New Year’s has come and gone; people are implementing their resolutions or maybe even abandoning them. And while it’s still important to set goals for 2017 at your company if you haven’t already, intentions and commitments rather than outcomes should be your focus.
Management, for example, needs to address employee engagement, which, as Gallup’s January 2017 report found, continues to be a major problem for most companies: 67.5 percent of employees are disengaged at work. Help your managers set clear commitments and intentions.
They need to commit to improving employee engagement in fun, meaningful ways, and communicate their intention to treat employees as people, not just assets.
By sticking to these engagement goals instead of regularly concentrating on checking employee “outcomes,” managers can focus on the process. Otherwise, it’s too easy for those employees to get stuck and attach their worth to the outcome, instead of the continual efforts they put forth.
This way of thinking will halt managers in their tracks. And that’s a good thing: Help managers concentrate on the process of improving engagement, so that that process is exciting, not agonizing. By doing this, you’ll help ensure that employees’ fear of failure dissipates, allowing them to give their best to daily efforts.
Here are some tips on helping managers improve employee engagement while staying focused on the process:
Measure performance.
This emphasis on focusing on the process instead of the outcome translates to all employees. Of course, outcomes need to be measured and tracked, but what’s more important is how well employees are performing in the process to achieve those results.
Train management on how to use technology to track important performance metrics. For example, if a sales representative has a low conversion rate, it’s time to assess his or her strategies to determine where he or she has lost leads.
Performance metrics tell managers how employees stack up to expectations, where they are succeeding and struggling and what changes in behavior are most effective. Help management…