when the driver uses the PA to pass comment in a human, spontaneous way, or the humorous discussion with the fast food server. Often it is the engaged employee (knows their role, how they fit but adds their unique value) that really makes the difference.

Many organizations wrongly use the term “Employee Engagement” to describe ‘engaging with’ employees, they are missing the point of adding to both the customers and individuals experience. Human Resources (HR) needs to wake up to the fact that job satisfaction and happiness are not synonymous with employee engagement. Many HR writers (journalists or academics) not practitioners often cause Confusion by using the term interchangeably for other constructs, such as employee commitment, job satisfaction, employee happiness or internal communication.

Fad Surfing

When a term seems to be “trendy” or “trending”, many seek to re-brand what they are doing, without actually changing what they do!

Any survey used as part of developing and encouraging employee engagement needs to be based on actionable statements or questions, asking closed or emotional based questions captures data but provides no basis for action beyond having the data collected.

 

For more information see our EESS an affordable, practical survey tool to help kick start your employee engagement culture

 

10 top tips for guaranteed employee engagement

Essential activities to ensure your people are engaged

Talent management  and engagement are current buzz phrases and in this context employee engagement seems to be climbing up the agenda again.

The environment in which we operate is changing at so many levels at a political, environmental, social, technological, economic and legal. These changes mean we need to find ways of both changing and yet providing some level of stability or consistency.

Recently, several requests have been made on social networking sites asking for tips to increase employee engagement. I have contributed to these and thought that this list worth sharing with readers of this site and blog. I would love to hear your thoughts on this.

Here are my top 10 activities for developing and sustaining some level of employee engagement:

1. Communicate WITH people
2. Tell your people what the vision is
3. Tell your people what their roles is
4. Tell your people how you are doing (good & bad)
5. Tell your people when you catch them doing the right thing
6. Tell you people when they do things right
7. Ensure your people who is responsible for what (delegation)
8. Tell your people you will back them up & help them develop (grow)& learn
9. Tell your people the customer is critical
10. Show your people you care about them as a human being

and by “tell” I mean by voice not e-message! Make sure the fully understand – i.e. check their understanding – communication is a 2 way process. Do they know what “success” looks, feels and sounds like?

Bonus tips:

11) Communicate..communicate..communicate..
12) Catch people doing a good job & praise them

Its not about doing these things once and ticking a box…. its about repetition, repetition, repetition and consistency.

Simples

Is Employee Engagement Rocket Science?

For me employee engagement is not rocket science – its psychology. We are human beings and as a human we have several basic needs. Maslow has given us a basic tool to use, and that is great, but as an employee, many are through most of the pyramid, assuming work is reasonably stable, so we need to look deeper.

Dr Yasmin Davidd has an interesting approach to this

He suggests six human needs:

1. Love & connection
2. Certainty
3. Uncertainty
4. Significance
5. Contribute
6. Growth

While some may not buy in to the model, we need to realise that as our society becomes increasingly fragmented, work as a structure and psychological ”crutch” and system is increasingly important. If we want to attract the talent we need, and more importantly retain that talent, we need to ensure that we do what is necessary to meet peoples basic needs.

People need to feel that they “belong” and are “loved” in the workplace. We need to feel that we are part of the workplace tribe.

They need to feel and believe that they know what is expected of them on a day to day basis. Some welcome the challenge of problem solving and uncertainty.

We all need to believe that the role we play is significant. The tale of when in the US the Kennedy administration first committed to putting a man on the moon, there were rumours that some at NASA weren’t dedicated to that vision. President Kennedy needed to beat the Russians, which required everyone at NASA be totally committed to that goal. He visited NASA to ensure that the goal was clear and understood by everybody. Upon entering one of the buildings, he met a janitor and asked, “How are you?”, The janitor replied, “I’m doing great. I’m putting a man on the moon.”  This janitor didn’t see himself as just someone sweeping floors, but as someone who was involved in the vision laid out by President Kennedy. Looking at the Kennedy speech from 1961 when he proposed the lunar mission. He said, “In a very real sense, it will not be one man going to the moon … it will be an entire nation. For all of us must work to put him there.” This clearly showed that everyone had their part to play.

Now was this story true? Does it matter, As long as every individual understand their contribution.

When people have contributed – then they need growth. Some only a little, others a lot.

What do you think are key ingredients for engagement?

 

See our other posts on Employee Engagement:

http://rapidbi.com/management/employee-engagement-morale-boosters-ideas-tips/

http://rapidbi.com/management/10-tips-for-engaging-employees-on-networks/

 

 

…. its often the little things that count… thanks for reading and hope to see you again soon

 

 

Social Media, Talent Management & Communications #cipd11

Social Media – the power of communications using internal & external talent

Social business is born and its all change for Human Resources, marketing, communication, engagement,talent management…

At one level or another we have all been impacted by some form of social media, LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Forums, Blogs, Yammer, Sametime, MSN etc. Over the last few months we have seen the Arab Spring, and many other changes to the society in which we live. On a day to day basis it is not obvious that things are changing… but stop and think for a moment. Two years ago we would not have seen the little “f” or “t” icon that is now on almost every TV show, billboard and magazine advert. Many of us are addicted** to our smart phones, updating our networks and reading the “recommendations” and testimonials people we are connected to are constantly giving.

How have things changed?

Go back 5+ years and people were being told to put testimonials like the one below on our websites and marketing materials:

”…Best training course I have ever attended. In fact I did not ‘attend’ I was fully participating and contributing. Mike was inspirational and at the same time challenging”

But now a testimonial is different and looks more like:

 

 

Not only is it instant, it’s public. This feedback can be both positive and negative. Equally if people think you are wrong, they will tell you:

 

This has the advantage in being “real time” and “honest” as we can easily trace the person that provided the feedback. We can also use potentially negative feedback to show we are listening and have reacted. Remember M&S built a reputation of excelence customer care by putting the returns desk at the front of their stores, (its now at the back!).

