Employee Engagement Requires a Strategy and a Plan
By Liliana Lasso Rambo, CAPP
We often hear about the value of having engaged employees at work and how we can monetize an organization’s culture by enhancing the way employees feel at work. How do you monetize/measure the positive or negative impacts of an organization’s culture, you ask? Well, this can be measured by levels of absenteeism and turnover rates and/or high operational outputs because of a happier employee with less employee relations issues.
Increasing employee engagement starts by meeting some basic, individual, teamwork and growth needs such as the ones mentioned below.
- I know what is expected of me at work.
- I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right.
- In the last seven days, I have received recognition or praise for doing good work.
- My supervisor, or someone at work, seems to care about me as a person
- In the last six months, someone at work has talked to me about my progress
And as easy as these actions sound, there are many employees who still do not know how important their job is or how their work contributes to the overall organizational goals.
If your company is not one that has an employee engagement strategy or plan in place, it is not too late to start. The first step would be to understand where you stand by setting up a baseline which can be accomplished via a survey. Yes, I know, ANOTHER survey! But before you send out the survey, be sure to know what your next steps will be in the plan and to communicate those to your employees and most importantly, please DELIVER. Putting the adequate resources to do the survey, understanding the gaps or opportunities, and getting the remediation plan in place is the first step in the right direction to higher engagement.
Liliana L. Rambo, IAP, CM, CAPP is the Chief Terminal Management Officer for Houston Airports. She can be reached at liliana.rambo@houstontx.gov.
By Cindy Campbell
We’re hearing it everywhere: rudeness, conflict, and confrontational behavior are on the rise, and parking and mobility professionals–especially on the frontline–are bearing the brunt. At best, a loud encounter with an angry person can leave a professional’s day dented. At worst, it can be dangerous.