Employee Engagement is one of the top priorities for leaders of teams these days.
Research tells us that engaged employees perform at higher levels and drive organizational results. It also tells us that engaged employees stay with the organization longer. This is very important as workplace attrition continues to be a big problem for many organizations.
Following are some conversations you can have with your employees – over time – to increase their engagement. These ideas are based on a recent Harvard Business Review article.
*What are your career goals and dreams? How can I support you in moving toward these? This is a foundational commitment that you can make to each employee – to support them for the long term. Every employee should have a professional development plan that targets both what they can do to improve their skills at their current job – and for their dream job.
*What could make this job more compelling for you? Discuss short run and long run ideas. If you can rearrange the employee’s responsibilities so they can do more of what they do best every day, that would be ideal. Or maybe you can get rid of things that they do not like to do and are not very good at.
*How do you derive meaning from your work? This conversation is your opportunity to make sure they understand how their work contributes to overall organization success. You may need to remind them of this regularly.
*What’s something that you are excited about outside of work? You may be able to support the employee with these outside passions. Even if not, it helps you get to know them better outside of the work world. And it shows them that you actually care about them as a person. (NOTE: this will not be effective unless you actually DO care about them outside of work; you can’t fake sincerity.)
Having these conversations with individuals on your team can be a great way to build engagement. If you want to continue building engagement, then I recommend the book First Break All the Rules, which outlines the Gallup approach to management – including the Q12 survey.
Mediocre employee performance and attrition are huge costs for organizations these days. Investing your time in employee engagement can have a big payoff for you, your organization, and your employees.
*Ideas for this blog taken from: Knight, R. “6 Questions to Find Out How Your Employees Are Really Doing,” Harvard Business Review online, December 17, 2024.
