​A 2019 survey of 400+ U.S. internal communicators at organizations with more than 1,000 employees found:

• 75% of respondents were spending more budget on employee engagement than they were two years ago
• 85% of respondents said that it’s a challenge to measure whether internal communications have a positive effect on employee engagement
• Bottom line - companies were making employee engagement a greater priority than ever before—yet they still can’t successfully measure whether their investment is delivering results.

Internal communicators play an important role in employee engagement.  Their skills and abilities are absolutely critical to assist leaders and organizations to:

• develop and refine core messaging
• customize content and suggested delivery for audiences
• develop and execute plans to ensure information timeliness, frequency, and consistency
• create effective and efficient internal communication processes
• support, coach, and remind leaders of the importance of communication   

BUT, an internal communicators’ role in employee engagement and communication is only part of the story. Internal communicators must actively partner with leaders. Leaders must be strong and active role models in communication and engagement. They can’t be passive or simply delegate responsibility to others.  
  
Based on 15+ years of studying, researching, planning strategy, and most importantly successfully executing employee engagement initiatives, I believe it’s a ‘game changer’ when high expectations and accountability are placed on leaders in these two areas (communication and engagement).
 Let’s remember:

• There is a huge difference between information and communication. Information is giving out.  Communication is getting through.  Many employees today are bombarded with information, especially through the use of new technologies, but starving for understanding. Leaders can ‘feed’ this need.

 

• Most communication is non-verbal. We look for facial expressions, body language, eye contact, hand gestures, as well as listen for tone, inflection, and loudness in communication. Leaders can either add or reduce the credibility of the information provided. 

 

• Communication has at least key three steps – share information; generate understanding; and reinforce key messages. Leaders are the linchpin for steps #2 and #3.

 

• To maximize engagement organizations must balance high tech and high touch communication. High touch (interpersonal) is best when we need to persuade, make tough decisions, have frank conversation on behavior or performance, and develop or mend a relationship. Leaders have the largest opportunity to deliver high touch communication.

 

• Effective communication should help each employee better understand what they need to stop, start, or continue doing (behaviors and performance). Who best to clarify and connect the dots (create alignment) then their immediate supervisor?

 

• Formal surveys are only one way to measure employee engagement.  There are many informal ways leaders can keep their finger on the engagement pulse.  Leaders can look for patterns of behavior including employees:
  • Consistently arriving right at start of shift and leaving as soon as the clock strikes quitting time
  • Physically attending meetings but mentally checking out by not paying attention or participating
  • Willingly wearing or carrying items (clothing, backpacks, folders, pens, etc.) with your business name or logo on it
  • Referring potential candidates for openings within your team – being advocates
  • Participating in recent optional or voluntary events and activities

Poor communication limits an organization’s ability to optimize performance. Please don’t scan, skim, or skip over a critical part of the communication/employee engagement story. Don’t overlook arguably the most important piece – leaders’ ability to effectively communicate.   It could have a HUGE impact on your story’s ending. 

I’ve always been drawn to the photo above and its caption – The world is changed by our example, not by our opinion. This month a SIGNIFICANT opinion was changed and documented by nearly 200 CEOs on the “purpose of a corporation.”  I applaud this first step.

These CEOs are part of the Business Roundtable, an association of chief executive officers of America’s leading companies.  In total, these CEO members lead companies with more than 15 million employees and more than $7 trillion in annual revenue.  Here’s the radical change:

• Since 1997, this group of corporate leaders has agreed on a principle – "The paramount duty of management and boards of directors is to the corporation’s stockholders." The interest of other stakeholders was "only relevant as a derivative of the duty to stockholders."
  
• Now this influential group is broadening its definition. It suggests ALL stakeholders should be considered in business decisions for the future success of companies, communities, and our country. More specifically:
  • Delivering value to customers.
  • Investing in employees.
  • Dealing fairly and ethically with suppliers.
  • Supporting the communities in which they work.
  • Generating long-term value for shareholders.

