Articles on Employee Engagement

8/13/2019 Articles on Employee Engagement

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Employee engagement: A leadership

priority

A leadership priority is emerging how to improve employee engagement withincompanies: There have been disquieting developments in recent times. All over the

world, good employee policies exist in the manuals. However, the management capabilityto engage with the workorce and to implement the policies humanely is under pressure.

!n his book The !dea o "ustice, #ro Amartya $en reers to the two !ndian philosophical

concepts o %iti and %yaya. %iti relates to the policies, principles and institutions o&ustice while the %yaya reers to the actual delivery o &ustice. The ormer is committed

to better &ustice, while the latter is deeply concerned with the prevention o in&ustice.

#revention o in&ustice is very dierent rom pursuit o perect &ustice. They are two sides

o the same coin, but their value perception is dierent. $o ar as the !ndian legislativeramework is concerned, laws pertaining to worker relations have or long needed to be

updated. 'abour reorms have been widely discussed, but the sub&ect remains on the

pending agenda.

However, at the irm level, managers can act on remedying the nyaya perceived by theemployees in the employee(employer relation) its practice can be modernised by orward(

looking managements. This requires special eort by company leaders.

*vidence o pressure: +onsider the evidence that employees do suer rom a eeling o

unair treatment, resulting in desperation and depression among employees o both

developed and emerging markets.

ell(known -rench companies such as -rance Telecom, enault, #eugeot and */- have

experienced increasing suicides among workers in the last two years. The cynic may

observe that the -rench suicide rate is generally high compared to 0ritain, 1ermany andthe 2$. That is true. However, even in the 2$, the rate o suicides has increased by 345

in the last two years.

*mployees eel that they are expected to oer loyalty to their employer, but they do not

receive an equal commitment rom the employer to protect their &obs. 6anagers are soocused on corporate survival that they seem to have a limited bandwidth to attend to the

employees7 eeling o in&ustice. *mployees everywhere say that they are 7in distress7 orthat they are 7stressed out7.

$urveys in the 2$ over the last ew years show that indices like 7loyalty7 and 7trust7 havecollapsed rom the 485 levels to 985 levels. 6ore than hal the respondents eel a sense

o stagnation and disinterest in their work. The recession has increased uncertainty

simultaneously with a perceived 7onslaught7 by managers to increase workorceproductivity.


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All in all, in the developed countries, permanent workers are unhappy and are

disenchanted with both their work and their employers7 attitude. Temporary workers too

have their own grievances. !n $outh orea, industrial action by temporaries has beenexperienced at $sangyong and /onghee. !n "apan, the president o engo has stated his

disapproval o ;temporaries being treated the same as robots;.

!n !ndia too, we have witnessed hyper cases o industrial action recently. Ater many

decades o relative labour tranquillity, company executives have been killed at 1ra


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3Cs of employee engagement: Career,

competence and care

Ask any H manager about employee engagement and pat comes a ready list o actions:

osite parties and picnics, birthdays and anniversaries cricket matches, qui


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will deinitely eel engaged. !ncidentally, i because o your attention employees grow

wings and ly away to another company, it7s ine. !n a growth market ull o opportunities

you cannot, in any case, keep employees arrested. However, i you truly invest in careerso your employees they will stay engaged or the time they are with you ( breeding

enthusiasm and good will.

+ompetence: hile career is about the actual growth, competence is about the ability to

grow. =pportunities to learn and apply the learning in real lie tasks grows competence.And most employees are looking or competence(boosting opportunities. They would

like to stretch, learn and improve as long as they eel they are growing marketable skills.

*mployees who know that their current &obs are helping them become competent oruture &obs will stay engaged.

+are: +aring is a ine art that requires managers to be sensitive, empathetic and

spontaneous. +aring is experienced by the small day(to(day gestures o managers >not by

grand policies o the company@. Are you sensitive to the 7mood7 o your employeeC /oes

your employee share with you that her child is sick or he has to attend a parentDteachermeetingC /o you volunteer some time o during those timesC /o you know their

workloadC Are you doing something about easing their stressC There are many dailygestures that comprise caring ( which no ma&or investment in swanky gyms and ood

courts can substitute. +aring is a culture that good companies oster through a set o

sensitive managers who balance tasks well with relationships. !ncidentally, sometimesun and ood(based entertainment helps express caring. Thus entertainment is perhaps 5

o engagement. And genuine caring deepens engagement.

"ust as band, baa&aa and baaraat does not equate wedding, un, rolic and entertainment

can not create sustainable employee engagement. !ts time we got serious with employees.

Chandrasekhar Sripada

(The author is VP and head, HR at IBM India, South Asia )


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and workers at 'and over. The world over, the biggest challenge companies ace is

engaging their people. And !ndian business houses like the Tatas and !nosys seem to do

it very well. !s this something academicians should researchC The &ury is still out on thatone,; he says.

1rant, who is in 6umbai to teach a course at the newly established 6!$0 0occoni$chool o 6anagement in #owai, believes there are also some things about !ndian culture

that corporates need to ignore. $ocial stratiication and power distance, or example. ;Theculture in !ndian !T companies, like !nosys, is very egalitarian. Goung people are

encouraged to challenge their bosses, which goes against !ndian culture, but they do it,;

he says. hich brings us to what 1rant believes is the second ma&or trend in strategicresearch today the study o leadership. The earlier dysunctional ocus on individual

leaders has gone out o vogue, thanks to the work done by the likes o "im +ollins.

'eadership is now being seen as acilitating the evolution o the organisation, which hasnone o the +*= hubris that accompanied the earlier description. ;=ne o the eatures o

a complex, modern(day corporation is that no one knows how it works, not even the

+*=,; says 1rant.

