6 Simple Ways to Grow Employee Engagement
Employees collectively form the basic working unit of any business organisation. The absence of a motivated, confident and capable workforce in any company would push it down the road to failure.
Many of the well-thought strategies fail miserably due to the absence of engaged employees to implement them.
Thus, it becomes crucial to keep the employees engaged for the sake of an organisation’s success.
This brings us to a crucial question.
What do you mean by Employee Engagement?
In HR terms , employee engagement refers to the working environment where employees reveal themselves in a dynamic, intellectual and enthusiastic way.
This brings us to the next question …
What’s the need for Employee Engagement?
Employees working in different departments need to feel actively engaged in the workspace. They should get the feeling that their presence matter, contributions appreciated and efforts reflect tangibly in the company reaching newer heights.
Apart from this, many studies have shown that employee engagement leads to some amazing benefits, like:
- 1. Increase in levels of output
- 2. Jump in retention rate decrease in turnover numbers
- 3. A boost in employee loyalty
- 4. Rise in profitability
- 5. Hike in Employee Satisfaction
- 6. A decrease in attrition rate
In spite of such benefits, a report by Gallup suggested that only 13% of the entire workforce worldwide comes under the engaged workforce. Therefore, to overcome this problem below are six simple ways to grow employee engagement at your company
1. Encourage Feedback
Managers often give feedback to the workers usually post the completion of the task assigned. But, they often forget to seek it back from the employees.
Frequent feedback from the employees can do wonders for the company. Managers can ask for their feedback via formal and informal channels.
Installing a suggestion box is a great way to invite feedback from the employees and keeping their anonymity intact.
Sending out a survey at the end of every month is another useful tool to gather honest feedback from the team. Direct feedback can also be gained by introducing a feedback session at the end of every week.
2. Promote Personal Growth
Highly successful organisations often invest in employees as they, in turn, will invest in them. Individuals prefer working for those organisations which gives them opportunities for continuous growth.
No employee wants to reach the point of stagnation regarding his or her skill set. So, they prefer a company where their skills along with career keep on rising to new heights.
Organisations can help them in achieving this objective by providing them with frequent training for soft as well as hard skills. This will make them efficient and contribute to there personal and professional development.
3. Keep Connected
Communication is the key when it comes to growing employee engagement. Every human feels the need of being valued and appreciated by those who matter to him.
For instance, if managers share some significant insider news with the team it will instil the feelings of belongingness as well as trust in the minds of employees.
So, when there is positive, useful and fitting communication between the employees and their heads, they will feel in the loop and involved.
A simple way of keeping connected (emails are outdated) with the employees can be done with the help of business-oriented communication tools like Slack, Stride, Microsoft Teams or Salesforce chatter, etc.
4. Perfect Workspace
Physical structure is as important as the organisational structure.
The physical workspace reflects a company’s culture, ethics and its atmosphere. You can start building the perfect office space by ditching those cubicles and taking down those tall walls.
Employees prefer a workspace where they can easily meet up and collaborate with other colleagues.
An open space promotes open communication. An approachable environment at the workplace eliminates communication gap, ego clashes and miscommunication.
A trendy workplace needs no to be expensive. The idea behind this is to make office space as comfortable and homely for the employees.
5. Work-Life Blend
Workforce worldwide continuously struggles to strike the perfect balance between professional and personal life. It is extremely difficult to divide the attention between two. If either of them gets neglected it will negatively impact the other one.
A giant like Google has done a fantastic job in this aspect. It offers some great on-the-job perks like gaming rooms, bowling alley, swimming pools, massage parlours, etc. All these amenities can be utilized by the workforce at any time of the day.
Apart from this, it offers work from home opportunity to its employees.
6. Offer Fun
As the old
saying goes- “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.”
Chasing deadlines, long working hours and high-pressure leave employees
exhausted and stressed out.
It is important for organisations to de-stress the employees and let them hit the refresh button every once in a while. Organisations can hold picnics, annual award functions, friendly soccer matches, marathons, etc to let them recharge and have some fun. As a fresh mind leads to increased efficiency and promotes innovation. Moreover, such activities help in forming a bond and a sense of belongingness among the employees.
Thus, with the implementation of such simple ways in the organisation, the employee engagement will definitely grow by leaps and bounds.