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March 31, 2008

Engage Employees By Communicating the "We" and the "Me" Messages

We recently came across an interesting case study on what not to forget when communicating with employees about change. What was very intriguing about this case was the fact that the company had communicated very well the basic change messages. The company had adequately prepared the employees for the change. They helped them to understand the change and they had communicated in more personal ways, which made everyone feel that the company was being both up-front and honest about what was happening and why. So what did they miss?

According to the employees, Management had communicated the “we” messages very well. So why were so many employees feeling disengaged? Well, interestingly enough the company had fallen short in delivering messages about how the change would impact the employee personally.

What did the employees want from Management? They wanted to know:
  • How the change would be integrated and how it would affect them directly.
  • Which rules and policies would remain the same and which would be different and why.
  • What would be expected of them after the change took place.
  • What performance expectations, if any, would change?

    While many of the employee asks were fairly simple, a failure to answer how the change would impact them personally caused much discontentment within the company. Individuals felt that the change was very different than they expected and they were having a very difficult time adapting to or embracing the change.

Here is a simple lesson that we think all companies should think about when making changes that will affect the employee base. Be sure to create messages that will address not only the “we” (why we are doing this as a company), but also the “me” (how it will impact each employee personally). Creating messages that address both the “we” and the “me” will go a long way towards building employee engagement.

Let us know your thoughts.

 

Posted by Judy McLeish at 12:15 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

March 14, 2008

Does Your Company Link Engagement to Business Performance?

  • greigaitken.jpgA recent interview conducted by Kate Hilpern with Greig Aitken, Head of Human Capital Strategy at the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), identified that many employers regularly survey their staff on how happy they are, but only a few actually make the link between engagement and business performance. According to Greig, he believes that the translation of employee engagement into shareholder value is the missing opportunity at a number of companies.

     

    "Knowing that the engagement score of a particular segment of your organisation is 89% is absolutely meaningless unless you understand how you can improve it and what benefits there are to improving it." 

We can’t agree more with Greig Aitken. Too many companies simply take a scatter-gun approach to improving employee engagement levels rather than focusing on the levers that truly drive business performance in their company.  So what does RBS do to tie employee engagement results to business performance?

  • At RBS, every business unit knows its measure of employee engagement, and every measure is underpinned by management actions that will impact directly on customer satisfaction and business performance.
  • The group calculates an 'engagement index' from the annual employee survey, measuring three key areas: employees' desire to say positive things about RBS, to stay with the company, and to go the extra mile to contribute to business success.
  • Once the survey findings have been identified (RBS also draws information from joiners' and leavers' surveys, as well as local 'pulse' surveys), it can build a model of 10 engagement 'drivers'. This feeds back into how the company manages performance, indicating the top three issues staff need to work on, as well as the three they are currently good at, but need to keep an eye on.
  • "One of the main things that our work has highlighted so far is that three businesses with the same engagement score don't necessarily have the same three reasons to improve”.
  • The index also enables RBS to examine specific business units, or specific segments of staff - for example by tenure, location and seniority. All of this is supported by the RBS human capital toolkit, a suite of interactive HR tools available to more than 1,000 HR staff on the group's intranet. There is even a human capital board backing up the entire strategy.
  • RBS has reported a 45% increase in job satisfaction over the past three years.
     

Now ask yourself whether your organization is effectively linking employee engagement results to business performance.

Posted by Judy McLeish at 01:45 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

March 13, 2008

Wal-Mart's Check Out Blog Does Not Challenge Traditional Model

On March 7th, we wrote a blog about Wal-Mart's new Check Out blog. At the time, we asked whether or not this type of corporate blogging could turn the traditional model of blogging upside down, as it claimed that the blog encouraged its merchants to speak frankly about the products the chain carries.

Today, we received an email for Eric Bull, Press Assistant, Wal-Mart Watch who stated that "we feel that the blog is probably not as "unfiltered" as some people think it is." He sent over a recent blog link highlighting that the corporate bloggers are subject to company blogging rules.

