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Employee engagement is more than just employee satisfaction.  It's about passion, effectiveness, commitment and results.

When President John F. Kennedy toured NASA, he saw a janitor carrying a broom.  He interrupted his tour, walked over and introduced himself, and asked, "What are you doing?"  The janitor replied, "Well, Mr. President, I'm helping put a man on the moon."  That's employee engagement.

You work hard to hire great employees with talent to help the organization achieve its goals.  Like most new adventures, it's an exciting time for both you during the onboarding process.  New team members are anxious to succeed and contribute.  Managers want to get them up to speed quickly and comfortably integrated into the team.  Coworkers are interested in developing a relationship with the new hires for friendship, collaboration and support.

Employee engagement is an ongoing process and two-way - employers must do what they promise to do.  Engagement is a consistent effort to inspire and connect with your team in meaningful ways, to listen and understand employee needs, to plan and implement solutions, and to monitor the effectiveness of those activities.

67%

of US workers are not engaged or actively disengaged

34%

actively disengaged workers cost US businesses 34% of their annual salary

According to Gallup, more than half of American workers engage in "quiet quitting," which is another term for disengagement. 

Why does employee engagement matter?

Watch this 3-minute video to learn what employee engagement is and why it matters to your business.   Then calculate the annual cost of disengagement to your organization below.

What To Look For

Engaged employees are passionate, love their jobs, and try to make things better everyday
Not engaged employees are checked out, sleepwalking through the day, and put in hours vs. energy
Actively disengaged employees are miserable people who sabotage projects and undermine coworkers.

202%

Companies with engaged employees outperform those without by up to 202%
(Dale Carnegie Institute)

2x

Customer loyalty doubles in companies in the top 1/4 for employee engagement
(Gallup, Inc.)

What is employee disengagement costing you?

According to the latest findings from Gallup, Inc., actively disengaged employees, aka "quiet quitters," cost organizations 34% of their annual salary.  Use this formula to determine the cost to your business.

Total # of Employees

X

Average Salary

X

.34

=

Annual Cost of Disengagement

People are your most expensive resources.  When you invest in understanding people's needs at work and understanding them better, the benefits far outweigh the costs.  Accepting and valuing people for who they are and learning what they need to help them be their very best ultimately improves your bottom line. 

The business case for investing in improving communication is clear.  When you improve communication, you realize stronger employee engagement, which improves profits, increases customer satisfaction, and reduces expenses. 

Engagement begins when you connect an individual's passion with your mission.

Sometimes organizations and leaders focus all of their energy on training for the job and don't train to the mission.  Connecting the staff to the organization's mission and purpose and communicating how their role and contributions impact the larger goals of the organization is an important aspect of employee engagement.
 
When an individual's passion is aligned with a clear connection to your mission, a real understanding of their contribution, and the opportunity to grow, you have the winning recipe for a star performer.

Engagement increases when you answer the question, "Why is my job important?"

Because we're all people and it's easy to lose sight of the big picture, individuals and teams need to be continually reminded of why their job and contributions matter.  When people understand how their job is connected to the mission and goals of the organization, they are more motivated, committed to results and demonstrate loyalty to the organization.
 
Their understanding of how and why their job is important is what creates passion and purpose for them professionally and personally.

Engagement improves when you answer the question, "How am I doing?"

People need encouragement to do their best work and have someone take a personal interest in their progress and development.  Employees who feel they have opportunities for growth and feel they are appreciated and valued show a stronger commitment to their job and their employer.

Organizations and managers that are willing to invest time in providing timely, measurable, consistent feedback to employees see the ROI in months, not years.  Recognizing and motivating talent ensures that the next generation of leaders is always under development.

Engagement is present when employees ask, "What more can I do to help?"

A truly engaged contributor is anxious to be a great ambassador for the organization and an active problem-solver.  They want the organization to succeed and are committed to results. 

 

You can count on them to invest themselves on projects or problems outside their role.  These ambassadors are the champions of the organization and worth their weight in gold.  

If you want to know if your team is really engaged, ask them!

How often do you ask your employees for actionable, meaningful feedback?  One-on-one sessions, team meetings and anonymous employee feedback surveys are all effective tools that you can use to expose the gaps and opportunities to help your team and your business thrive.

Engaged team

Best Practices to Survey Your Workforce

  1. Survey questions should be actionable. If you intend to ask questions about current engagement programs, separate satisfaction and importance independently and balance the results against one another.

  2. Survey everyone in your organization.  Do not collect role or department questions unless there are at least 15 people in each department or function to ensure anonymity.

  3. Survey electronically, preferably through a 3rd party administrator.  You will receive more honest feedback when employees know a neutral party is collecting the information.

  4. Survey consistently, at least once per year or more often.  The more often you survey, the more often you can measure progress.  Consistent surveying yields better results.

  5. DON'T survey your team unless you commit to taking action as a result of the feedback.  It is far worse to survey and take no action than not to survey at all.

The Hive Q12 Engagement Survey by John Ryder

The Hive Q12 engagement survey was developed free for unrestricted use by John Ryder and based on Gallup's Employee Engagement survey.  Two-thirds of the survey questions are dependent on communication and work relationships.

Employees answer the following 12 questions using a 5-Point Scale: Strongly Agree to Strongly Disagree

​

1. My performance is measured against outcomes and metrics that are clearly explained.

2. I have access to everything that I need to perform well at my job.

3. My strengths are recognized here and I put them into practice every day in my job.

4. I regularly receive meaningful recognition for doing my job well.

5. How happy are you with the relationship between you and your manager?

6. My manager supports me to get even better at the skills I’m valued for here.

7. My opinions are taken into account and considered here.

8. The purpose or mission of the organization is clearly defined and fulfillment of my job counts toward achieving it.

9. My coworkers are accountable for doing quality work.

10. At work, I consider at least one of my co-workers to be a true friend.

11. My personal progress and development is important around here.

12. In my role, there are ongoing opportunities to learn and grow.

Everything DiSC supports employee engagement initiatives by strengthening relationships and fostering a culture of open communication and trust.

Want to improve employee engagement?

Five Steps for Improvement

If you want to begin the process to improve employee engagement, follow these five steps:

 

  1. Define what success looks like when employees are engaged.

  2. Ask for actionable, meaningful feedback from employees

  3. Report on the findings of the feedback to everyone at all levels of the organization.

  4. Begin the action planning process and include employees to improve engagement.

  5. Implement the plans, communicating intentionally along the way.

 

Repeat these steps regularly to measure progress and continue working on improvements to achieve success.

​

Engaging your team improves performance!  Let us show you how.

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