A case in point

Early on at the recent CIPD annual conference in Manchester UK this week, I was aware that unlike last year where there were between four and five attendees tweeting on a regular basis, this year there were more than thirty eight conference delegates doing so on a regular basis. A little homework shows some startling facts.

Have a look at the top 30 contributors to this particular twitter stream (#cipd11):

Impressions Contributed by 523 Twitterers

Twitter name	No. of impressions
RapidBI	2,473,237
CIPD	1,175,146
hrmagazine	207,910
PeopleMgt	182,836
joningham	160,767
CIPD_Events	119,249
williamtincup	70,689
MervynDinnen	39,964
lruettimann	38,377
koganpage	34,222
Academyofrock	26,625
TimDouglasHR	24,361
dougshaw1	23,153
mwbuckingham	18,944
grahamsalisbury	16,742
JobsiteUK	16,451
MJCarty	16,136
neilmorrison	15,488
HRConnector	15,264
DPGplc	12,678
HRSolutionsUK	12,393
sczepanski	10,961
robjones_tring	10,556
charlie_elise	10,478
warwickuni	10,447
N_Thomson	10,026
signalbc	9,840
davidpaulwoods	9,522
HR_Exchange	9,436
Timothy_Hughes	8,710
garelaos	8,465

** source tweetreach.com for the tag #cipd11 on 11/11/11

Between the 500+ people that got involved this resulted in an Exposure of 5,193,637 Impressions. Not bad for a conference that had an attendance of around 1300!

From the graphs we can see that over 160,000 people say one tweet or message about the event, with more than 80,000 seeing seven or more messages. We can also see that while there were over 700 messages sent out from attendees, over 500 of those were re-sent by readers – recommendations if you like.

This type of circulation is significant, and much more than would be expected through conventional Business-to-Business (B2B) print channels. This particular event was “experienced” by over 300,000 unique individuals. That is a marketing reach not to be ignored.

If you as a business are not into social media, then I hope the evidence above shows that it’s either your messages or your competitors’ messages that will get to customers. Who’s material do you want them reading about?

It also shows that as well as growing your network, a strategic alliance with other people that have networks that cross over your market space can be highly valuable.

Internal communications & engagement too

This is not just about marketing, or customer engagement. Internally if social media communication tools were to be used, just imagine the impact that could be achieved amongst your people. Employee engagement can be harnessed to share information and learning across organizations with complex structures and multiple sites/ countries/ time zones.

If the current generation of professionals do not learn how to use these tools quickly there is one thing for sure… the undergrads of today are ready, competent and looking for the opportunity. Please do not get me wrong, I’m not saying go and hire these people. Quite the opposite, learn to use the skills and techniques before the current batch of undergrads takes your job. And to prove the point, if you look at the top 10 of the list above, there was only one person under the age of 30 contributing to one of the corporate accounts, and her personal profile while on the list was down in the late 20s! This is a skills and attitude thing – not an age thing.

Trust your staff

Throughout this conference (CIPD11) and many other conferences before it, there has been an increasing trend to block social media. Many claim it is a main cause of poor productivity, and “brand risk”. Well they said the same about the telephone in the 1980s, they said email would be a distraction (sending personal messages and potentially subversive) in the “naughties”. Both of which have proven in the main to be untrue. Social media if not already mainstream business tool in your organization soon will be. The future is employee and customer engagement – social media is one central and core tool set and strategy.

Remember that some of the key talent that can help you deliver your business goals may well sit outside the organization, they may be a supplier, a customer, a service user… its not JUST about employees.

Social media addiction**

I do believe that for the more habitual posters in the web 2.0 space, there is a form of addiction. A compulsion if you like. The reality is like most addictions you cannot stop it by saying “stop”. So if you say do not Facebook, they will but much more carefully. This could be a lost opportunity. Why not harness your people’s love for social media and their passion for your business?

Social media is changing, in the context these tools are starting a revolution in the way we communicate and collaborate. They are becoming tools of the “social business”.

Footnote – The reach of RapidBI would have been higher, as an experiment I sent NO tweets using the tag for more than half of day 2! I will start my medication soon..

Employee Engagement & Talent Management #cipd11

Engagement – heads they win, tails you lose

Who are “THEY”?

Why your competitors of course.

This article contains some of my thoughts and reflections from Day 2 of the annual CIPD conference in Manchester UK.

The recurring theme and thought at this years CIPD annual conference for HR professionals has been engagement. Some speakers have spoken about the value engagement provides to the level of customer engagement and retention, others about productivity, but the overriding factor has been that engaged staff reduce costs, reduce absence, increase sales and deliver customer fans.

So why do HR and business leaders not trust our staff to represent our brands to existing and potential customers and long term customer fans?

This manifests its self in a number of ways:

1) The way we empower and enable our staff to solve customer questions at one point

2) The way we show our distrust by not allowing staff to use social media.

While waiting for a potential client I overheard a member of staff of a well known professional body say to a delegate “sorry I’m not important enough to have a business card. Now think about how valued that person would feel and how they would represent the brand if they had £10 worth of business cards. It’s also a great way to show staff you trust them.

A few weeks ago I was involved in an accreditation meeting and the accreditation representative said the reason they were not issued business cards was for tax reasons…. Utter bull!

This simple act of ensuring that EVERYONE in your business has individual business cards sends many messages – to managers, staff and customers. Give personal cards even if the employee is unlikely to be customer facing. O2 go one further and have a text number staff can call to help give advice if they are approached by a customer, where ever they are in the world. It’s the little things.

Much like the prohibition in the US tried to stop the consumption of alcohol, when we (try to) stop people from using social media, all we do in fact is drive it underground. On the surface all is quiet, but duck under and all is alive frantic and well. Worse, if people cannot be proud of the organisation for which they work they cannot be advocates or help to grow the fan base.

