They are my favorite articles out of a possible 84 articles I wrote since July. I chose them based on how helpful they can be to the reader and how they also express my specific perspectives on employee engagement.

As an extra, I included a bonus article on engagement and retirement.

9. The Employee Engagement Six Pack. This article uses the six pack of aircraft instruments to look at six ways to assess employee engagement.

10.  Zengagement. This was a series of over 35 very short posts/articles with an image and a quotation to foster your thinking or inspiration on employee engagement.

***

Bonus Article: Blogging break…Retire Now. This article examines retirement less of a state and more as a way of approaching our work and our lives.

Photo Credit: Number 10 by http://flickr.com/photos/spilt-milk/164145237/

David Zinger is devoted to working with employee engagement

to foster results that matter for all.

Joseph Libertia has written a fine short post on how to overcome Bad Boss syndrome with emotional intelligence. He cites the common statement that people don’t leave organizations, they leave leaders. Bad bosses are not always jerks or worse. Joseph listed some of the reasons for being a bad boss:

• Have a lot on your plate
• Are under pressure to perform
• May be in over your head
• Don’t know a better way
• Are scared
• Fight to stay in control
• Have you identity and value attached to the results you produce
• Don’t get the support you need

Joseph Liberti offers 5 solid suggestions on how to apply emotional intelligence to forge better relationships with your employees. He writes,

Solicit people’s feelings and just listen. A leader I once had as a coaching client started by simply asking, genuinely, “And how do you feel about that?” in conversations with direct reports about current issues. and improved relationships. You don’t have to fix them. Just hear them!

Go to Emotional Intelligence at Work to read Joseph’s other suggestions. While you are there, I encourage you to read more articles from his blog by clicking here.

TIME OUT!

This is the week with July 4th in the United States and Canada Day, on July 1, in Canada. Many people, especially with children, use July to start their summer holidays and students have a long “time out” from school. I hope you have or had a good time on your holiday.

This leads into the post for today - the importance of time out or disengagement to enhance engagement.

Employee engagement is not a 24/7 way of being. Our engagement levels should fluctuate during the day, during the week, and during the year. Our energy levels change, the demands of work increase and decrease, and relationships at work can also fluctuate. Our rest and recovery can fuel our performance and give us a much needed perspective on our direction.

Do you consciously disengage to foster higher levels of engagement?

Much like a time out during a basketball game where the players huddle to get ready for the next few plays we must also consciously disengage from work to strategize for more efficient and effective performance. We need to pause or come to a complete stop to determine our next step.

Get Perking:

1. Take time to savor and smell the coffee.
2. Turn your phone or blackberry off for parts of the day. Do you really need to be available 24/7?
3. Don’t bring work home with you - physically or mentally.
4. Engage in an activity that takes your mind completely off of work — from playing with children to even playing basketball.
5. After every 60 to 90 minutes of work take a few minutes to stand up, stretch, or walk around the office.

Foster more powerful employee engagement by making the effort to also consciously disengage from work. As Jon Kabat-Zinn wrote: you can’t stop the waves but you can learn to surf.

Fear not!

The 7 Olympic quarters offered as the prize in my last post are not the “spy” quarters that created the U.S. Defence Department warnings. The olympic quarters show peaceful Canadians engaged either in curling or hockey. Okay, hockey isn’t necessarily peaceful but it is not exactly espionage either.

Here is the snippet of the story:

WASHINGTON — An odd-looking Canadian coin with a bright red flower was the culprit behind a U.S. Defense Department false espionage warning earlier this year about mysterious coin-like objects with radio frequency transmitters, The Associated Press has learned.The harmless “poppy coin” was so unfamiliar to suspicious U.S. Army contractors traveling in Canada that they filed confidential espionage accounts about them. The worried contractors described the coins as “anomalous” and “filled with something man-made that looked like nano-technology,” according to once-classified U.S. government reports and e-mails obtained by the AP. The silver-colored 25-cent piece features the red image of a poppy - Canada’s flower of remembrance - inlaid over a maple leaf.

You have 6 more days to enter the contest and I have decided to sweeten the prize by offering an additional Canadian quater - The Veteran quarter: A 3-headed quarter that will only flip heads.

I have one entry so far from Dan Whitmarsh who suggested all is one. Click here to read the last post and create a unexpected comment about: Employee Engagement for All.

Employee Engagement Monday Morning Percolator #12

There is no such thing as a failed experiment, only experiments with unexpected outcomes.

Richard Buckminster Fuller

This is the third in the series of articles outlining the employee engagement application of Made to Stick by Chip and Dan Heath. Dan Heath in an interview in Tom Peter’s Cool Friends stated that for an idea to stick means three things:

The idea is understood, it’s remembered, and it changes something — it changes people’s minds, it changes their behaviour, and it changes their values.

