Last updated on February 13th, 2023 at 07:19 pm
Employee engagement can be a tough thing to gauge. Every organization is susceptible to major changes in how the team engages. This can usually be traced to a change in company culture. There’s been a lot said about the benefits of employee engagement, such as improved productivity, but what are some of the best methods to increase employee engagement, especially amid uncertain times?
Emphasize the Culture
You need to recognize that increasing employee engagement will be more beneficial with a shared culture, whether this is a collaborative culture or one based on communication, when you emphasize the culture based on a common goal, this will help to align your employees’ aims with those of the business. A shared culture allows companies to benefit from consistency and collaboration, but it makes for a far more open organization.
Businesses that lay everything on the table, in other words, transparency, will always have a far more improved sense of self. It all begins with communication. Many people believe that changing the culture of an organization is a timely tactic that takes years. We start very simply, by increasing communication, for example, by communicating company announcements via an intranet social media page.
Prioritize Well-Being
If your employees have increased well-being, they will be more engaged. It’s essential in the modern day for companies to incorporate a wellness Initiative, as this will ensure that your employees truly care about their wellness on a deeper level. There are a number of ways to improve employee well-being, not just in terms of addressing components like mental or physical health, but increasing that notion of connection between employees.
The missing link that we’ve all learned from the pandemic is that social connection is just as important to our mental health as learning self-care tactics. Increase employee well-being and the engagement will follow. Shift planning and staff scheduling software can both also help to promote employee well-being. You can track working hours more precisely, keep an eye on your labor expenses, and lower staff turnover. For example, if you are a small restaurant owner, employee scheduling for restaurants would be the practice of arranging, improving, and controlling employee schedules to ensure that restaurant productivity and customer and employee satisfaction are always met.
Encourage Individuality
Having a collection of drones that follow every order you bark may sound great in theory, but this is a very quick way for an employee to turn toward the door. Encouraging individuality and autonomy through taking control over their workload or encouraging development through passion projects or courses can make a massive difference. Encouraging language learning amongst employees who can tie it in with the company’s core values can stick with a business because they are doing something that benefits their lives and your business goals.
Passion projects are not just about an employee communicating that individuality, but it’s a very subtle way to foster innovation. Language learning can be a way to increase customers and clients across the sector, while also helping the individuals pursue their passion projects.
Conduct Frequent Surveys
Feedback is so important, and organizations must understand what is working. An engagement survey gives individuals the opportunity to voice their opinions honestly and openly, but it will also make employees feel valued. Quick surveys will also give you the data to harness the best engagement strategies.
You can always follow it up with a detailed survey once a year, but you can spend a short period of time every quarter sending out a quick survey focusing on specific areas, perhaps related to pay progression, and other common employee concerns.
Create Engaging Management Practices
It can be easy to look at the disparity between a line manager and the employees, which can be made worse if the line manager is someone purely on the hunt for something to benefit themselves. A great manager is someone who is passionate about the work they do, to the point that their positive attitude becomes contagious.
We must cater to the individual needs of each employee, but we must also focus on middle management and see if they are doing everything they can to engage those employees beneath them.
Give Recognition
It is one of the fundamentals of increasing employee engagement because if you recognize them, this will increase their productivity a tiny bit more. Personalized employee recognition and rewards will additionally inspire and motivate teams at the workplace, and the employee recognition programs offered by Perkbox can help you engage teams all around the world. Recognition and rewards are two key approaches that will not just improve productivity but will make employees more likely to stay with you. Recognition is key to inspiring them to work for additional recognition.Â
If an employee never feels like they are contributing to the greater good, it’s important to show recognition in a number of ways, for example, by giving them their birthday off, celebrating milestones, and highlighting their achievements by showing how it has directly contributed to the business.
Employee engagement is something that will work wonders for your business in the short and long term. You must ensure that you gauge the engagement every step of the way.