It’s all about the small things. We need to show that we trust our people and that (one the whole) they will do the right things. Sure they will make mistakes, but they will learn from them if we provide positive and supportive feedback.

Most of our people are honest at heart and their only intension is to support our customers and the business.. Our role as managers is to trust, support and give them the tools to excel, not to be mediocre.

If your organisation has 1000 employees then typically 5-8 people will be involved in sales & marketing. Imagine the power and growth potential if every one of those 1000 were taking a proactive marketing or sales role? Even if only 20% did, that’s double your sales & marketing team for no cost!

Engagement needs to be more than initiative; it’s an attitude from managers, which create an attitude and set of behaviours in staff. There is no magic process or set of tools, sure regular surveys can help measure, but that is only the very beginning of the journey and not the end by anyone’s stretch of their imagination

HR It’s all about the business customers #cipd11

HR It’s all about the business customers

An interesting first day at #CIPD11 yesterday.

Through a diverse range of sessions:

• Leadership, People Management & Growth – Sir Terry Leahy (ex tesco)
• Building Organisational Culture – William Rogers, CEO UKRD
• Managing Change Successfully – Natalie Woodford, GSK
• Challenging Traditional Management Thinking – John Seddon, Vangard
• Turning Customers into Fans – Nicky Brimmer, O2 Telefonica UK

Over the next few days I am sure that each of these sessions will deserve their own blog entry, however when reflecting on the day as a whole there was some interesting consistent messages from the majority of the speakers. Now why this is to be expected, what could not have been expected was the nature of the consistency.

Terry Leahy set the scene in his session where he reminded the audience that while as a CEO he spend 40% of his time in retail outlets. Not tied to the board room. For him the best way to lead and grow his business was to get close to the customers, and make it easier for staff to be seen to react to the immediate needs of customers. This in turn increases employee engagement.

For William Rogers his focus was on values. Real values that would add competitive advantage and enable employees to engage and feel part of the business. Hr observed that at the end of the working day the majority of the assets that deliver profitability leave the building at the end of each day.

GSK took a different route to “understanding the customer”. Managers and leaders on key development programmes were sent to work in third world countries to understand the person that received the medication they produce. Helping manager to realise that in this part of the world patients do not buy packets of tablets, but one at a time when they can afford it. This simple act of understanding the needs of users have enabled managers to understand the needs of these emerging markets. The impact on staff has been palpable.

O2 realised through data analysis and employee feedback that what customers wanted was easy access to solutions for problems they experienced. Staff felt uncomfortable when they could not help, and this was impacting employee engagement. By listening to staff, putting systems, training and the culture in place to enable staff to help customers has had a double success. By enabling employees to support customers this has created customers and staff that are “fans” of the brand and the way it does things. This develops both staff and customer retention.

John Seddon took a more challenging approach claiming that if you aim the “cut costs” you actually increase costs. Using examples of call centre, Seddon showed that having KPI’s can infact reduce customer satisfaction and increase staff turnover and reduce engagement. By dropping KPI type measures and focusing on enabling to help the employee to meet the needs of the customer may drive call times up, but in the medium term actually reduces costs, increases customer retention and improves employee engagement. He was scathing of process approaches like LEAN, saying to focus on what counts.

Common Sense

Yes much of what was said was common sense, but what is important is that the majority of these speakers are not HR but operational leaders talking to an HR audience. Of course these things would only be “common sense” if everyone knew and did this stuff… they don’t!

So what gets in the way?

Ego, verticals, and to some extent our total preoccupation with measuring, often measuring what we can and not what we should.

What is the obvious thing you do in your organisation that you wish others would do?

Talent Management – how to shoot yourself in the foot in the future!

Talent Management – Easy today… pain tomorrow

Most of us agree that the success of any organization is down to the quality of its people. So why do we fail to realise that talent management is not just about the “top 50” people, but those with the potential to be in the top 50 at some point in the future, as well as talent that will enable our organization to be competitive in a sustainable way. Talent is NOT just about tomorrow’s leaders, it is about next week’s skills and next months leaders.

This was brought home to me recently by the experiences of my 19 year old daughter. She is currently at home over the summer during the summer break from University. In April she applied and was offered a summer job at a major leisure provider, her experiences have already brought her to realise that she will never want to work with the group again, and worse – she is telling all her friends (but NOT on social media – she is not stupid!)

Background

Just to give you some idea of the person and their experience puts some of what I will describe into context:

• Academic achievements – A Levels with grades A* and A’s, achieving 2:1 in a first year joint Hons course at a redbrick uni – so bright not stupid
• Work experience – 3 years working at a high street jeweller regularly achieving top sales in the store – business savvy
• Charity work – experience with children in the UK, co-ordinated youth activities, overseas orphanage work – can build relationships

This is an individual that cares about people, quality and customer experience. She builds trusting relationships with people at all levels very quickly so can communicate equally well with the company director, army captain, manager, disabled adult, very young children or people standing at the bus stop.

The role at the leisure company – a cleaner, mainly outdoor work. This is Seasonal work, and the hours are flexible on both sides. Not the best of pay, but not minimum wage either. Many of the people working at roles here are 16-23 year old students, for most it is their first taste of work.

