By Rachel Adrian
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Getting (and keeping!) employees engaged and excited is a huge challenge for most businesses. Traditional tactics for engagement no longer work and people are more inclined to leave their jobs if they feel underappreciated, unchallenged, or dispensable. CEO’s are becoming increasingly worried about how they will replace the boomer generation as they retire, so it is essential that companies have great employee engagement programs in place to attract new talent as well as maintain the talent they already have. Over the past few months I’ve been doing a bit of research on employee engagement techniques and I would like to share them with you in this blog.3 Keys to Engaging Your Employees
Connection: Make sure that you have proper programs and initiatives in place to make your employees feel like a team. Encourage collaboration and use teambuilding activities to improve the company dynamic.
Consistency: Your plan for employee engagement should be engrained throughout your company’s entire strategy. Get employees excited about what you are doing as a team and involve everyone in community investment initiatives. This is an excellent opportunity to create shared value.
Continual Improvement: Aim to improve corporate engagement strategies year after year. With time, the company culture will evolve and it is essential that employee engagement programs grow to fit the employees.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4H4MIwklvHQ&feature=youtube_gdata_player Give Them Something to Be Proud of!Everyone wants to be proud of what they are doing at work, why not challenge your employees and encourage growth! Give employees the opportunity to show you what they can really do. Increased collaboration, creativity and support will lead to better work being done in less time. Frequent constructive feedback also helps employees to remain engaged and do better work.Not only can you make sure that your employees are proud of what they are working on, but you should also try to make your company the kind of company that they are proud to work for. With more and more millennials entering the workforce, companies should strive to ‘do business better’ and meet higher standards.Employees want to be acknowledged for the role they have played in the success of the business. Your employee engagement plan should aim to ensure your employees know that they are appreciated. Have FUN with it!A fun, welcoming and comfortable environment goes a long way in keeping employees excited about their jobs. Having a little bit of fun in the office releases tension and refreshes people's minds so they can be more productive.Surprising your employees is another great method of keeping employees happy. While taking employees out for an ‘employee engagement dinner’ once in a while is nice, they will eventually come to expect it instead of appreciating your efforts. Switch things up every once in a while and employees will be reminded of how great your company really is. Ideas Adapted from PricewaterhouseCoopers’ “The Keys to Corporate Responsibility Employee Engagement” Report.