Today’s workforce
If you look at the workforce right now, you’ll see a myriad of different people. Different ages, races, beliefs.
Multiple generations of workers are collaborating which is kind of a first, so Emplify decided to dive deeper to see what drives and motivates employees to stay engaged.
Vistage Executive Network
Emplify recently released its inaugural report on employee engagement, identifying trends and culture gaps based on a 750 employee sample from the Vistage Executive Network. Participants all received the Amplify Insights metric, and represented industries like B2B services, Construction, Healthcare, and Manufacturing. A couple of highlights from this research:
- Shared values and friendship was lowest amongst employees who had stayed at the same company for over ten years. In a multigenerational workforce, this means that newer employees are coming in with value systems much different than older incumbents in the organization.
- 18.4% of employees felt disengaged, or extremely disengaged. And those 20% are a big part of productivity loss.
- New employees in the 2-3 year range and employees in the advanced stage of their career struggle with the need for learning opportunities. The lack of Formal training programs, even simple mentoring programs, is a factor in this matter.
- Employees in the 2-3 year gap had challenges related to purpose, utilization, and role clarity.
Emplify makes a couple of different recommendations, which yield two critical insights:
- Social opportunities and relationship building will be essential. Utilize company lunches, picnics, or social hours to encourage people to communicate in an informal setting. In addition, company team challenges or team projects create opportunities to build relationships and support networks even across intergenerational teams, which will drive engagement and retention for those employees.
- Professional development, growth, and promotion opportunities are foremost on the minds of employees. Investing in your employees’ growth is going to be essential. But even if you don’t have the big budget.
Assessing where you’re at
What is most important, however, may be the most understated – you need to be assessing your employees and assess them regularly. Data about your employees will empower you to make the best decisions and understand what your employees need to stay engaged.
Disengaged workers lack drive or focus, and give you a smaller return on your investment, and often lead to staffing challenges in regards to training.
Our diverse, intergenerational workforce demands engagement, and collecting that data, interpreting that data, using industry best practices and successes in weighing decisions, and then making the best decision possible is how to meet that demand. Engagement is a precursor to excellence, so get those surveys ready!
#EngageYourPeople