While, we would agree that this type of corporate blog doesn't turn the traditional model on its head, it is in our opinion reponsible blogging by a corporation. Company bloggers need to follow rules and regulations to ensure that they don't comprise the integrity of the corporation or its confidentiality rules and policies.

Thank you Eric for the link and the email.

Posted by Judy McLeish at 03:41 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Quote of the Day

QuoteMarch13.bmp  "I don't mind coming to work, 

 

But that eight hour wait to go home is a bitch."

 

 

Posted by Judy McLeish at 09:19 AM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

An Interview with David Zinger

Thank you to David Zinger for asking us to do an interview on our ten rules of employee engagement. David has been someone who has spearheaded much of the discussion around employee engagement.  

We were very honoured to share our thoughts on employee engagement and what we believe are the keys to creating a culture that fosters employee engagement. Have a look at our interview here.  

 

 

Posted by Judy McLeish at 07:24 AM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

March 12, 2008

Is Your Organization Offering Worthwhile Work?

A spring 2008 study conducted by the communications consultancy CHA has highlighted a very interesting 21st century reality – over three quarters of working people in the UK are looking for more worthwhile work.

What do they mean by worthwhile work? For work to be worthwhile they identified two things: they want to contribute to society and they want to make the most of their talents.
 

Contributing to society was found to be particularly important for the 26-45 year olds. The top three definitions of worthwhile work offered by the respondents were as follows:

  • Contributing to society
  • A job I can do well
  • A job I can be proud of

    What is interesting about this study is how the views of employees change over time.

Employees highlighted that when they started working they were looking for:
  • A good salary
  • A job they could do well
  • Developing their skills

    However, as they settle into their working lives, the concern over earning a good salary recedes and their focus turns to their contribution to society – and this was true in every age group.

So if this is the case, what can your organization do to demonstrate that you offer “worthwhile work”?

  1. Talk about the impact that your goods and services have on society or about their economic contribution.
  2. Help the individual understand their role and how they can make a visible difference to the organization and those they serve.
  3. Highlight your career opportunities and outline how an individual can make the most of their talents.  

Posted by Judy McLeish at 01:32 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

March 11, 2008

Have You Lost Sight of What it is Like to Be a Grunt?

We loved the article by Joel Spolsky, Inc. Magazine. It was titled “A general’s pep talk taught me that a leader can’t lose sight of what it means to be a grunt.” We agree with Joel, that far too many Executives have lost sight of what it really feels like to be on the frontline!

He starts the article off by explaining what it is like in an infantry sergeant training course. “It was 1986. I was on a six-month infantry sergeant training course and dead tired. During basic training, our officers had been tough on us, but they were usually pretty good about letting us get at least six hours of sleep each night. For sergeant training, though, the officers would let us go to bed at around midnight, but we had to wake up each morning at 4. And somewhere in those four hours of rest, we each had to serve half an hour of guard duty. Worse, because we did not train on the Sabbath, we essentially drilled for 30 hours straight on Thursdays and Fridays. We were perpetually exhausted; we walked around like zombies during exercises--exercises that involved the use of live ammunition, no less--and the lack of sleep was starting to seriously impede our performance. People were upset, and it was more than just the usual soldier grumbling.” According to Joel, it was a “pep talk” from the brigadier general that highlighted that he had truly lost touch…

"Though his talk was well intentioned and interesting, most of us troops struggled to keep our heavy eyelids from closing. Finally, the speech drew to an end, and the general offered to answer any questions we may have had. "What problems are you having?" he asked. "I'm here to solve them for you."