How to create Employee dis-engagement

Here are just some of the things that have happened which have given her, me and the people she knows an insight into this particular organization and its culture… in no particular order:

• No training on use of cleaning chemicals (for people with no work experience)
• No training on how to manage sharps or glass
• No training on manual handling even though this is a key part of the task
• Poor elearning which was a “test” not learning on procedures & policy
• Issued with work-wear 2 sizes too large – poor fit means the image being projected to the customers is wanting
• “Wet weather gear” that is not waterproof by any definition – causing people to get very wet & cold and having to take time off as a result
• Wet weather gear given to staff that work inside (and don’t need it) – leaving those that work outside with jackets 3 sizes too large! – demoralising & embarrassing
• 16 year olds working 12 hour days – illegal!
• 16 year olds working 7+ days consecutively – illegal!
• Provided with a rota which would have meant 10+ days without a day off – where was the common sense?
• Not given a radio/ communications tool & then team leaders complain when they cannot find her(it’s a large site) – not to mention lone worker regulations
• Team leaders that have had no management training & lead by ego – poor productivity & employee engagement
• Team leaders allowing some workers to “pick & chose” their work activities, while “dumping” on those willing to work
• Managers & team leaders go home before telling all staff they can “stand down” leaving staff wondering what to do!
• Being part of a team of just 20-30 people and the department manager has never spoken to some of them. Seen them working but never approached and said “hello”
• A manager saying I’ll call you on return from holiday and tell you what shifts you are on – they don’t call – & when you phone they are not available – then when you do start work the same manager asks ”where have you been” forgetting that they were responsible for the individuals work schedule!
• A manager asks “why aren’t you coming to the staff event tonight” and is surprised when the reply is – “I have not had an invite or been given the information, I did not know one was happening” – this event is supposed to engage & motivate staff!
• A six week probation review that happens after 12 weeks – the outcome of this entitles the employee to “contractual perks” – now almost too late for the employee to use this!
• Given an average score in appraisal when the main comment given as to why it was not “above average” was she “needs to delegate more” – SHE IS A CLEANER! Who does she delegate to customers? This she found particularly demotivating

I could go on – but you get the picture and this is enough to get a discussion going…

The only reason she has not left by the way… not because she needs the money, but she does not want to say at some point in the future at interview – reason for leaving – I quit due to a bad company & poor management. She does not see herself as a quitter. The ironic thing was she had an interest in joining the sector post graduation. That thought has now gone!

What is the cost to our businesses long term survival if we promote people to team leader or manager post without them having the right aptitude for the role, and certainly without training and appropriate support/ coaching.

The experience of this individual will stay with her for her life time. As students we all took work that was not particularly engaging, however it was work. Here is a person not complaining about the work, but more at the way the site and she is managed, and more importantly (her words) the lack of commitment to the people that make the experience what it is for their customers. This type of business relies on repeat business. If the owners and shareholders knew of then I am sure they would not be impressed.

• Where is HR in ensuring that people in roles have the right skills?
• Where are the management ensuring that health & safety is at least meeting legal requirements?
• Where are the stakeholders seeing the brand undermined?

Anyone want to hire a 19 year old management consultant? – reasonable day rate

If a 19 year old can see where quality can be improved, customer experience improved, costs reduced and employees engaged for no outlay, what does that say about the level of managers they have employed on a permanent basis?

Of course this would never happen in your organization would it?

Top Tips to Manage and Coach a “Micro-Manager”

Tips to Manage and Coach a “Micro-Manager”

Have you ever had one of those managers that need to see every little step, make sure you are doing the task “their way”?

Frustrating isn’t it?

This is worse for the organization as why have both of you employed if you are both in effect doing the same job. Micromanagement is usually used in a negative connotation and definitely points towards excessive control or close attention to finer details. A micromanager is created when a person is promoted to the managerial level when he/she is either not ready for the promotion or is interested to rather ‘do the job’ than ‘manage’. They believe in monitoring each and every part of the business process rather than offering general instructions. They prefer to sabotage delegation of decisions which proves to be a negative aspect for the subordinates, manager and the organization.

However, if you are stuck with a micromanager, there is no way out other than coping with this irritating behavior. But, if you are able to handle this person wisely, then there is no doubt that you can comfortably work without being interrupted at your work at all times. It is important that you handle your micro-manager tactfully otherwise it will be difficult for you to showcase your talent and hard work. There are no hard and fast rules for dealing with your micro-manager but the below tips (in no particular order) will help you to handle micromanagement in the right way.

Top Tips for dealing with micro managers

1. Reward good behavior – If and all they let you to be yourself and trust your decisions, then thank them for allowing you to take the lead
2. Ask for input – Micromanagers always feel to be shown their importance and hence it is important that you ask for input at all times. Make sure that you ask for their opinion and suggestions on all matters so that they do not feel that they are left out. Give them your opinion too on the matter and let them still feel ownership of the project which is important for a healthy co-existence
3. Plan & keep track of all your work so that you can give an update to your micromanager at any point of time
4. In the event of things getting out of hand, a one-on-one conversation will do both of you good
5. Decide which battles you have to fight – A micromanager is quite an irritating person and thus he may pick battles on every issue. You need to be calm on this aspect and never even try to match him. But, it is important that you pick your own battles which you feel are important to you
6. Be defensive on deadlines – A micromanager is quite confused in his own approach and he loves to impose and also twists the deadlines. When offered a task, study its intricacies carefully and offer a convenient timeline before the micromanager can interrupt the same. Also, indicate that if he wants to offer little time, then it might heavily show on the quality of the work
7. If you feel that the situation is starting to get out of control, then take the help of your HR and discuss the situation with them
8. Unravel your micro-manager’s agenda – It is important to understand your micromanager’s agenda. This will help you to follow him in the right path and the important thing is to be in the same path as your micromanager. If you try to pull yourself in a different path, the rate of friction will definitely affect your relationship and will also prove as a major barrier in your work
9. Initiate to offer information to your micro-manager – A micro-manager cannot wait for the information to be offered to him. Don’t keep him waiting and provide information to him ahead of time. Be confident and comfortable and approach him so that you are not let down.
10. Communicate effectively – It is important that you practice the art of effective communication. The micromanager is always scared about inertia and the perfect way to deal with such a person is to always communicate ahead of time. You need to make this person realize that you are working by prioritizing your work and thus while communicating with your micromanager keep in mind to effectively make use of awareness, reassurance and time-lines
11. Make sure that you keep clear-cut expectations –Micromanagers have the tendency to change their expectations and convert them to high-level targets. Make sure that you clarify your conversations at every point of time and that the trail of e-mails should be in accordance with your conversations
12. Renegotiate priorities – The micromanager is quite smart to pile on changing priorities on your shoulders. You should adopt a straight-forward and simple approach such as a numerical or color-coded system so that the ever-shifting priorities could be renegotiated.
13. Play by the rules – It is not very easy to deal with your micromanager and thus avoid being his easy target and make sure that you always follow the rules such as policies on time and technology as maintained by your organization
14. Learn from the ‘best practices’ of others – Learning is a part of coping in your career line and watching your micromanager will help you to learn the secrets of success
15. Listen carefully – A micromanager needs to be felt at all times that he is being listened to carefully. Also, listening carefully will allow you to remove any room for misunderstandings. Whatever instructions you receive, make sure that you repeat it back in a concise manner so that all misunderstandings are removed in this fashion
16. Offer feedback – If you feel your micromanager is open to listening and discussing, and then you can offer your feedback by pointing to specific examples so that he understands what you are pointing at
17. Turn it to them – Offering feedback is not the only solution. You need to make them comfortable and ask them how you can do things better and also communicate to them in a better fashion. Asking them for their opinion will help you to be on the right path and will allow you to carry on with your work in a faster manner
18. Learn their tendencies – There are certain things which may easily bother them and if you see a pattern in this, you can avoid creating such situations and offer advance information, input or can ask for feedback prior to starting with the work which will help them also to admire your way of work
19. Try to stay emotionally neutral in all the discussions with your micromanager
20. Ask permission from your micromanager to be frank as most of these managers are not mature enough to have direct conversation
21. Aim at one behavior at a time and do not bring up all the problems at a single conversation

