Why Exactly is it Called Employee Engagement?

Employee engagement. Ahh … the mountain top. Something every leader strives for to achieve success. An engaged employee is a happy employee. An engaged employee is more productive. An engaged employee is __________ (you fill in the blank). Right?

How does the corporate world evaluate employee engagement? Well, by issuing an employee engagement survey, of course. Who better to ask about engagement than the employees themselves? And when structured properly, and with a supportive culture, these types of surveys can deliver incredibly insightful feedback to the leadership team.

See, here’s the thing. Every leader knows that improving employee engagement will improve company performance and cultural significance. Just makes reasonable sense, right? But the problem is, when the survey is over most action items and action plans addressing the survey feedback are assigned exclusively to members of management. We aren’t engaging the very employees who know what needs to be fixed and know what winning looks like. Does that seem backwards to anyone besides me?!?

Your team members are passionate about making your workplace, your company the best place to work. Their beliefs about what would create a culture of significance are embedded in the feedback provided through the surveys. So why not deeply involve them in the action plans and resulting initiatives in response to the surveys? Seems to make sense to me.

Leadership should not be the only ones responsible for making change in an organization. That is a mistake being made in too many companies today.

When someone is involved, when their ideas are heard and when they are allowed to communicate the plans and actions to their teams, that someone now owns the change. And they want it – badly!

You can’t have engaged employees without engaging your employees. What? Did he just say that? It’s simple, gang. People want to help. They want to be a part of something significant. I have seen the power of highly engaged employees and it gives me goose bumps. Why not get some goose bumps of your own?

Ask folks their opinion. Let them tell you what they would do if they were in charge. Allow them to take the lead on culturally significant issues. Ask them to “Tell me more.” And all the while, you will be sharing your power with them. Try it once and judge for yourself – I can’t wait to hear the results!

Engaged employees – folks who really care about the success of the business – will push hard to turn today’s chaos into tomorrow’s payoff. Just give them a chance. I know what you see will be Simply Amazing!