At that point, one soldier toward the back of the crowd raised his hand. "We're not getting enough time to sleep during this exercise," he said. "We're getting about three hours a night. People are starting to make dangerous mistakes with live ammo because they're so groggy." "Ah!" the general smiled. "This is not a problem. You can always find time to sleep. For example, I sleep in the car on the way from place to place." He wasn't kidding, either. As you can imagine, the effect he hoped to have did not come through. No, sir; actually, we can't find time to sleep, we thought. That's what we're telling you. We don't have free time, and we don't have drivers: We hike everywhere, with 40 pounds of gear on our backs. Long after the general drove off, we remained astonished that he was so cut off from the experience of the troops. Did he actually think we were exhausted because it never occurred to us to sleep in the back of our chauffeured cars! This is a wonderful example of what happens far too often. Leaders lose sight of what it is like to work in the trenches. Their pay is so inflated that they lose sight of reality – of what it is truly like to be struggling on the salary that they pay to a majority of their workers. The workers who are just trying to survive!

This is one of my personal pet-peeves with the Executive Suite. Far too often, they lose sight of what it is like to actually work for the company they are running. Somehow they allow themselves to simply lose touch with the majority of their employees. They fail to walk around, talk to, or even experience the day-to-day reality of most of their workers. This causes them to lose touch with their most valuable assets - their employees.

Thank you Joel for providing such a powerful example.

 

 

 

Posted by Judy McLeish at 09:38 AM | | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

March 07, 2008

New Corporate Blog Challenges Model – View “Check Out” from Wal-Mart!

A new corporate blog turns the traditional model upside down. Rather than relying on the polished views of high-level executives – General Motors, Dell and Boeing – it is written by little-known buyers, largely without editing.

 

The site is called Check Out and it is encourages its merchants to speak frankly about the products the chain carries. “This is a blog, simply, about a team of experts at Wal-Mart and Sam's Club who have really cool jobs working with gadgets, games, sustainability and more. Even better, these jobs are centered on helping people save money and live better.”

 

The Web site has become a forum for rants about gadgets, raves about new video games and advice about selecting environmentally sustainable food. “The result is an intensely personal window into the lives, preferences and quirks of the powerful tastemakers at Wal-Mart, the nation’s largest retailer, who have spent years shielded from public view.”

 

According to Wal-Mart, the site helps buyers solicit quick feedback from consumers on the merchandise — and tries to show a softer more personal side of the giant company.

 

“We are real people, and that gets lost in the to and fro of business,” said Nick Agarwal, a Wal-Mart communications official who helped develop the blog. “It puts real personality out there in a real conversation.”

 

Very interesting content – go check it out!

 

Posted by Judy McLeish at 09:11 AM | | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

March 06, 2008

The Employee Disengagement Curve

How many companies are focusing on keeping their employees feeling that they are lucky to work at their organization? According to the OECD, the average tenure of a U.S. worker is only 4 years meaning that organizations have less and less time to create and keep employees highly engaged. What is your engagement strategy?

Thank you to David Armano for inspiring the Employee Disengagement Curve. Have a look at his Novelty Curve.  DisengagementCurve.jpg

Posted by Judy McLeish at 12:10 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

March 05, 2008

Virgin's Crown Jewels

Virgin's vision is to become the most exciting company in the world. Have a look at this presentation by their group brand manager for customer service, Michael Murphy. Adherence to core values, consistently living the customer experience and putting the employee first are all reasons why this company continues to dominate. Be sure to view Slide 18 - and then ask yourself whether your company would pass the "Acid Test".

Posted by Judy McLeish at 11:57 AM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

March 04, 2008

Meet Chris Blatnick - An Employee Evangelist!

spreadingtheword.jpgEvery company should strive to have at least "one" Chris Blatnick on their team. Why? He is what we would call a true employee evangelist.

An employee evangelist is someone who believes so much in the company they work for and the products they sell that they passionately commit themselves to them. The evangelist becomes both an internal advocate and external sales force with the sole purpose of promoting the product or service that they love.

We think you will be astonished at the passion, energy and commitment that Chris has put into promoting Lotus Notes.
 

We were very fortunate in that Chris agreed to do an interview with us. We asked Chris a series of questions to help better understand the mindset of an employee evangelist.
 