You are not alone

Look around for the micromanager’s behavior and you will be relieved to find that you are not the only victim which actually offers you some consolation as your micromanager might be picking at you at all times.

Do not consider the answer of this solution as an attempt to fix your micromanager.

Micromanagement is a very difficult situation at any workplace and it can even lead to reduction in employee engagement, production and a disinterest towards your profession. It is important that this aspect is handled in an extremely delicate manner so that you can continue to have cordial relationship with your micromanager.

Another Reason to Hate Micromanagers

Since publishing this piece I have come across an interesting piece of research on the performance issues about being micromanaged. In a recent bnet.com article they referr to some research that took place in cassinos, looking at the impact of mictomanagement on performance. The three professors from Harvard Business School and Rice University analyzed data from six MGM-Mirage Group hotel/casino properties. the findings back what most of us have believed for a long time:

• Workers perform just fine when managers don’t keep close tabs on them.
• Workers are more likely to be fearful of experimenting when their managers micromanage; as a result, the employees learn less and performance suffers.

“Employees in tightly monitored business units face strong implicit incentives to experiment less…and have fewer opportunities to learn,” write Dennis Campbell, of Harvard Business School, Marc Epstein, of Rice University, and Asis Martinez-Jerez, also of Harvard.

Read the full article at Bnet

Readd the origional report from Harvard

10 Employee Engagement Survey Mistakes

Why Employee Engagement Surveys often fail

Employee engagement is one of those “holy grails” that many HR, OD and management professionals seek to achieve for their organizations. Today I was reading an interesting blog by US firm Performancepoint LLC.

In the article they list 10 comon mistakes:

1. Conducting an in-house survey
2. Putting the onus on managers
3. Questions that spread discontent
4. Findings that aren’t actionable
5. Using the goals of others
6. No follow-up on findings
7. Hosting just one event
8. Skirting transparency
9. Looking for the quick fix
10. Not training managers in wider EE issues & tools

Now I am not convinced that all of these are in themselves mistakes – sure they are all areas where things can go wrong.. but mistakes?

Take the first one – “Conducting an in-house employee engagement survey” – is this wrong…no! but when it is done this way care must be taken to ensure that all responses are seen as anonymous and that individuals feel free to give honest feedback.

Number 2 – “Putting the onus on managers” – sure any survey needs the commitment of managers, but not for the survey to be reliant on line managers – they have an operational job to do which should be a high priority.

What we know from our Employee Engagement & Satisfaction Survey tool, its development and deployment is that it is not about the survey – but the whole process from end to end… to end. It must be an on going process not a one off project. Indeed the very best organizations have employee engagement surveys, there review and actions as a part of “the way we do things here”.

 

Employee Engagement is not, and can never be a “tick box” system or solution. It is about engaging with and through the people we use to deliver and facilitate the product of our organizations.

10 No or Low Cost Employee Morale Boosters

Simple Management Steps

In difficult times all managers are challenged with keeping staff engaged and morale high (or even up!). “Boosters” are activities that can have short term but duplicable results in lifting morale in individuals and teams. Morale boosters can take the form of recognition, compensation or special perks or privileges.
Here are 10 no or low cost morale boosters to get you started:

 

1. Ideas – Employee morale often improves when staff feel they are valued and listened to. Implement their ideas where practical and tell people who’s idea it was
2. Listen to your people – Provide regular open forums to allow employees to express their concerns and feelings can be an easy means to boost morale (company or team level)
3. Public recognition - Put a large score board in the workplace to show top performers and to motivate those towards the bottom of the list
4. Focus & clear goals - clarity and checking understanding of expectations on a regular basis. Firms with a lack of focus can confuse employees and this often leads to reduced morale
5. Show charity – Encourage your employees to get involved in a local cause to help them see there is more to life than work
6. Thank you notes – Send a special thank you letter to your employees’s family or spouse, praising their (specific) good work and efforts
7. Have fun – Special events and outside work activities can take the pressure off the day-to-day grind in the workplace
8. Add playfulness – Use low cost items such as a football table in rest rooms/ staff lounges
9. Measure it –  Keep tabs on the levels of engagement and satisfaction in your business by regularly measuring employee satisfaction
10. Fire people - Sometimes the root cause of low morale can be an employee whose negativity brings down the group. Even a high performer can bring down employees behind your back

When it comes to employee morale and motivation there are 3 important factors we need to remember:

1. People are different
2. People are different
3. People are different

What motivates one will not necessarily motivate another – as managers we need to know our people and work with them appropriately.

