Employee engagement is an integral part of any business that seeks to ensure that their staff is happy and working at their highest performance rates. The term employee engagement itself can be identified as a multitude of different things but most importantly is the following: a team that is excited about coming in each day to give their best while working towards your business’s goals and values. At its core, employee engagement also includes overall healthy employees and higher productivity. A team that is engaged at a level that increases their motivation is more likely to finish projects ahead of deadlines, communicate cohesively and proactively seek out solutions to problems or challenges.
Some of the key factors that drive employee engagement include perception of job importance and expectations, opportunity for advancement, a consistent flow of feedback dialogue and interpersonal workplace relationships. To provide an environment that stresses the former you can create policies that enforce open communication, a healthy work ‘culture’ and motivation for promotions. Weekly check-ins with your team is one of the most basic things a manager or employer can do to to help drive better communication. You can also maintain many of these things, specifically check-ins via employee focused technology. This encourages people both in remote and traditional workplace settings to be not only engaged but in a constant flow of open communication with their teams. By utilizing web-based applications you can easily help to achieve many of the key things that make employee engagement flourish.
The advantages of engagement are a trickle down effect, when you have leaders who are excited about their work – their employees are likely to follow. Harvard reported that 70% of workers are more engaged when upper-level management communicates transparently with their employees. In the end, this only helps support your business and the goals you are setting out to do. By bringing about an atmosphere where people are excited to work you are inherently engaging your staff and maximizing the potential of your talent.
Some important stats to look at from Gallup analytics:
– Only 33% of Employees were ‘engaged’ in 2016
– 17% of engaged employees are more productive
– Businesses with engaged staff reported 41% less absenteeism
– 51% of employees state they are actively looking for a new job at any given time due to lack of engagement
See below for some of the most prominent advantages of running a company that stresses the importance of creating a community of engaged employees.
From engagement comes ideas and increased productivity. It’s a pretty simple equation that people who are engaged are more likely to do their job at a higher level, come up with innovative solutions and finish projects ahead of schedule. It’s important to note again, that this trickles down from management. An engaged manager creates a staff environment where people are looking for more ways to contribute to their jobs. When a staff is motivated as such, your productivity levels increase and it is better for the company as a whole. Additionally, in a study by Wyatt Watson it shows that there is a 26% increase in profits for companies that have higher employee engagement. This in turn leads back to productivity because it allows people to see a physical result of their hard work.
Your employees are the face of your company – they are ambassadors for your brand and products in client and colleague settings. Forbes has confirmed that by 2020 75% of the workforce will be millenials. One of the most important things to this generation is being highly engaged by their jobs because they want to be happy. It sounds so basic but they are asking for more than coming into a 9-5 and punching in numbers – they want collaboration and a sense of ‘team’. It is also worth it to note that this generation works better than ever in said ‘teams’ creating such an environment where people can interact and communicate better with one another. Millenials are changing the way we value work-life balance and it can end up resulting in turn we are seeing increased engagement throughout the workforce.
When you have employees who are engaged you have a higher point of retention because people who are happier they are less likely to leave. When employee engagement is at its highest, turnover rates are at their lowest. The less turnover your company has the more opportunity you have to internally promote team members who care about your brand. It also keeps workflow at a steady pace with less interruptions from said employee turnover. This also gives you the ability to build a stronger managerial level of employees. When you have a group of leaders who care as much about their work as their counterparts do, you start creating a series of teams that want to stay and grow together. Many times, the increased amount of engagement is a direct result of people simply enjoying doing their work with the people they work with.
Retaining your most engaged and productive employees is just as important as attracting new talent to your company. As stated before, engagement has become a part of the entire package for many job seekers. It’s important for future employees that they see the culture of any given company presents a workforce of people who are genuinely interested and excited about what they are working on. This gives you the opportunity to bring on new team members who will motivate your other employees even more and creates a diverse culture for your company.