Background: Chris now works Lotus Software. Lotus is part of IBM, within their software group. Chris was a user of the Lotus products for many years and became the de facto evangelist at each company he worked at.  Being in this role has served him well and he believes that it was one factor in him obtaining the job at IBM.  Besides his day job, Chris runs the Interface Matters blog, where he write posts and shares code that helps Lotus Notes developers learn about best practices around user interface design.
 

We asked Chris five questions to help better understand the mindset of an employee evangelist. Here are his answers to the questions.


1. What does it mean to be an evangelist?

I definitely consider myself an evangelist of the Lotus brand.  I have seen the tremendous business benefits that implementing the Lotus technologies in the correct way can bring to a company and I love to share this experience with others.   Basically, I have a passion for what Lotus software brings to the table and I feel like I need to tell everyone about it and help people become more proficient when using it.   This passion manifests itself in many ways. 
 

For example, in my previous job for a large, international company, we had an enterprise-wide deployment of Lotus Notes.  We used it for our e-mail system as well as for thousands of situational applications around the business.  Even though it was a tool that many employees spent a good part of their day in, we provided very little in the way of training.   I knew that there were so many good features going unused since people didn't know about them and I observed employees performing certain tasks in obtuse ways because they were unaware of the correct tools to use.  Because of this, I decided to start a grassroots campaign to educate people.  Since our training department couldn't afford to put a formal program together, I came up with the idea for a monthly lunchtime session which we coined the "Lotus Notes Power Hour".  During this session, I invited employees to join in (either in our training room at the corporate office or remotely via web conference) as I explored various functional parts of Notes.  This was a completely voluntary event but it was enormously successful.   People loved learning about these "new" features and they felt that the sessions provided immediate benefit in that they could start being more productive right away.   I actually invested a lot of my own time in putting these sessions together each month, but as an evangelist I felt that the payback to our company and our employees was completely worth it.  Not only did people become more productive with the software, but they actually liked it much more and some even started showing others a few of the key features.  This was very exciting to me!   

Part of being a self-proclaimed evangelist is getting the message out to as many people as possible.  Sometimes you are "preaching to the choir" but it's great when you can share that vision with a wider audience.  While I loved helping people internally, I always felt there was more I could contribute.  Lotus Notes has a vibrant on-line community, with many bloggers sharing their knowledge and thousands of people around the world participating in various web forums.  Two years ago I started my own blog and began spreading the word by participating in some of the major Lotus conferences as an industry speaker.  I've really enjoyed the opportunities I've had to interact with people from all over the world via my blog and like to think that my efforts have helped strengthen the Lotus brand in some small way.

 
2. What do you think companies can do to create employee evangelists?

Certainly I think that many companies would be well served by creating actual positions with "evangelist" in their title.  Evangelists not only help promote the brand or product that they are passionate about, but they help build goodwill within their community or sphere of influence.  These are the people that hang out in product message boards sharing their knowledge with others and answering the tough questions or the folks that tell all their friends, families and associates about how cool their company's stuff is.  
 

Although I'm sure most companies would love to have every one of their employees be evangelists, the truth is that it often takes a lot of work.  By creating a true position for employee evangelists, these employees could dedicate themselves to the cause without feeling that they have to go it all alone.  If this idea is not a possibility, companies could still help employee evangelists in small ways.  Perhaps they could give them a sneak preview of upcoming products or enhancements (under an NDA, of course).  Maybe the marketing department could give them a supply of t-shirt or other give-away items (people love tchotchkes!).  The evangelist does what he or she does because of love for the product, but any kind of support that the company can give to aid them in their cause would most definitely be welcome.  Whatever you do, make sure you let them know that their efforts are appreciated.  This is often the only thanks they ever need.
 

3. Are there any companies out there that are fostering employee evangelists? If so, which company and what are they doing?

