Employee Engagement
what is it? why do i want it? how do i get it?
What do companies like J.M. Smucker, General Mills, and Marriott Hotels know that seems to elude many of their competitors? What’s one thing that has contributed to each organization’s decades-long record of growth and profitability?
The answer may lie in a paraphrase of an advertising slogan long used by Carnation Milk: “Contented cows give better milk.” Translation: satisfied, engaged employees give better performances, which results in better business outcomes.
Employee Engagement: What is it?
This is engagement
This is not
Seriously, though… here at Contented Cow Partners, we define Employee Engagement as the degree to which you’re into your job.
How connected do you feel to the organization whose name appears on your LinkedIn profile? How much of your career can you see spending there? How much of yourself do you put into your work, because you want to, not because you have to?
The answers to these questions define the term Employee Engagement better than any dictionary-style definition we might offer. More than employee satisfaction, engagement speaks to a deeper emotional bond between the individual, their work, and the organization – a bond that drives individual and group performance, and that has a direct bearing on business results. In fact, our firm’s research since 1995 shows that an intentional strategy of having a focused, engaged, and capably led workforce is one of the best things your organization (or your competitors’) can do for its bottom line.
In our most recent book, Contented Cows Still Give Better Milk, we were able, once again, to put forth a compelling business case for Employee Engagement. In this go-round, a sequel to our 1998 work, Contented Cows Give Better Milk, we compared the financial performance of 12 “Contented Cow” employers (companies with stellar employer reputations and strong strategies around people practices) to the performance of the economy at large. Over a ten-year study period, our corporate exemplars managed to outperform indices of the U.S. economy by a substantial margin and make some serious money for their investors.
This was our third such study, and no matter how we slice it, the numbers keep pointing to our original premise: how you treat people at work matters. Especially if you enjoy earning a profit. And yet, Employee Engagement is facing some formidable headwinds.
Surveys regularly done over the last decade by our organization, Gallup, and others suggest that, by their own admission, only about 1/3 of the workforce is truly “engaged”, some 40-50% are nominally engaged (mailing it in), and about 20% are actively disengaged (deliberately throwing sand into the gears of commerce.” The cost of this to the broader economy is in the range of 1% of GDP and 1-2% of lost productivity growth.
Employee Engagement: How do I get it?
So how do we get a more fully engaged workforce, one whose output shows up in a better bottom line? It’s not as easy as upping compensation or plugging in the latest, most elaborate and costliest employee perks. Instead, today’s best and most profitable employers focus on sound organizational and leadership practices that get the most—willingly and enthusiastically—from everyone on the payroll. Here are three things you can begin doing right now that will have an immediate and long-lasting impact on your company’s ability to succeed through its people practices.
Hire for fit. Skills and experience aren’t enough. Identify what it takes for people to be happy, productive and successful in your organization. Sit down with your senior leadership team, and identify those non-technical ‘fit’ requirements – things like strength, attitude, heart, and passion. Teach those fit requirements to all hiring managers and provide incentives for hiring around those factors. Use behavioral interviewing techniques to identify those candidates whose values and attitudes set them up for success in your organization.
Define your mission in clear and compelling terms. I’m not talking about having the best-worded mission statement in the world, but having a clear sense of mission is motivating. Make sure everyone—from your CEO to your newest hire—knows why your business exists, and can articulate its most important priorities.
Here’s something you can do right now to see how you’re doing in this department. On a piece of paper, write down what you believe to be your organization’s top three business priorities. Put the paper in your pocket and go out and ask the first five or six employees you happen to see the same question. Compare their answers with yours and with each other’s. Should the answers stray too far from one another, you’ll know it’s time to get busy focusing everyone on what matters most.
Teach people how their work matters. One of the most important engagement factors is having meaningful work. The minute someone loses sight of the importance of his work, he can’t possibly perform at the top of his game. If some of your workers have forgotten (or never really knew) how their daily work matters to your customers and the rest of your business, teach them.
Get your back office professionals out on the manufacturing floor from time to time. Let machine operators accompany your salespeople on customer calls. Send your HR manager out to see your products being used. Those are but a few examples of how you, as a leader, can help to make meaning out of people’s work.
Business leaders can learn a lot from dairy farmers. Leaders who hire well, articulate a clear mission, and help people understand how their work impacts the business will get a greater measure of engagement from the best and most talented people in the business, resulting in better business outcomes. Contented Cows Give Better Milk.