Some corporations will immediately point out their core values as evidence they are already “walking the talk.” But here’s a reality check - that’s just the SAY portion of the equation.  The DO (actions and behaviors) is equally if not more important.  Ultimately when the SAY and DO are aligned we usually GET a positive result or perception.  When they are inconsistent and/or misaligned there is increased risk of credibility, trust, character, and reputation.

Consider that it’s easy to SAY:

• “Meet or exceed customer expectations” but what does your organization DO when there are specific delivery or reliability issues? 
• “Deal fairly and ethically with suppliers” but what does your organization DO when significant, non-forecasted demand spikes or drops?     
  
• “Invest in employees” but what does your organization DO when positions are outsourced / streamlined / eliminated?  Does the work get reduced or simply reallocated to already busy staff?    
  

Here are four additional, practical steps I hope that many organizations will consider and then DO.

1. CLARIFY which principle their organization embraces – exclusive or inclusive stakeholder(s).  Then document it and communicate it broadly internally and externally.
2. ACTIVELY MEASURE and proactively address how frequently “stakeholder sweet spots” are hit (where action benefits multiple stakeholders at the same time compared to one exclusively)?
   
3. INCREASE ACCOUNTABILITY and start with leaders.  Accountability should be a personal choice, to proactively influence, take ownership, and deliver desired results. If one or more stakeholders are getting little to no attention, resources, or action – address it. 
4. ASK DIFFERENT QUESTIONS.  Consider questions such as, how many of your current employees:
   1. Need to have a second job (full-time and/or part-time) in order to make ends meet?
      
   2. Qualify for and/or depend on any type of government assistance to survive (food, childcare, healthcare, etc.)?
      
   3. Would voluntarily leave if the right financial package were offered?
      

      
Or questions like:

1. Are we competing with our suppliers for the same limited talent pool?
2. How many suppliers are too dependent on us?
3. How is our benefits strategy impacting local community health care services and costs?
4. How have mergers and acquisitions impacted local community primary and secondary education institutions?

The Business Roundtable’s new policy statement on the “purpose of a corporation” acknowledges each individual company serves its own corporate purpose. What business executives and Board of Directors will step out and truly model Benjamin Franklin’s famous quote - “Well done is better than well said.”  Let’s see what individual businesses will actually SAY but more importantly DO regarding their purpose!

Pod D is a wing of our local cancer center where chemo treatments are given. It’s where we have spent considerable time over the past four months as my beautiful bride of 35 years battles pancreatic cancer. 

There’s nothing unique about the physical layout or equipment in Pod D. There’s lots of sterile stuff.  And, the nurses’ station with PC’s, pharmaceutical dispensing devices, IV poles, patients’ reclining chairs; and caregivers’ straight back chairs could be found in many other medical settings.   

What makes Pod D so different is the emotional environment and the people – staff, volunteers, patients, and caregivers.  Their collective attitudes and behaviors have reminded us in this time of personal anxiety, shock, and unknowns of some timeless truths. While the following seem self-evident and hardly worth mentioning – they are in fact priceless if consistently lived out in families, neighborhoods, schools, churches, and businesses.     

Here are a few truths that have been reinforced in Pod D:  

