When you hear the topic of employee engagement, many things come to mind. But what is it and how can you increase it in your own company?
Employee engagement is much more than the emotional bond between employee and employer. It is a measure of how committed your own employees are to the company and thus make a greater contribution to the company's success. More and more companies are seeing the benefits of investing in their employees. Starting with lower employee absenteeism, lower staff turnover or simply increased job performance. In our blog article, we would like to show you which adjustments are worth making and working on your HR & employee management:
1. definition of the candidates Persona
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- Employee engagement starts very early on in the application process. In the definition of the candidate persona, in the job advertisement and then in the candidate selection process. Senior HR managers should put the candidate through their paces here. It's not just the skills of the candidate in question that are important, it's much more important to check what the motives were in the past. Or rather; what actually drives the employee and then ask yourself; will this person provide an upswing or rather a downswing in the team?
It is therefore essential to make your company values as transparent and honest as possible in the job advertisement. Conversely, this helps to ensure that the "right" candidates, with similar values to your company, apply to you. If this is confirmed, it can often be seen that those candidates not only remain loyal to the company for longer, but also make a significant contribution to the company's success.
- Employee engagement starts very early on in the application process. In the definition of the candidate persona, in the job advertisement and then in the candidate selection process. Senior HR managers should put the candidate through their paces here. It's not just the skills of the candidate in question that are important, it's much more important to check what the motives were in the past. Or rather; what actually drives the employee and then ask yourself; will this person provide an upswing or rather a downswing in the team?
2. clear allocation of tasks and the Big Picture #OKR
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- Assign your employees clear areas of responsibility. If your employees know and understand the big picture, it helps them immensely to know what they are working towards. Also be prepared to give ownership to the employee. This not only builds trust in the employee on the one hand, but also responsibility on the other.
Objectives and Key Results, also known as OKRs for short, can help to break down the big picture to the teams and the individual employees below them. With such a detailed breakdown of tasks, the employee is more aware of which company objective is being pursued. Not only are their own goals clear to them, they can also see those of their colleagues. This is exactly what offers tremendous hidden opportunities! When cross-functional teams can exchange information on specific objectives and even make suggestions for improvement to each other in order to ultimately work even more efficiently towards the company goal!
- Assign your employees clear areas of responsibility. If your employees know and understand the big picture, it helps them immensely to know what they are working towards. Also be prepared to give ownership to the employee. This not only builds trust in the employee on the one hand, but also responsibility on the other.
3. the recognition of performance by superiors
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- Who hasn't experienced it? You've worked together as a team for weeks on one or even several large customer projects and finally the Solution implemented at the customer and the next customer project is just around the corner. Depending on the customer, depending on the employee, motivation can fluctuate, which is perfectly fine.
But what can managers do to prevent these fluctuations from getting out of hand? As a manager, you have the responsibility to give the employee feedback on the work they have done. If the work done is more than satisfactory, praise the employee. Don't just thank them for the work they have done, but focus in particular on the employee's skills. Because let's be honest, who isn't proud of their work when the manager praises them? It doesn't matter how the praise is ultimately given, whether in a 1:1, a phone call in the evening or at the annual Christmas party - the main thing is that the praise is authentic and directed at the employee!
- Who hasn't experienced it? You've worked together as a team for weeks on one or even several large customer projects and finally the Solution implemented at the customer and the next customer project is just around the corner. Depending on the customer, depending on the employee, motivation can fluctuate, which is perfectly fine.
In any case, one thing is certain: in order to bring about increased employee engagement in the long term, it is advisable to focus on the intrinsic motivation factors.
The examples listed above are only a small excerpt of the factors influencing employee engagement. As you can see, there are a number of factors to which it is worth turning the screws. Because only satisfied and committed employees maximize your company's success in the long run!