The level of employees who are engaged at work is only as high as around 20% according to recent Gallup research. Yet there are so many benefits of having an engaged workforce. These include, improved productivity, increase in profits, increase in morale and a reduction in absenteeism as well as less turnover. Huge benefits to both the business and the team.
With approximately 80% of employees either disengaged or worse still actively disengaged, there is much work to do to turn these numbers around. As you can imagine, the loss of productivity due to this is massive, so how do we go about fixing this? It has a lot to do with the way managers lead their teams, we just have to improve at being better leaders.
Here are four ways every leader can improve on to increase their team’s engagement levels:
1) Invest in your team’s development. Spend time with each of them ensuring they are growing, learning and thriving. It’s sharing your knowledge and wisdom to show that you care and you believe in them. Set high expectations for your team and set them up to succeed by helping them.
2) Get to know your team individually. Of course, we have to be careful and healthy boundaries are important, but how can you get the best out of each individual if you treat them all the same. Get to know your individual team members, spend time 1:1 to find out what motivates them, what doesn’t and understand their aspirations so you can tailor your leadership to those aspirations.
3) Hire your leaders for their attitude. Leaders have to care about their people, if you are hiring new leaders this needs to be a major driver of their success. I love this old saying “people don’t care what you know, until they know that you care”, this has certainly come to the fore. Leaders need to be able to show that they have invested in people and helped them to be successful – these are the ones you want to hire.
4) Show them that their contributions matter and make a difference. We all need to feel valued and that what we do makes a difference to others. Great leaders have the ability to point this out to their team. Furthermore, they regularly tell their teams that they matter and their work is appreciated. How often do we do this?
The radical part comes now – I would recommend you check yourself against these four points and rate how well you do. You might even be bold and ask your team to rate you on these as well. If you do, you are well on the way to showing them you care about them and want to improve as a leader.
Roger Simpson – CEO, The Retail Solution and Author of “The Ultimate Retail Sales Experience” With over 35 years’ industry experience, Roger Simpson is recognized as Australia’s #1 Authority on customer ROI in the retail industry and as a global expert on staff coaching, customer service, and selling skills.