• Escaping is not optional. Pains, hurts, disappointments, and tears happen in life. We can’t escape them all by blaming others, buying something, or refusing to accept reality. But a positive attitude and mental outlook can be very helpful and healing.  Attitude is everything!
• Life is lived through perspective.  Being tethered to an IV pole or the toilet for severe side effects of chemo is excruciating. But, amazingly it feels just a little bit more bearable when you meet two brothers sitting side by side and both are getting treatment or a young father eating popsicles from his 3 year olds giraffe insulated cooler to reduce his mouth sores from his 12th chemo treatment. Even a small change in one’s perspective can change his/her outlook on a specific situation and/or life. How many things or people in life have we looked at and never really seen?
• Each step is a step. Treatment, improvement and healing are one step at a time. NO fast track. Sometimes it means reinventing a daily routine or creating a new habit. Sometimes it means celebrating small successes like fewer trips to the bathroom. But every step adds up to a bigger thing. Speed is not as important in life as direction and the will and strength to not stop.   
• Walls and fences divide and separate. Pod D has minimized any walls of bias. Patients and caregivers spend little to no time or energy on differences (like the type of cancer one has, gender, ethnicity, age, or economic status) but instead focus on what they are battling in common. Most often we exchange experiences, words of encouragement, some laughter and a few tears. There’s compassion from feeling sorry WITH people not for people.
• The secret to living is giving. A literal army of volunteers serve at the cancer center. Some are survivors. Others have lost a love one to this terrible disease. ALL of them focus on showing they care through simple acts of service. Consider the effect of giving one little word of kindness, a smile, a helping hand, or a moment of truly listening to another person. It could make the difference between a good or bad day for BOTH of you.         
• Collect memories not things. In an instance, everything in life can change. The people we have met in Pod D don’t talk about things such as job titles; houses; cars; and expensive electronic devices or clothes. They talk about memories of events and relationships. Stop waiting till tomorrow because schedules will still be jammed and the demands for your time and attention will outstrip your supply. Memories are the long-lasting adhesive that fastens pictures to the walls in our heart and mind. They can bring joy, comfort, and connection for a life-time.   

We saved the best ‘truth’ for last. Faith trumps fear. Someone once said, “Faith is seeing light with your heart when all your eyes see is darkness”. Something positive will come from my wife’s battle with cancer. So after months of chemo treatments, we head cautiously optimistic toward her June 4th Nanoknife surgery near Chicago. We have faith. So, we see light and with it hope.  

St. Augustine said it best, “The truth is like a lion. You don’t have to defend it. Let it loose. It will defend itself.”  We challenge you to let these 7 truths from Pod D loose in your life!! They will make the challenging times easier and the good times even better. And, that’s the truth!

One of the biggest blind spots and biases I have encountered in my career is the mindset – ‘ok, but that doesn’t apply to us because we are different’. Countless research findings, fundamental principles, and good techniques are often thrown out. Many organizations ultimately avoid changing how people perceive things should be done, how they interact, what they spend time improving on.  

Last month I had the honor of doing a workshop on communication at the Construction Education Institute near Chicago. We discussed common communication challenges including:

• the fundamental differences between sharing information and communication
• handling large amounts of information being exchanged because of new technology
• the criticalness of balancing high tech and high touch communication, and
• increasing awareness of individual communication styles and preferences then aligning to maximize understanding

Workshop participants determined in exercises that:

• There was too little communication to create and sustain high performance (79%)
• Their organizational grapevine needed pruning due to too much fertilizer – poor communication (92%).
• Current big wastes in their communication included: listening to better understand not reply; creating more dialog and less messages; and balancing ‘need to know’ and ‘nice to know’ information.

How would your organizational assessment of your current communication effectiveness compare – the same or different? 

Effective communication must drive outcomes – what is done, when it is done, and how consistently it is done.  Many organizations create lots of well-intended communication activities but ultimately don’t drive understanding and therefore behaviors. Personal accountability to learn and actively use proven communication skills, techniques, and processes is ‘hit or miss’ and there are limited or no consequences for avoiding or not doing it.

So, where do you start? Here are four fundamental areas that deserve time, attention, and disciple to create effective communication for high performing organizations.  

1. A strategy or plan.  Here we are talking about forethought not afterthought about some basics including: key objectives of your internal communication; messages to be shared; methods and media to use; key roles; feedback mechanisms; and success measurements.
2. Voice of the employee (VOE).  What are your employees expecting and actually experiencing with your communication efforts?  Customer feedback helps drive continuous improvement in your products and services.  Employee feedback should do the same for internal communication.
3. Key communication processes to be used.  These should include a balance of high tech and high touch.  What communication process is used for ‘breaking news’? For additional background or historical information?   For reinforcement of key messages?  Please don’t put all your communication eggs into a single process.
   
4. Standards.  As noted management expert, Joseph Juran once said, “without a standard there is no logical basis for making a decision or taking action.” For example, does your organization have standards for interpersonal communication; electronic and social media communication use; or the timing, frequency, and duration of organizational communication?                        

