Engaging Conversations: Encouraging a Culture of Dialogue
Author: Barb Krantz-Taylor
Employee engagement has become a mantra within many organizations. The executive teams seem to be looking for secret insights into how to help their workforces become more motivated and more productive. Many professionals at many levels have seen the same research that has been published outlining bottom line improvements (such as enhanced productivity and higher retention) that come from effective engagement.
In many of the interactions I have with these professionals, I’m often tasked to provide some of these “secret insights” to effectively engage employees. Here’s my highly strategic recommendation: Talk to them.
Sure, companies need an overall engagement strategy that they’re rolling out across the organization, one that helps employees connect with the organization’s mission, become more passionate about their work, and exceed expectations. But in my experience, the best-intended employee engagement plans hit a wall if the company’s managers and supervisors aren’t able to build effective relationships with their employees.
That’s a core issue: many managers simply don’t know how to initiate honest and open conversations with the employees they seek to engage.
Joining Companies, Leaving Managers
The now-popular axiom that employees join organizations and leave managers is amazingly accurate. To address that challenge, organizations need to teach their managers how to have “engaging conversations,” open-ended, non-judgmental conversations with each employee about passions, aspirations and opportunities.
Failure to encourage this kind of open dialogue unwittingly discourages the very people that companies seek to motivate. Organizations where employees are scared to talk to their supervisors and unwilling to share how they really feel about their jobs, are also companies full of “clock-punchers” who feel stuck in their careers. I notice that these are often the same companies in which senior managers openly fret about the lack of “bench strength.”
At The Bailey Group, we define employee engagement as “a personal connection employees have to their job, organization, manager or team that motivates them to excel in their work.” Engaged employees are easy to recognize: they bring their full selves to work, exude positive energy, consistently seek ways to improve, and are upbeat and committed.
For many employees at all levels, engagement comes from within. Some workers will be engaged no matter which organization they work for. But for many others—more than 50% of the workforce, by most estimates—engagement never happens. Those employees deserve some of the responsibility, of course, but companies can take real-world action steps to help them find that personal connection to their work.
Creating an environment that encourages engaging conversations between employees and their managers is a critical component of any engagement plan. We need to engage employees in conversations about their talent, ask them about their passion, and help them learn how to explore opportunities for job renewal. “It’s as much about the act of conversations as it is about the outcome of those conversations.” (Performance Improvement Solutions, 2005)
