Top 5 Ways To Increase Employee Engagement

It’s no surprise that higher employee engagement leads to greater productivity, lower employee turnover, and higher profitability. Investing in your employees and paying ample attention to engagement levels will have both short- and long-term positive effects. Consistent employee engagement requires a plan of action and measurable goals. You can increase this starting today within your own organization. If your engagement is down, assess and tackle the following.

#1: Align Leadership

No significant change can take place unless it’s guided from the top down. Leaders need to set an example if they want their teams to become more actively involved at work. Do your leaders show up on time and prepared for meetings? Are they active participants in company training and educational events?

List specific ways you’d like your top-level team members to perform and hold them accountable to the activities and expectations. Many times influential team members are the ones who do not truly engage and it affects the company as a whole. When positive engagement behaviors are outlined and adhered to, a ripple effect can take place.

#2: Create Visibility

A divide in a company between employees and executive leadership causes distrust and lack of communication. Be as transparent as possible with everyone in the company with regards to the organization’s goals, achievements, and contributions. Your management team should be accessible, approachable, and ready to meet individually with employees to discuss concerns and challenges. Decide the type of communication you want to have and how often it should be scheduled and distributed. Consistency is the driving force that will allow people to trust, open up, and more fully engage.

#3: Show Appreciation

Appreciation at work is one of the top ways to get employees to become more involved. The key is to understand how employees like to be appreciated. Take a poll, ask employees in team meetings, do whatever it takes to find out how people like to be appreciated most. To start, keep in mind a genuine “thank you” can go a long way for someone who deserves credit for a job well done.

#4: Demonstrate Accountability

Accountability is necessary for any company to succeed. It’s not a one-time initiative or something that can run on its own. It requires ongoing communication and action. Without it, an organization struggles. Take a pulse on how connected employees feel to their tasks, to their role, to the company? Companies must guide managers to be active in building engagement plans with goals to track progress.

#5: Eliminate Roadblocks

Visibility, appreciation, and demonstrated accountability are all things you can provide your team in order to succeed. However, it’s equally important to address roadblocks. Roadblocks in a company include lack of structure, outdated systems, naysayers, and lack of training. Unfortunately, many organizations don’t invest the time or money necessary to set employees up for success. The roadblocks remain and employee engagement continues to dwindle.

Engage to Be Better

Increasing employee engagement requires more than simply checking the boxes of tactics to try and roadblocks to remove. It’s not enough to change a few things and correct certain behaviors without giving the full effort to each task. Likely it will take several tries before you can advance to the next phase. An attempt is not the same as an accomplishment.

Leading through change by prioritizing culture and employee engagement will improve your culture and help you build stronger teams. Once you have the tools in place to take hold of change in your company, gather the people and create the processes that can put them to good use. Employee engagement is a reflection of your business. Give it the attention it deserves.

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