Employee happiness is easy, right? If you follow Angela Nino’s steps that is.
Depending upon which study you read, approximately one-third of the workforce can be considered as actively engaged in their day-to-day tasks. That means about 67% of the population is ambivalent or does not feel an emotional connection to their organisation or company values.
Even when we focus on the one-third that are strongly linked with a company, there are three core principles that can derail your greatest employee: culture, technology, and satisfaction.
Employees and culture
Never underestimate the power of company culture. Organisations spend millions of dollars and focus whole marketing departments on branding, or external perception. Many corporations miss out on internal perception, or organisational culture.
Just because your employee appears to be engaged, doesn’t mean they are truly satisfied with what they are doing.
How your company sets its vision and values contributes to defining your culture. But, failing to address systems, norms, assumptions, and unwritten rules will shape your culture in ways that hurt your internal perception by your employees.
Creating a positive, learning culture will not only help you engage more of your employee personalities, it will also increase your chances of attracting new talent. Hiring and onboarding employees willing to culturally ‘buy in’ requires even more effort and intentional decisions.
The newer generations of talent aren’t as willing to just accept having a long-tenure job. They are looking for meaning attached to their behaviours and tasks.
Employees and technology
In today’s digital age, technology evolves at the speed of light. Being on top of training is everything. Nothing can hurt even your brightest employees more than taking away their fundamental tools for success.
Part of being able to engage with the vision and values of an organisation is knowing that your company supports your needs, especially when it comes to frequent platform upgrades and general technological changes.
If you have software that can increase your efficiency and productivity (which is often benchmarked and measured) but do not know how to use it effectively, then employees are likely to search for another company where they are better supported. Intentionally reaching out to find out what technology is needed is imperative to keeping your best employees invested and engaged.
Employees and satisfaction
Just because your employee appears to be engaged, doesn’t mean they are truly satisfied with what they are doing.
Knowing how to differentiate between employee engagement and employee satisfaction is highly important. Satisfaction is often tied to contentedness with one’s pay, work hours, benefits, and overall work life. Whereas, engagement is the emotional attachment individual feels towards their company.
Engagement has elements of autonomy/independence, growth/development, impact, and heart. Engaged employees aren’t just connected with their organization, they’re truly passionate about their industry and feel enthusiastic about company progress.
So next time you ask your employees to complete a satisfaction survey, consider if what you’re measuring is the same thing that’s going to propel your organization forward.
Takeaways
- Your organisation has a culture, no matter how large or small it is. Mould and transform it in a way that promotes growth, innovation, and other values that align with your vision.
- Reach out to your talent to find out how they need to be supported and what technology needs they have. Then, measure and evaluate your existing training program and make adjustments based on their feedback.
- Having satisfied employees is great, but having engaged staff is even better. Want to have more creativity and responsible risk-taking at your disposal? Connect with your talent, build on that foundation to create a company where everyone can thrive.
About the author
Angela Nino is blessed to be part of two fantastic organisations. At Versitas, she is the Training Manager and manages the blog and social media. At Richland College, she is a full-time professor and program coordinator in the School of Business.