Research shows an organization of 100 people will spend 17 hours per week or more than $500,000 annually clarifying previous communication. Poor communication also impact internal collaboration, trust, relationships, consistency, and performance.

So is your organization really different when it comes to communication? If not, then what is proactively being done to improve its’ effectiveness?   
 
 
To learn more about Brian’s workshop on Communication download the topic description: …https://www.briangareauinc.com/uploads/3/9/0/0/39008241/wouldsomeonecommunicate-sb.pdf or contact us at 214-543-0844.
 

According to the U.S. National Resources Defense Council (NRDC), last year we threw away over 200 million pounds of turkey meat after Thanksgiving. That equates to over 6 million turkeys or more than $290M in the U.S. And, that doesn’t factor in the wasted resources (time, labor, food, water, etc.) to raise these birds. Unbelievable!

Eliminating waste (non-value) in organizations has also been and will continue to be a relentless journey. One significant mindset, practice, and framework to conserve resources and eliminate waste was the Toyota Production System (TPS). It became the precursor to Lean efforts today. In TPS, seven ‘wastes’ were originally identified. But an eighth waste – human capability (non-utilized talent, skills, and knowledge) was added when the western world adopted TPS.

Unfortunately, too often this 8th waste (human capability) gets the least amount of time and attention when implementing and sustaining most, critical continuous improvement strategies. There’s great technical alignment and execution but average to poor adoption of culture change. The result is non-sustainable results, frustration, and sometimes more waste.
 
Take a moment and reflect on the following equation:

   Current Employees’ Capabilities minus Capabilities Actually Used = Waste of Human Capability Potential

What impact would tackling human capability ‘waste’ have on your business’ customer value, quality, velocity, and cost? What ‘potential’ is untapped?

Below you will find my Waste of Human Capability Potential Assessment that is used with clients. Simply rate each question using the following scale where 1 = Little Waste; 2 = Some Waste; and 3 = Too Much Waste. Remember there is some ‘waste’ of human capability in ALL organizations.

Currently our organization’s ability to [fill in with each phrase below] creates this level of ‘waste’?  It doesn’t allow us to maximize the full potential of employees’ talents, skills, and knowledge.  

1. Communicate information then ensure its’ understanding  ___
2. Ask employees, “What do you think?” ___
3. Respect and value others (opinions, experiences, backgrounds) ___
4. Surface and respond to employees’ work related issues ___
5. Handle internal conflicts in a healthy manner ___
6. Collaborate - put diverse individuals/groups together to find new solutions to old problems ___
7. Place employees where their skills and knowledge are best utilized ___
8. Provide necessary resources (tools, technology, training, time) to ALL employees ___
9. Involve employees doing the job in daily decision-making processes ___
10. Empower employees to think and act like owners not renters ___
11. Encourage employees to learn from each other ___
12. Reinforce desired behaviors by both recognition and rewards ___
13. Proactively address both performance and behavior issues ___
14. Develop others (skills for current and future jobs) ___
15. Draw valuable lessons from past mistakes and errors ___
16. Capture best practices and lessons learned from people retiring or leaving ___

If you scored your organization a total of 16 points on the above assessment then congratulations, your organization is set up to maximize its’ workforce’s human capability potential.  If your total score was higher than 16 points then there is potential waste of employees’ heads (creative ideas and problem-solving), hearts (commitment), hands (physical work), and habits.

Let’s talk turkey (frank, straightforward, and seriously) – How much human capability ‘waste’ (untapped potential) would be uncovered in your organization if every employee honestly answered - “Are we maximizing your potential contributions to the organization? Why or why not?”     

Think back to previous Halloween evenings. Your neighborhood is filled with princesses, witches, ghosts, and superheroes going door-to-door collecting ‘treats’. Very quickly there’s information ‘on the street’ that there are full-sized candy bars at the Smiths’ house; homemade cookies at the Andersons’ house; oranges at the Holmes’ home; and pencils at the Jones’. Many kids start prioritizing which houses they will go to depending on the ‘treat’ they will or will not get. All the homes had good intentions, but some fell way short of meeting the trick-or-treaters’ expectations. The same holds true for many organization’s recognition efforts. 
        
