Of all the other functions that HR professionals are required to deal with, employee engagement becomes one of the most difficult cases to define and measure. There are times when HR leaders think that they have done their best and in turn, expect positive responses from employees.
In such situations, it would be safe to assume that employee engagement and retention strategy goes along well. However, only later do you discover the lack of employee engagement, when the rate of voluntary turnover remains high, showcasing that the workforce is highly disengaged on job.
Disengagement is not only bad to ensure employee retention and company branding, but it also poses a risk of disrupting overall business goals. Since actively disengaged employees tend to be less committed to achieving and completing the business plan, they are not motivated to perform their best on job.
If it keeps continuing, it will greatly affect company’s productivity and thus bring bad impact on long-term goals. In order to optimise better human capital, HR needs to be attentive in recognising any forms of issue that triggers to disengagement at work. Here are two things you can do for a start:
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Implement open and honest communication
Maybe this is something beyond HR department’s capability, but based on a study in 2013, 49 percent respondents stated that their managers or supervisors were the main reasons behind workforce disengagement. While it is not so surprising, the survey highlights the fact that healthy relationship between employer and employee is the first thing to build for a better engagement strategy.
Many people might think that good salary, healthy company culture, and fun work environment are keys to guarantee employee engagement. However, if these compensations are not supported with conducive workplace relationships, employees will be more than willing to leave any time.
Thus, the inharmonious relationship between managers and staff should be the first area that needs to be fixed. Most common problems such as lack of trust, confidence, and respect to senior leaders will only lead to further issues, so HR department should take immediate action.
One of the method to solve this problem is by implementing an open and honest communication between every element in the organization. Make sure that any policies and regulations have been propagated clearly to the taskforce such that there is no misunderstanding between one another. Communicate any possibly arising problems with all stakeholders so that everyone can share their thoughts on the issue openly and transparently.
Pay attention to small issues
It is understandable that HR department has a lot of work loads, which makes it highly impossible for them to deal with small and trivial concerns. The problem is, all big problems most often emerge from smaller issues that have been left unattended for long periods of time. Therefore, HR professionals should start paying more attention to certain issues, that are considered insignificant and tend to be overlooked.
One of the most effective strategy for employee engagement is to attend to neglected and ignored concerns of employees for extended periods of time. For example, if you realise that a certain employee is speaking ill about colleagues in the workplace and spreading rumors, then you should investigate the matter further to find out truth.
Through this approach, every misunderstanding can be cleared through effective communication in the team and no one will be hurt. While this might sound like a petty issue (everyone loves gossiping sometime, right?), so do not let negativity make room for itself in the workplace culture with groundless rumours and baseless discussions creeping into the system.
Read also: Gift Your Employees Work-Life Balance this Year
