It's fantastic when companies strive to improve employee engagement, and even better when they measure it. Measurement is the initial step companies must take before they can implement actions to enhance engagement. However, measuring the wrong things in the wrong way can render those actions ineffective, and they won't have a measurable impact on business outcomes or the bottom line.
The narrow focus utilized in tools like employer net promoter score (eNPS) fails to provide a comprehensive view of the state of your workforce or highlight opportunities to potentially enhance business outcomes.
Concentrating on employee engagement can fortify companies, enabling them to withstand, and possibly even thrive in, challenging economic circumstances.
How to Build Engagement
As Cy Wakeman aptly stated, engagement is tied to accountability. Here's why: Engagement comes from being challenged to push oneself and succeeding. To foster this sense of engagement, managers must set high bars and provide the needed tools and knowledge for success.
Job Fit: Ensuring job-person fit is critical for engagement. Administer behavioral and cognitive assessments to ascertain if a candidate is suitable for the role. Offer meaningful, achievable work and recognize success to foster higher engagement levels.
Manager Alignment: The manager-employee relationship is a vital factor in employee engagement. Provide managers with tools and training to understand, support, and challenge each of their employees.
Team Dynamics: Foster relationships by understanding one another's drives, needs, and communication styles. Build diverse teams to benefit from various skills and experiences.
Culture Alignment: Build a harmonious culture by doing frequent employee engagement surveys and paying attention to feedback, especially from high performers. Establish and live your values and align your people around them.
Remember, engagement efforts must be continuous. Keep finding new ways to challenge and support personal and professional growth. Measure engagement through regular surveys, 1:1 conversations, performance reviews, and employee NPS surveys.
Predicting Key Performance Outcomes
By conducting this research consistently over time, the connection between employee engagement and key performance outcomes, such as customer loyalty, profitability, productivity, turnover, safety incidents, and more, becomes clear.
The benefits of employee engagement were made evident when researchers found substantial differences in business outcomes between top- and bottom-quartile business units, such as:
81% in absenteeism
58% in patient safety incidents
43% in turnover for low-turnover organizations
28% in shrinkage (theft)
64% in safety incidents (accidents)
41% in quality (defects)
18% in productivity (sales)
23% in profitability
These performance differences are crucial, particularly during disruption. The ability to positively affect employee engagement and well-being to drive growth and productivity is of vital importance.
Increased Engagement Leads to Higher Earnings Per Share
Research has shown that companies with engaged workforces have higher earnings per share and seem to recover from economic downturns more rapidly. Having an engaged workforce became a strong differentiator in regaining and growing earnings per share faster than industry counterparts.
Measuring What Matters
"Without a standard, there is no logical basis for making a decision or taking action," observed Joseph Juran, the management expert. By working to measure and manage employee engagement, companies can gain a competitive edge that propels them forward, even in tough economic times.
By concentrating on employee engagement, businesses can withstand—and possibly even thrive—in adverse economic conditions. They're investing not just in numbers but in people, and that is what makes the real difference. Engaged employees think about the whole company and how they fit into it, leading to better decisions.
At Straightline Consulting Group, we believe that understanding how people are wired for work is a competitive advantage. Our approach to engagement encompasses everything mentioned above, reflecting our comprehensive understanding of how engagement ties into the broader business strategy. If you're a business owner, CEO, Senior Executive, or HR Manager facing challenges in attracting, hiring, and retaining employees, we're here to assist you with solutions tailored to your unique needs.