Here’s a short, Halloween-themed assessment on real life recognition efforts I have seen in my nearly 20 years of consulting. For each scenario, determine if it was a ‘trick or treat’ specifically in regard to effective recognition practices:

1. Water popsicles were given out during shift to show appreciation for all the extra effort despite unusually high temperatures and humidity in the shop. BUT, the first day a number of employees passed. The second day EVERYONE participated because both sugar and sugar-free popsicles were made available.
Trick or Treat? 

Remember - in effective recognition, one size does not fit all.

2. Employees were thrilled with the special, free barbeque lunch served by management. There were lots of favorable comments after about the pork, sauce selections, baked beans, coleslaw, and cornbread BUT employees struggled to answer a basic question – Why are we celebrating?

Trick or Treat?

Remember – be specific as to what you are recognizing otherwise it may not be repeated.

3. A supervisor gave each project team member a colorful recognition certificate for completing the special project on time and under budget. One of the eight team members looked disappointed. The supervisor found out that he/she misspelled the employee’s names on their certificate.

Trick or Treat? 

Remember - little things mean a lot in showing appreciation!

4. A supervisor purchased ‘blank’ thank you cards and wrote personalized notes to each employee when they wanted to reinforce a specific employee behavior or result.

Trick or Treat? 

Remember – most people value personalized recognition and appreciation significantly more than generic thanks.

5. Customer feedback on an exception service recovery effort was received. The supervisor delayed communicating the feedback and recognizing the employee for two weeks – until their next scheduled staff meeting.

Trick or Treat? 

Remember – timeliness increases the perceived value of recognition.

Effective recognition is one of the key processes organizations can use to strengthen, reinforce, or increase the probability of a specific action, behavior, or result occurring. Recognition shows appreciation and thanks through non-financial means – unlike rewards which are financially based. When employees feel they have made sacrifices, put in extra effort, solved problems, and delivered results but nobody says anything, it can be perceived that ‘it just doesn’t matter.’  And, when employees feel it doesn’t matter, many will stop doing it or doing it consistently well.   

Would more effective recognition lift the ‘spirits’ in your organization?  

Have you ever heard or thought – “we can’t work in the same company.” Things just aren’t done consistently between work-groups, departments, shifts, locations, etc. – especially when it comes to people-related activities surrounding performance management. 

Leaders have different strengths, weaknesses, behaviors and personalities, so it is natural they approach performance management differently. But, all employees need to see some consistent application of both formal and informal rules for important performance activities including:

• Reinforcing good behavior and performance
• Enhancing average behavior and performance
• Correcting poor behavior and performance
• Disciplining unacceptable behavior and performance

A best practice we developed in my roles as Start-up and then Operations General Manager in a Fortune 50 corporation was a weekly ACT meeting.  Its’ focus was 100% on taking action to drive Accountability, Consistency, and Trust. This standing meeting was mandatory for anyone who had the privilege of supervising others – no exceptions. The format was a simple round-table discussion. 

First, each leader was asked to answer two sets of questions:

1. Who should we make sure to thank for their extra effort, performance, or values-based behavior this week?  Why?  (Then ALL leaders reinforced, over the next several days, by stopping - showing sincere appreciation – and reinforcing).
2. Who should we be aware of that is being corrected or disciplined?  Why?

And then, a final exercise was done where one specific policy or procedure in the employee handbook was reviewed by the on-site HR specialist.  This helped create a common interpretation and execution.

What we initially found, through healthy dialog and debate, were that leaders had lots of different tolerance levels, ignored, or made excuses for certain employee behavior and performance.  These inconsistencies created perceived favoritism, trust issues, and eroded relationships.  And, they all negatively affected performance. 