Since I'm in the tech industry, I know that some of the big computer companies out there have been cultivating an employee evangelist culture.  I work for Lotus now (see...evangelism really pays off!) and we are putting some effort into that area.   I just started to get involved in an internal community within the greater IBM company whose goal it is to empower all IBM employees to better use our Lotus tools.  We do this through lunch-and-learn sessions, web conferences and one-on-one coaching.  I think this is going to be very successful.  Microsoft is another company well-known for their employee evangelists.  They are actually one of the employers that have people dedicated to this role.  The evangelist's role within Microsoft is to travel to customer events and industry conferences, participate in online groups, etc. and share their passion with others.  This has certainly paid off for Microsoft, as they have a very dedicated developer community. 


4. What has Lotus done to help foster your continued evangelism?

One of the most important things I think Lotus has done in recent years to make me even more of a true believer is that they really began to open up to the entire community.  By that I mean that we saw a movement toward involving the community in more of the product development lifecycle.  Lotus Notes recently released version 8 of the software and this version is a radical leap forward from an end-user perspective.   Lotus realized that the success of this release hinged on getting actual user feedback and interaction, so they mobilized the community like never before.  They conducted many, many user interviews, asked for feedback on a community facing blog, and so on. 
 

This desire to get the product right by actually engaging the people that use it really struck a cord with me and made me more passionate about the company than ever before.  In fact, it inspired me to finally pursue a job with Lotus and I am now very happily spreading the word as a Lotus employee!

5. Do you believe that employee evangelists have common traits? If so what do you think they are?

I think that employee evangelists are basically cut from the same cloth in many respects.  First and foremost, they are passionate in delivering the message, whether it be for a product or service, because they truly believe in what they are endorsing.   You can't fake this part, because most people can see right through the facade.  

I suggested before that companies should go so far as creating actual evangelist positions within their enterprise, but the most important part of this exercise would be getting the right people in the job.  They can't just throw the title at someone and expect them to perform well in the role.  Rather, the title should follow as a direct extension of the work that they are already doing on their own. 

I believe evangelists also have an innate desire to help other people.  That desire, coupled with their sincere belief in the product or service they love, helps drive them to become an evangelist in the first place.  They also are generally very motivated people.  Being an evangelist is not just a 9 to 5 job.  Rather, that person puts in the extra time and effort that it takes to preach the message to others.

Thank you Chris for such agreeing to do an interview with us. Your passion and commitment is proof that companies should spend more time promoting a culture that supports employee evangelists! Your passion and commitment is truly inspiring!

Posted by Judy McLeish at 01:28 PM | | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

March 03, 2008

Are You Adding the Virtual World to Your Interview Process?

avatar.jpgHave you ever heard of Second Life? It is a 3D virtual online digital world imagined, created and owned by its residents.

So how does this virtual world link to corporate recruiting?

The use of Second Life for recruiting is another way that employers are incorporating popular Web sites into their talent searches. Employers have set up pages for prospective hires on social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace and on the video-sharing site, YouTube. A handful of companies are now spreading their brands to Web-based social networking communities like Second Life. According to Second Life, much of the virtual recruitment is done through online job fairs. TMP Worldwide Advertising & Communications, an advertising firm in New York, held two virtual job fairs last year, events that included Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft, Verizon Communication and Bain & Company.

Interesting – but what value does a virtual interview really have? Conducting virtual job fairs or interviews:

  • Demonstrates a candidates’ affinity for technology.
  • Shows prospective candidates that the company is progressive or “cool”.
  • Is more cost effective than a face-to-face interview.

    • While it may be cool to say to a candidate that you are holding a virtual job fair or interview process – this would certainly not be appealing or relevant to all. We think that companies should not apply a one-size fits all recruiting program to attract new talent but should continue to leverage a combination of the new and traditional methods such as; telephone, videoconferences, face-to-face meetings, interviews and social networking sites to find the best talent.

    Let us know what you think.

     

Posted by Judy McLeish at 10:08 AM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)