Employee engagement and employee experience are all the rage. New tools, techniques and technologies are coming out of the woodwork to help executive teams recruit, retain and maintain a highly engaged workforce.
Yet, there is one thing every company should already have in place to improve employee engagement. What is it?
It’s your story. Yes, your company’s story.
Yet, this is the one thing that executives often overlook and undervalue. Don’t agree? Well, it is easy to prove. Just walk down the halls of your office and ask a few team members one of these three questions …
“What is our vision?”
“What is our purpose?”
“What is our story?”
Chances are you will get a “deer in the headlights” look from almost every one of them.
So, the question is:
How can you expect engagement to improve if your employees don’t have an emotional connection with your company’s story?
This is a pervasive problem, and it is mind-boggling why more executive teams aren’t doing something about it. In fact, according to Gallup research, 91 percent of frontline workers are unable to articulate what their company stands for and what differentiates it from the competition.
What a huge miss. Not only from an employee engagement standpoint, but from a business performance standpoint.
Your company’s story is the one thing that should align your workforce. It is the one thing that should be shared by every team member. It is the invisible fabric that has the power to unite your entire organization.
Why is that? Because, we all love stories. We all connect with certain stories. And most importantly, we all remember stories. And yet, most executive teams we work with do not have a formal process by which the company’s story is woven into the employee experience and culture.
Forget all the latest bells and whistles. Get back to the basics.
Crystallize your company’s story in a way that resonates and connects with the workforce. Instill that story into the hearts and minds of current and future employees. From the recruiting process to employee onboarding, performance reviews, recognition programs and more. Make it omnipresent in your employee experience.
You might be asking yourself, is it really worth it? The short answer is yes.
A company story that is shared consistently throughout the employee experience and embraced by team members will not only increase employee engagement — it will become an indefensible competitive advantage in the war for talent and customers.
Is your company struggling to recruit top talent?
Is your company suffering from high voluntary attrition?
Are large segments of your employee population disengaged?
Most likely, the answer to these and other employee engagement challenges that your company may face … won’t be found in some new HR application.
They will be found in your story.