International businesswoman Margaret Heffernan once said, “for good ideas and true innovation, you need human interaction, conflict, argument, and debate.”  I would add that these same key elements are needed for creating a high performance organization with Accountability, Consistency, and Trust (ACT).

During my workshop last month at the Construction Education Institute, we discussed one of the biggest challenges in cultural change – aligning and coaching new required/desired behaviors of both employees and leaders.  Alignment is critical because it helps answer a basic question for each employee – here’s the impact you and your behavior have on the business. Bottom line – what you do and how you do it really does matter!

Common alignment issues include:

• Aligned behavior not routinely reinforced.  Many times this can lead to people believing it’s not important to continue to do a specific behavior. In addition, immediacy teaches the correlation between the positive reinforcement and new, desired behavior.  Research indicates to change a new behavior into a habit requires 17-21 times of reinforcement.  

• Inconsistent behavior not coached in a timely manner.  Consistency teaches predictability, creates trust and helps eliminate stress and confusion.  When behavior exceptions become the general rule - the ‘accepted or perceived way we do things here’ (culture) gets very fuzzy.  Fuzziness creates a loss of clarity.  Clarity is the first step in personal accountability.        
• Misaligned behavior tolerated too long. Procrastination or lack of pro-activity can set a precedent and provide for extended debates and arguments that it ‘was or use to be okay’.  Rationalizing misaligned behaviors by making excuses only allows the behavior and perceptions to continue. In addition, a leader’s overall effectiveness can be called into question by other direct reports, peers, and upper management when misaligned behavior is tolerated too long.
  
• Unacceptable behavior consumes too much time.  It absolutely takes time to properly address prolonged or blatant unacceptable behavior.  But it is important to remember, that in most cases, if a leader has already effectively explained the behavior  the employee is expected to improve, coached them on ways to improve, and allowed time for the employee to make improvement then most issues will not get to this stage.

Here are five key skills that can help you better align behavior: 

1. Dealing with differences of opinion 
2. Giving and accepting feedback
3. Creating mutual responsibility in accountability (between supervisor and employee)
4. Coaching for reinforcement, enhancement, correction, and discipline
5. Using positive reinforcement (research shows the ideal praise/criticism ratio for maximum performance is nearly 6 to 1)

Most leaders know these skills are important but struggle to properly allocate the necessary time to consistently execute them. Also, some leaders are misguided and think these skills are nice to have but not needed to be successful.  

Have your leaders mastered all five skills?  If not, then your culture has unnecessary waste, performance inefficiencies, and loses of human creativity & capability.    
       
Author Jim Collins once said, “Building a visionary company requires one percent vision and 99% alignment.”  Don’t make behavior alignment a last resort performance remedy.

If you would like to leverage some practical techniques in these five skills, then let’s connect! 

(Part 5 of a 5-part Series)

Here are more lessons learned from my eight years helping lead a global Fortune 50 corporation’s employee engagement journey. We leveraged internal best practices by:

1. Using 6 Sigma methodologies to determine statistical correlations.  6 Sigma was being used throughout the corporation to drive improvement. So, we used it too on our engagement journey. Examples included: a) Production supervisors who provided effective performance feedback; made employees feel appreciated; and solicited and valued employees' opinions and ideas had 50 percentage point or more differences in engagement than their counterparts; and b) Supervisors who were on a specific job longer, had lower supervisor to employee ratios, and used team leads had significantly higher engagement.

2. Holding monthly Engagement Exchanges.  These global conference calls had leaders whose division or facility had high engagement and/or significant year over year improve highlight tactical and practical actions they had taken. Each session was kicked off by a high-ranking executive and then passed on to middle and first line managers for more detailed discussions. Each session was recorded for future reference.

3. Hosting an annual Global Engagement Conference.  At first, everyone thought they were different due to the country they operated in, product or service they provided, function they administered, or makeup of staff. But, the conference helped people quickly discover they had much in common on this engagement journey. Networking exploded. New relationships and benchmarking started. And, the mix of people attending the conference shifted from primary HR professionals to HR and Operation professionals.  The agenda was usually 80-90% internal and 10-20% external expertise. We had over 300 people attend these global conferences.