Another interesting area o strategy research that 1rant mentions is the management oreal options. -rom the Tatas and 0irlas to the Ambanis and 6ahindras, this is a strategy

that many !ndian business houses have deployed to move into new areas like deense,

telecom and retail. 1rant gives the example o 1oogle, which has adopted a strategy oregularly going into new areas like theandroidsystem and the 1oogle +hrome browser.
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/topic/androidhttp://economictimes.indiatimes.com/topic/androidhttp://economictimes.indiatimes.com/topic/androidhttp://economictimes.indiatimes.com/topic/android


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ull Engagement: !hree steps to sol"ing

the employee turno"er problem

According to a recent article in The *conomic Times, !ndia is ;in the eye o an employee

turnover storm.; ith a pro&ected employee turnover rate o 3.E5 or 38?9, !ndia will

lead the world in employee turnover. ecruiting and training replacement employees isexpensive and has a signiicant negative impact on a company7s bottom line. High

employee turnover also damages the morale o the employees who remain thus making

them less productive which urther erodes the bottom line.

6ost experts agree that the key to solving this turnover problem is or businesses toimprove their level o employee engagement. *ngaged employees are not only more

productive but they tend to stay where they are. These same experts, however, come up

short when it comes to dispensing concrete advice on what a business needs to do toimprove employee engagement. ecently, ! completed a study o a number o companies

that have a high level o employee engagement. $everal o these companies, like 1oogle,

!ntel, 6arriott Hotels and $A$ !nstitute, have a presence in !ndia. These companies are

doing well and their turnover rate is very low. hat7s interesting is that when you take aclose look at these companies, you soon reali


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but when combined with a set o core values, these two concepts together can transorm a

workplace into something that employees believe in and are proud o.

+ore values(this is how we do it. +ore values communicate how the employees within anorgani


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anagers practice position$ship rather

than leadership

NEW DELHI:E!"o#ee en$a$eent%oes &ro the 'ua"it# o& ana$ers an

or$anisation has, sa#s urt o&&an, or*!"a%e %onsu"tant, +usiness s%ientist, and

Ee%uti-e .e""o at theDanie"s S%hoo" o& Business/

He is in India &or 0.irst, Peo!"e 12310, an HR %on&eren%e or$anised +# SHRM India, asu+sidiar# o& the The So%iet# &or Huan Resour%e Mana$eent,here he ta"*s a+out the

!oer o& %o""a+oration and eer$in$ trends in the or*!"a%e/ In an intera%tion ith ET,

o&&an ta"*s a+out e!"o#ee en$a$eent/

!: .ow can organisations build highly engaged workforce1 What2s the role of

managers therein1

-irstly, organisations need to stop measuring and start building. 6ost companies have

become very good at measuring the engagement levels o the workorce. However, theydo not take the next step to discover ways to build these engagement levels.

At the organisation level, we can measure as much we want but, ater engagement levels

have been measured, the ocus needs to be on changing behaviours and building an

engaged workorce. ight now, organisations simply do surveys every three weeks but itsocus washes away until next year.

!t is the role o the managerto keep inormation and dialogue about engagement activeover the course o the year. To build a highly engaged team, the quality o managers that

an organisation puts in ront o their people is important. There are many ways that onecan become a manager on the career ladder.

However, &ust because you have achieved one rung on the ladder does not necessarily

mean that the next rung will make you a manager as you may not have the same talent. !t

is extremely important to put managers in the right place because we know thatengagement comes rom the local work units and the quality o managers an organisation

has.

Another way to build an engaged workorce is to have a dierent manager developmentapproach. To build engagement, a manager does not need to work only on the bigchanges) rather, they can start by tackling bite si


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E!: What are the mistakes managers make when it comes to keeping their teams

engaged1

=ne mistake is that managers practice position(ship rather thanleadership. They ocus onconstituency, the people they need the most and depend on, only caring about how they

are viewed by the leaders above them, thereby ollowing position(ship.

6anagers orget what it was like to be an employee and the qualities important ormanagers to have. Also, managers need to maintain strong relationships with the people

they manage.

e oten hear ( /on7t get too close to your managersDemployees as you may loseob&ectivity, which is alse. !n act, you gain to communicate eectively and have a

meaningul relationship.

E!: What are the warning signs for an organisation that engagement le"els of the

workforce are coming down1

/rop in energy levels at your workplace. !s your workplace energised, is it un, do peoplelook orward to coming to workC =r is your workplace always serious, slower in pace

and lacks motivationC

Another sign is when there are more people who are saying why they can7t do things vs

what they can do. -or example, when there is a new idea, there are more people against itthan or it. hen people in the organisation become sceptical to adopt new ways, it is a

sign o lowered engagement.

E!: What should managers do when they see engagement le"els slipping1 .ow canorganisations help1

The irst thing that managers need to do is to have a transparent conversation with the

team. The power o dialogue is most powerul and the most underutilised thing that a

manger does.

The manager needs to talk to the team, about the team, bring issues out in the openbecause long(term disengagements are caused by people who cannot move out o

problem mode and get into the solution mode.

A manager needs to ask people or help and not shy away rom it. As humans, when weare asked or help, the best o us comes to the surace. Thus managers need to address theissue head on, ask or help and expect solutions rather than urther problems.
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/topic/leadershiphttp://economictimes.indiatimes.com/topic/leadershiphttp://economictimes.indiatimes.com/topic/motivationhttp://economictimes.indiatimes.com/topic/leadershiphttp://economictimes.indiatimes.com/topic/motivation

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Articles on Employee Engagement