The success of any organisation or business resides in the attitudes, productivity and output of your employees. Those companies who are sensitive to the signs of low morale and who focus on improving morale can minimise the impact of a low morale workplace.

A Guide to Conducting Employee Engagement and Satisfaction Surveys

Employee survey techniques have developed  significantly over the past few years, with web based technologies it is easier and cheaper than ever to collect and manage data.

In the past, any HR driven initiative was seen as tactical and of little real benefit to the organization as a whole. Now many enlightened organizations see HR and employee surveys as a powerful business improvement tool.

Customers now have a greater range of choices than ever and are becoming increasingly better informed . This in turn means that many have very high expectations and, if they feel they are being “short changed” in any way, they take the initiative and switch their allegiance. This reduction in consumer loyalty can create difficulties in retaining existing customers, causing organizations to increase the amount they spend on engaging new customers.

Consumer choice has also brought greater competitiveness to the market and in many situations it is difficult for an organization to differentiate itself from the competition in terms of production range, quality and price. As a result, the main differentiator for organizations has to be the quality of service that the customer receives. This may well result in people buying from you because they engage with specific individuals and the service/ attitude they offer.

When was the last time you went out to a restaurant for a special meal. Regardless of the quality of the food and the price, if the service was poor, you forget how good the food was and you will probably not visit that restaurant again.

Following on this same principle, there is a significant amount of survey demonstrating that employees have the greatest single impact on customer service. In the eyes of the customer, the employee they interact directly with is “the face” of that organization and heavily influences how they feel about the organization.

It is vital for every interaction to be a positive one, not just for the customer, but for the employee as well. If the customer is happy, they spend more money , which naturally improves the organization’s overall business performance. Likewise, higher employee satisfaction levels can come about as customer satisfaction and business performance levels increase because of the pride and kudos that come from working for a successful company.

Research shows that the most successful organizations have satisfied, motivated, flexible, committed and well-trained employees who believe that they are able to personally contribute to the success of the organization, in turn they are more likely to be supportive of the organization’s products, strategy and goals.

The most successful organizations get the most from their employees because they consider them to “their greatest asset” and they are prepared to invest in them in the same way as they invest in technology, product/brand development and customer segmentation.  This means considering employees as a key stakeholder group in the same way as customers, shareholders and other corporate “investments. This leads to a critical need to understand and proactively manage the impact that any  change will have on your employees in order to protect the investment made in them. In many cases your business IS your people.

One approach is to proactively use employee survey to understand what the key motivators and dissatisfiers are for them. The critical link between employee satisfaction and organizational performance has been  clearly established in many independent and academic studies, people practices were found to have a significant impact on improvements not only in employee satisfaction, but also in the organization’s productivity and financial performance.

Different Types of Employee Survey Programmes

Annual climate and employee satisfaction surveys are by far the most popular kind of employee survey activity. However, the following types of survey programs are also gaining in popularity:

• Combining employee and customer satisfaction studies.
• Procedure/policy evaluation.
• Alignment of employees behind new product development.
• Alignment of employees behind organizational rebranding and repositioning efforts.
• Managing employees through organizational change programs (e.g. merger, acquisition/downsizing, etc.).
• Internal customer service evaluations.
• Internal communications evaluations.
• Evaluation and design of different benefits schemes.

Defining Employee Survey Goals and Objectives

Before starting on a staff survey process, it is vital to define a set of objectives for the survey. Without these objectives, the survey program will lack focus and it will be difficult to raise enthusiasm for the survey among your key influencers and decision-makers.

All employee survey programs need to be seen as a company-wide initiative that is driven by managers and employees from across the whole organization and not something that is solely initiated and managed just within HR.

It is therefore vital that any defined objectives for a survey are business related. In this way, improvements resulting from the survey can be seen as improving customer service and overall business performance.

Deciding on the Appropriate Survey Methodology

Defining objectives at the outset will help to determine the methodology because, to meet the desired objectives, you will need to consider the following:

• Are all employees affected and should all employees need to be involved?
• Will changes and improvement action be required at different levels across the organization?
• How will managers and employees be engaged in the improvement process?
• How will awareness of the survey, its  results and improvements be raised and managed among employees?
• How will the progress of improvement actions be reviewed, monitored and communicated over time?

Quantitative and qualitative research methods can both be highly effective in employee surveys. It is essential, though, to ensure that the correct methodology is used for the type of survey being conducted.

Qualitative research is most appropriate when:

• The research involves relatively small groups of people,
• You are looking to pursue a subject in real detail,
• You are looking for the flexibility to move between subjects dependent on how participants respond,
• You are attempting to determine strength of feeling on a certain subject,
• You are trying to understand root causes of a feeling rather than just the symptoms of issues,
• You are trying to seek the connections between issues,
• You are surveying particularly complex issues.

Face-to-face individual interviews and focus groups are the most common forms of qualitative techniques used in employee research.

Quantitative research is most appropriate when:

• Large numbers of people need to be included,
• The survey needs to cover a large number of different subjects,
• It is important to have robust numerical data,
• You need to have measurable comparison data between different groups,
• You want to be able to compare performance against other external organizations,
• You want to identify correlation with other survey data (e.g. customer satisfaction data),

Employee satisfaction surveys are the most common form of quantitative research.

There are occasions when both methodologies can be effectively combined. For example, in an employee satisfaction survey, you may decide to use focus groups before designing the survey in order to determine the survey content and/or pilot questionnaire. Then you may also want to use qualitative research after the survey data has been collected to better understand the meaning behind the quantitative results.

Employee Satisfaction Surveys

It is worthwhile examining employee satisfaction surveys in more detail given that they are the most popular type of employee survey.

Census or Sample

Having defined your survey objectives, the next thing to consider is whether there is a need to survey all employees (“census”) or just a subset of them (“sample”).