4. Creating and celebrating the Chairman’s Engagement Award. This non-financial recognition and reinforcement was given to individual divisions and facilities for reaching engagement milestones (best-in-class, most improved, etc.). Awards (banners and trophies) were presented to winners, based on size of organization/facility and function they performed (service, marketing, operations, distribution). Extensive ‘internal press’ was given to winners through our corporate media channels. Note: at the time there were only two other Chairman’s awards – one for quality and one for safety.

5. Partnering in research studies with our survey provider.  One study compared some key performance metrics in our independent dealer branches. When we compared the engagement levels of the top 25% of branches in the study to the bottom 25% of branches, we found highly engaged branches: a) out-performed their counterparts by meeting or exceeding quarterly financial targets 40% more often; b) had 60% lower technician related rework; and c) 3 times fewer accidents. This information was then broadly shared.

How are you capturing and leveraging internal best practices to drive and sustain high levels of employee engagement?

I hope this five-part series has given you new ideas and food for thought to support your organization’s employee engagement journey. I am passionate about sharing my experience and consulting with my clients to help drive and sustain their culture and employee engagement. How can I help you? Let’s start a dialog to discuss your efforts and how I might be able to help. Please contact my Business Manager Michele Lucia at Michele@BrianGareauInc.com or 1.214.543.0844 to set up a call.  Always remember – Employee Engagement is a contact sport!     

(Part 4 of a 5-part Series)

Here are more lessons learned from my eight years helping lead a global Fortune 50 corporation’s employee engagement journey. These lessons focus on the formal measurement of employee engagement. We found engagement had to be measured:

1. As a key component of a larger process.  Research strongly indicates that measuring employee opinions ‘without’ any timely feedback on what was said or tangible actions taken, creates morale issues and increased ineffectiveness. In fact, internally we found more than 15 points higher engagement for employees who received timely feedback on survey results versus those who did not and more than 30 points higher engagement when employees saw managers take action on the survey results.

2. As a major contributor NOT sole contributor to performance improvement.  So, we conducted a global Employee Opinion Survey (EOS) that measured key strategic factors including: quality, safety, velocity, change, leadership, and engagement. This allowed us to analyze if statistical relationships and trends existed between key strategic success factors.  Each functional area (safety, quality, etc.) worked with internal and external resources to design high level survey questions that would drive high-level trends and follow-up dialog. Most functional areas asked less than five questions on our EOS.

3. By correlation versus causation.  We debated and researched this issue for several years. At the end, we concluded that when important business measurements (e.g. quality, safety, scrap, rework, attrition) were trending favorably so was engagement. We found the opposite was also true. We also stopped trying to determine if there was an absolute cause and effect with engagement. Instead we worked on creating engaging behaviors to complement our systems, processes, and philosophies of how to do business.

4. Both activities and outcomes.  Our activities were some of the key tactics that helped us achieve our desired outcomes. We tracked and monitored activities such as leaders: opening their survey results on-line; soliciting employees’ reaction and ideas to improve results; creating action plans; and completing action items. But we also measured the correlation between engagement and other key business metrics.  We found many favorable correlations between increased engagement and decreased attrition and absenteeism; improved quality and safety, increased implementation of LEAN principles; and a decline in union grievances.   

5. Consistently, so leaders who were trying to ‘game the measurement system’ had to be coached.  A few of our 7000+ leaders who received survey results tried to shift numbers in a desired direction – even though those numbers may not have reflected reality. Many tactics are mild and overt, but some are not.  Four common ‘gaming’ techniques we found were:

• selective timing of morale-boosting events (just before survey)
• withholding perceived negative news/actions until after the survey
• leading the witness, by asking questions in a manner that suggested the leader’s desired answer before taking the survey 
• trying to influence the survey rating scale. Some leaders told employees “a neutral score was bad” or “only the highest rating score counted”.

How does your employee engagement process ‘measure up’? 

Tomorrow - Lessons learned on Leveraging Success on An Employee Engagement Journey.