Employee Engagement – Just a cliché or does it really make a big difference?

There is a trend that is gathering pace in the enlightened companies of the UK – motivated staff are rising to more challenges and are happy to put in longer hours and take on bigger workloads in order to help their business achieve their goals.  What great news.  But how do they do it?

The Sunday Times Best Companies to Work For survey shows that despite falls in the sense of well-being, levels of engagement in employees rose across the board.  If you, as a manager, are leading and inspiring your team, giving them a sense of belonging and making them feel their opinions matter, it seems that any pressure they are feeling to achieve more for less is not affecting them as much as you may expect.

So, if you have had to enforce a pay freeze in that last 18 months, you wouldn’t imagine standing a chance of being within the Top 100 Best Companies to Work For, right?  Not necessarily.  There is a company who has had a pay freeze and on it’s first attempt in entering the Top 100, has come in the top 5.  What a great result!  Despite the impact the lack in increased salary has had on the employees, the flexible hours, mentoring, social events and fitness programmes mean that staff are enjoying their time in the office and are still motivated and inspired to do well.  But without leadership and team spirit, this may well be a very different story.

There is one company who has a “cuddle budget”.  This is used for staff treats like nights out and champagne, but with one simple aim – to celebrate success.  When was the last time your team celebrated success?  You’d be amazed how much these small, thoughtful rewards will motivate your team to reach that ambitious goal and put in the extra effort to achieve.  There isn’t a person in the world that doesn’t need to feel appreciated, it’s as basic a requirement as food and this is where less-enlightened companies are missing the point.  There are some companies out there that are still heavily reliant on job insecurity as a motivator, but do those on the ‘shop floor’ really care for a company who is simply asking for ‘more for less’?

Getting the best out of your team is not all about pay but it is about behaviour.  In times when everyone is under pressure to perform that little bit harder, work that little bit longer for the same pay as they did 2 years ago, it has never been more important to give honest and sincere appreciation for those that are going the extra mile.  Rewards, no matter how small can create an eager want within your team and this will in turn, have an impact on your bottom line.  The Work Foundation recently published a study that reported managers who invested 10% in Employee Engagement strategies could raise the profits of their company by £2,700, per employee, per year.

A happy, motivated and engaged workforce means –

• reduced sickness – dis-engaged employees are 3 times more likely to call in sick
• better attrition – dis-engaged employees are 4 times more likely to leave for an alternative job
• stronger economy – The Work Foundation claims that making small investments into employee engagement could contribute £49bn to the economy
• embracing change – an engaged employee finds it much easier to implement organisational change to achieve a faster or improved outcome
• increased customer satisfaction
• increased productivity
• increased profits

Have you implemented any employee engagement tactics that have made a considerable difference to the productivity and engagement of your team?  We’d love to hear about it if you have.  Follow the conversation on Twitter or Facebook.

Written by Lucy Rawes, Operations Director