Evidence overwhelmingly suggests that a census survey is most appropriate for employee satisfaction surveys. This is mainly due to the need to drive through improvement action planning at local levels which requires frontline managers to be provided with their own reports. By undertaking a sample survey, there may either be not enough responses to provide a report or the number of responses may represent too small a proportion of the whole employee population to be considered statistically robust.

Communication

Employee buy-in is critical to the success of the survey. If they believe that improvements will result from the survey, they are more likely to participate by completing it and will become actively involved in the follow-up improvement action planning process. This is another strong reason for a census approach rather than sample.

Communication is critical to getting this employee buy-in, particularly at the outset of the program and we recommend developing a communications plan that covers the following stages:

• Pre Survey
• During the Survey
• Post Survey
• Between Surveys

When developing the plan, there is a need to consider the different messages that you want to give to the different audiences and what are the most appropriate communication channels for reaching those audiences.

For example, it is important for first line managers and immediate supervisors to be positive role models for the survey so that when they interact with their staff, they demonstrate active encouragement of the survey, a commitment to administer it properly and to act on the results. This is important because employees are usually heavily influenced by their immediate supervisors or line managers. If they do not think that their manager/supervisor believes in the survey, then neither will they. The whole process is then derailed before it starts.

Part 2 continues this article

Team Leader Mentoring (Management Mentoring)

Using Mentoring to Effectively Develop Team Leaders

Team leader and middle management mentoring is rapidly becoming the “must have” in replacing conventional and costly internal training programmes.

With the changing economic climate presenting new challenges every day, many middle managers lack the skills and experience to make informed decisions. Worse – much of the management development over the past 10 years has focused on systems and growth, not survival and sustainability, certainly not problem solving. One solution to this development gap is the use of external experienced managers as mentors to your managers. This is proving to be a cost effective solution for financially astute organisations for manager of all levels and experiences.

The basic principle of management mentoring

These programmes are not optional. Employees (Team leaders, Supervisors and Middle Managers) are advised they will be given a mentor and are obliged to accept. While some will resist, most are happy to embrace the concept and evidence shows that the mentee, the mentee’s immediate superior and the overall company benefit from these programmes. Meetings take place every 2-4 weeks depending on the needs of the organisation.

External mentors visit the company three or four times a month and mentor up to five managers on each visit. It gives the executive an opportunity to discuss issues with an external person and to bounce ideas off someone who has no axe to grind and can give objective advice and guidance.

As well as the fortnightly or monthly one to ones, the mentors are also available to their mentees on the phone and email at other times. This allows the mentee to always be supported.

All meetings are confidential, and apart for confirming attendance, no feedback is given (unless specifically agreed in advanced). This ensures the managers talk openly with the mentor. Any generic or common needs will be highlighted to the sponsoring director or executive, for consideration as an organisational wide development need.

It is important to stress that this is not executive coaching. The staff are mentored by professional mentors who are themselves business people, many of who are non-executive directors as well as specialist consultants. The mentor teams are put together to offer a vast reservoir of knowledge, experience and expertise.

Expertise in management mentoring

For this to work the external mentors need to be experienced and credible. They need to have considerable experience as both line managers and business managers, with proven expertise and competence in mentoring and at least 4 of the following:

• Strategy & business planning
• Finance (operational and strategic)
• Marketing (operational and strategic)
• Operations (operational and strategic)
• HR (operational and strategic)
• IT (operational and strategic)

Knowledge of management mentors

As times and trading conditions change, so does the need of the mentor. Having experience to draw upon, rather than just text books is increasingly important. For many in management positions – especially those that have spent their entire career in public or large corporate positions, they have relied on function to undertake activity. The world is changing, and increasingly organisations require the adaptability of people that have developed and grown small and medium sized organisations – where dealing with diverse issues was order of the day. In other words we need mentors with 20-40 years experience rather than those with 1-10 years. The recent business challenges (loss of jobs, financial constraints etc pose problems to less experienced managers and mentors – but these challenges are not new, and we can learn from the way these situations (or ones like them) were handled in the past.

Recent reports from the CIPD show that experienced managers are losing out in obtaining employment. The irony is that it is often just this experience that organisations need to support their up and coming younger managers. An effective mentor needs to have worked in a diverse range of sectors, in varying roles and had experience of passing or transferring knowledge effectively.

The management mentoring cost from £2000 per person per annum whereas a typical coaching programmes can cost upwards of £5000 per person. Coaching will often lead to identifying additional training needs for an individual, where as mentoring can often provide that training as part of the on going relationship.

Want to learn more?

If you are interested in this cost effective manager development strategy, please contact a member of the RapidBI team for a discussion.

Top management blog posts of 2009

The last 12 months has been a major shift for the team at RapidBI. As a way of looking back here are the most read blog entries in the last 12 months.

What was Hot….?

1. Leadership models
2. Learning Styles – Honey & Mumford Learning Styles Questionnaire (LSQ)
3. PESTLE analysis for schools and education
4. Ansoff matrix – product market grid – Management theory & model
5. Training Needs Analysis TNA
6. Models for use in leadership, change, projects and management
7. Writing a training session or lesson plan – templates
8. 25 great tips on employee engagement – morale boosters
9. Training Needs Analysis Template – TNA sample
10. Sample Key Performance Indicators – KPIs
11. Porters five forces

 

What was not…?

1. Change management – approach and models
2. How to Write a SWOT analysis
3. Stop Start Continue Change – a Management and facilitation Model
4. Who owes what to who…?
5. Organisational Diagnosis and diagnostics
6. 5 common mistakes in SWOT analysis
7. Diagnosing Organisational Culture
8. Managing Change in Organisations
9. Employee Engagement – the solution in difficult times?

Strange as there are some topic overlaps!! I suspect it is because many of these less read posts are in fact early ones, at a time when the blog was not getting the same traffic as it is now.

