A communicative workplace is a happy one. Knowing your employees’ needs, aims, and specific skillsets is the best route towards efficiency and workplace satisfaction, but it can seem complicated and time-consuming. Employee engagement takes many forms, but an engaged workforce gives its best every day.
1. Involve them in the planning process
The best way to engage with employees is to make them feel valued by giving them a stake in your companies’ destiny.
Shutting employees out of the decision-making process, especially when those decisions are likely to affect them, is a sure-fire way to sow discontent amongst the workforce; instead of making closed-door decisions be open and involve your employees in the future of the company.
An easy way to do this is to hold regular brainstorming sessions around significant changes. This will give your workforce a chance to voice their thoughts, concerns, and ideas while deepening their emotional connection with the company.
These sessions benefit you, too, as the hive mind can develop some truly innovative solutions. Above all else, make sure that team leaders are both fully accountable and completely accessible.
2. Use an employee survey
There is a no more straightforward way of getting to know how your workforce feels than simply asking them! Employee surveys might sound time-intensive, but that is no longer the case. Platforms like inpulse.com provide employers with all the tools to surveying the workforce in a simple and efficient process.
Tailor your questions carefully to evaluate how employees feel emotionally, their integration within the team, their aims, and how they think the company could improve.
Conducting a survey is one thing, but you should also let employees know that their voices have been heard. Study the survey responses carefully and make changes where appropriate.
An employer who appears intractable will rapidly alienate the workforce. Similarly, conducting a survey and then paying no attention to the results makes employees feel that their voices are not valued.
3. Give feedback (but keep it concise)
Letting your employees know what you expect from them is an integral part of team management. Feedback boosts job satisfaction because it allows the workforce to operate with confidence rather than guessing what is expected of them.
The companies’ ambitions, goals, and values should be clear, and team leaders should aim to give feedback along those lines. Employees want to improve and work effectively, but it is up to managers to provide an environment for them to do so.
Bombarding employees with ongoing feedback can have a negative effect, though. Instead, please keep your input simple and to the point, ensuring that it focuses on the company’s core values and is tailored to individuals rather than blanket criticism.
Providing room for individuals to flourish will keep them engaged and positively impact the rest of the workforce. Remember that feedback also includes celebrating and rewarding achievement rather than focusing purely on areas to improve.
