Employee Engagement: Tips to improve employee engagement
Prioritizing employee engagement is a crucial part of establishing a successful work environment. Companies that take advantage of employee engagement experience less job turnover, work together better and have happier and productive employees than companies who neglect to make employee engagement a priority. Figuring out creative ways to incorporate employee engagement into the office might seem time-consuming but it doesn’t have to be. Here are some helpful tips to improve employee engagement in your office today.
- A great way to start off is to hold your office to certain core values. When training a new hires or staff member, go over your company policies and values to make sure everyone in the office is on the same page. Ensure you have a proper onboarding procedure in place. You can increase employee engagement right from day one. At the beginning of company-wide meetings, briefly cover the company values. Including a code of values and appropriate work behavior in your manual and in an easily accessible online platform for employees to rely on is a way to insure that employee behavior is held to a standard your company values. Setting a standard of values and behavior for your company culture leads to a comfortable and respectful workspace for everyone. This can also help motivate disengaged employees and make for a more engaged workforce.
- A tip that works every time is establishing employee engagement centered around teamwork. From the get-go, when a new employee feels as though they are a part of a team and can comfortably look towards their peers for guidance, their first couple of weeks in the office will be a breeze. Mentorship programs and professional development courses are a great way for job training and coworker-to-coworker advice goes hand in hand. Match each new employee with somebody in their department with more experience who can be their go-to man or woman in that first couple of weeks. Mentorship will also help to establish office-wide friendships and an overall sense of community throughout the office.
- The third tip for teamwork-focused employee engagement is to ask for feedback. At the end of each week or month, send out a reflection survey for members of the staff to report back on all aspects of the office, from the environment to their work, and leave comments and suggestions. These employee surveys could be anonymous to promote more honest answers, or, strictly just department-specific. Asking for employee feedback ensures employees that their opinions and experiences in the office are valued and important. Often suggestions and feedback from these kind of surveys can also help improve a company’s bottom line if there is something fundamentally wrong with the working environment that has been overlooked by the management team.
- One of the easiest ways to ensure that your employees are engaged is to make work fun. Recognizing your employee’s accomplishments via social media, work-wide emails, or simply in person at their desks is a great way to remind your employees that their hard work pays off and is valued in the office. Celebrating good work for those who have gone the extra mile, on a regular basis can improve job satisfaction and increase engagement. Providing extra perks for great work is also good for employee recognition and making employees feel valued.
- Oftentimes, a bland office, with little to no natural light and decorations can have a negative impact on the mood and performance of employees. Brighten up your office with artwork, pictures, greenery and specialized items that will add color and character to the walls. An aesthetically pleasing workspace will help employees to feel comfortable and at home in the office.
- The office environment itself might seem insignificant in an employee’s experience, but it is actually crucial for one’s ability to engage properly. Establishing a workspace or a cubicle that is clean, quiet, and collaborative can be done so in a couple of ways: the first being to hold employees to a certain standard of cleanliness. Make each team member responsible for disposing of trash and encourage everybody to eat together in the break room at lunch to both bring people together and avoid food and mess at individual desks. Designate a room in the office as a “quiet space”, a place where employees can escape to when the office gets too loud and they need to focus. Be flexible and understanding with your employee’s time, and schedule by allowing reasonable flexibility when an employee is late or makes a mistake. Promoting this kind of environment that is a safe space for employees to focus, work, and feel comfortable working in every day will lead to higher job-retention rates, and encourage employees to recommend your company and others like it.
There are quite a few different employee engagement strategies that you can employ in your business. Pick the ones you think will work best in your kind of company. By following these processes you can improve engagement levels and get better engaged employees.