What will be hot in 2010.. come back in 12 months to find out!

Employees leave their boss not their job!

Are our managers leaking talent, or retaining it?

While responding to a question on a network group I belong to about employee motivation and engagement, I recalled some research about the fact that people left bosses not their jobs.

Then I came across a recently published piece of research carried out by a the Florida State University that clearly suggests employees leave their bosses not their jobs.

Matching employees to managers is an element of recruitment which is rarely done (except at some very senior posts), we seem to focus on job competency, when we all know that it is attitude and behaviour that is the difference that makes the difference. 

The study at Florida conducted by FSU professor Wayne Hochwarter and two doctoral students – Paul Harvey and Jason Stoner – shows that 40% of employees work for bad bosses based on survey results.

• 23% said their supervisor blamed other to cover up personal mistakes or minimise embarrassment
• 24% indicated their boss invaded their privacy
• 27% report their supervisor made negative comments about them to other employees or managers
• 31% said their supervisor gave them the “silent treatment” during the past year
• 37% indicated their supervisor failed to give credit when due
• 39% of workers said their supervisor failed to keep promises

Read the FSU research summary here.

How many good people have you lost through having a poor manager?

While writing this piece, it reminded me of the situation with my wife and here employer, great people, she loves the job, but the manager is proving that she cannot manager and is undermining the business (a small medical practice) with her poor decision making abilities and thinking. Had it not been for a family illness and bereavement she would have changed employers by now.

How much is employee turnover costing you and your business?

1. Total Work force x % of Exempt Employees ___________
2. Multiply answer to #1 x your turnover % ___________
3. Multiply answer to #2 x average salary ___________
4. Add to your final answer some of the potential costs from demographic changes.

Our company turnover cost ___________
Had enough? Maybe it’s time to get serious about reducing turnover in your company!

How many people do you have that at the first opportunity will leave. In HR and management we say our people are our most valuable asset, but do we manage and take care of therm as though they are?

Other research on why people leave:

Harvard Research
An insightful blog article on engagement

Want to take action to prevent this from happening in your firm? have a look at our EESS a cost effective employee survey that you can run yourself – and benchmark progress too!

10 tips for engaging people

Managers engage, so do we as ‘community’ champions

Having a community or network (intranet or social network) is one thing, growing it and building trust is quite another.  Engagement of users, be they employees or customers is vital for the strategy to be sustainable and successful. Remember the 90:9:1 rule, our goal must be to beat this.

As organizations become more geographically diverse, having the ability to share knowledge, communicate and network is a competitive advantage. Using networks, forums and channels effectively as communication strategies can support both internal and external people. Interestingly the same principles apply, however we seem to focus better on customers than we do employees in this matter.

Below are some ideas and tips that I like to follow, to ensure that I have a healthy and growing community. These can be used for networks for customers and employees.

1. Listen – you have to listen to your users and potential users. Don’t ignore the important things your members have to say to you
2. Respond – Ignore users of your service at you peril, especially when they care enough to take the time and energy to tell you what they think
3. Follow up – When an employee asks you a question or leaves a fantastic comment, don’t just leave them hanging. Tell them that you’ll get back to them shortly – and then do. If your members get no response from you or the rest of the community, then why would they come back?
4. Update content – There is nothing worse that your content looking months old and out of date, it makes the community feel abandoned
5. Nurture your champions, advocates and top contributors – An important factor in creating an engaged community is to ensure that you nurture and reward the top contributors on your site or space.
6. Demonstrate action – You should be regularly reporting back to the community with updates on what’s happening, which of their suggestions have been acted on, which ideas are the most popular etc.
7. Be personable – The managers and communicators of any community should be a person first, not a corporate front.
8. Re-engage – It’s very common for members to become busy, forget to visit your community, and become disengaged. Send out a regular newsletter or other appropriate communication (Twitter/ yammer?), you can let people know what’s happening and is a great way to gently remind people that you’re still there
9. Engage other social networking sites & channels – Depending on your member base, it’s likely that they regularly visit sites such as these, and shouldn’t be ignored or expected that people will always remember to come to you
10. Be open and authentic – people understand when they’ve made an unreasonable request, and by openly explaining why you are unable to act on some ideas builds respect and loyalty among your user base.
11. Remember – you are all one community, help people to ‘own’ the platform. If they feel the platform is ‘theirs’ they will commit more time and energy

Ok so I started out by saying there would be 10.. you have an 11th – justa little added value…

Employee Engagement – the solution in difficult times?

Yet another weekend where the news broadcasts and the Sunday papers have been full of the economic doom and gloom. With many of the retail stores starting with 20% & 25% discounts with four weeks before Christmas you know things are changing.

If the key to survival is employee talent, then retention of talent has got to be a prime drive. But security is not the only factor, often when organizations offer redundancy, it is those that are most marketable that jump at the challenge. These people believe in their abilities, and of course one there has been one set of redundancies then the thought of more is always in peoples heads.  How you an an employer treat those that leave provides vital information about how you will treat those that stay.

One way to measure and keep measuring the “temperature” of employee attitudes and engagement is through the many employee satisfaction or engagement surveys available. While designing your own may be cheapest in terms of out going cost – what is the real cost you your organization in time and lost resources. There are many commercial offerings, some turnkey and all done for you, others where the design and reporting are done and you manage the data collection.  There are a bewildering range of employee engagement models available on the market, your role is to find the one which closely matches the cultural and budget needs of your organization.

Whatever model you chose, ensure that:

1. you can afford to use the same method to measure progress in 6,12 or 18 months hence
2. it allows organisation specific questions to be asked
3. that the questions have good face validity
4. that all employees/ staff can answer anonymously
5. that you manage the action plan and feedback to those that participated in a timely way.

Keeping an open mind and regular data capture shows employees that they are important, and that keeping employees engaged in what you do is a distinct competitive advantage.

See how the RapidBI EESS (Employee Engagement and Satisfaction Survey) can help your organization