In regards to the unexpected he added:

We have to tell people things they don’t know. Because if we spend all our time talking about common sense or speaking in abstractions, we can’t expect people to remember the conversation, and certainly not to change anything.

How do you make employee engagement unexpected or surprising. Do you have a statistic or story that can jolt employees out of lethargy or complacency.

Now be careful, don’t make your point pointless with an overabundance of PowerPoint slides as you blur into a darkened room dimly lit by glowing BlackBerry screens as participants drift off to bulging email in-boxes.

Can you offer something more than hype, hyperbole, or trite expressions. Unexpectedness adds a richer dimension to simplicity. For example, my last post’s statement about Employee Engagement for All is simple yet is it really unexpected? It is surprising? I wrote it and I don’t think so. It may be sincere but is it surprising?

This is your chance to be unexpected!

If you are surprising you will also win a prizing of quarters.

I will send 7 minted Canadian Olympic Quarters to the person who writes the most surprising or unexpected suggestion in the comment section of this post on how to make the statement: Employee Engagement for All unexpected or surprising.

Help me please! Don’t let employee engagement drip away in drabness.

Now I know if you are in the United States the total value of 7 minted Canadian quarters is less than a buck fifty but who else do you know in Lubbock, Tempe, or Kansas City who has a bunch of minted Canadian quarters jingling in their pocket.

Remember: The unexpected element helps us get people’s attention and keep it. Surprise functions to get attention while interest functions to hold attention.

Get Perking:

1. Write a comment to make the statement Employee Engagement for All more surprising and know that you are open to change - at least $1.75 worth of Canadian change. The deadline for your short burst of unexpectedness is by May 14th. I will die a writer’s death if I can’t get beyond the anemic Employee Engagement for All. Thanks

 Photo Credit: Untitled by http://flickr.com/photos/unsureshot/93671849/

Inspire yourself. A major inspiration for employee engagement comes from within.  Are you relaxed enough to perform at your best?

Dr. Saul Miller wrote a wonderful little book in 1990. I encourage you to read it if you want to feel freer, lighter, more alive and at ease.

Each of us has a personal connection to an unlimited supply of energy.

With each breath relax and breath in some of that energy.

Focus on drawing in power.

The outbreath will look after itself.

From: Dr. Saul Miller - A Little Relaxation: on being more alive & at ease.

Can employee engagement lead to employee disengagement?

I felt sad reading how the Saskatchewan labour relations board put a halt to employee engagement activities for SGI, an insurance company in Saskatchewan. The sadness was that the very concept that could enrich the workplace for all had become a source of dispute between the organization’s management and union.

Here are a few snippets from the Regina Leader-Post article on the halting of SGI’s president’s employee engagement team (PEET):

The Saskatchewan Labour Relations Board (LRB) had ordered a temporary halt to all activities conducted by SGI’s president’s employee engagement team (PEET), including handing out bonuses under its employee recognition program.

The Saskatchewan Insurance Office and Professional Employees’ Union (COPE) Local 397 filed a complaint with the LRB in January alleging SGI had committed unfair labour practices by negotiating directly with employees through the establishment of an employee engagement committee in April 2006, which was composed of in-scope and out-of-scope employees.

The union claimed the committee gathered employee-related information, made recommendations and took steps to implement changes which related to the terms and conditions of employment of in-scope employees.

The union also complained that the employer had undermined the collective bargaining process by promoting the initiatives of the committee, by unilaterally paying bonuses to employees without the involvement or knowledge of the union and by failing or refusing to bargain these matters with the union.

SGI denied that it had committed an unfair labour practice through negotiating directly with in-scope employees by way of the president’s employee engagement team, the primary objective of which was to increase employee job satisfaction and engagement in the workplace.

I am not close enough to this situation to understand the full extent of the issues involved. In addition, it is not my intention to judge either party in the dispute, I imagine there is validity to both sides on this issue. Rather, I want to express my dismay and grief that employee engagement - something I see so positively -became an issue that probably contributed to employee disengagement.

Engagement must be for all!

This article points out the need to ensure that there is mutual purpose for everyone involved with employee engagement initiatives. For PEET’s sake and the employee’s experience of work, I hope this does not set the sun on engagement for management, union, and the employees in this company. I wish them well as they sort this out and I hope the sun will rise again on employee engagement - making the workplace a better place for all.

Get Engaged:

1. How do your employee engagement initiatives fit within the wider context of the organization?
2. How would you avoid having something similar occur at your workplace?

Photo Credit: Crescent Moon Sunset by http://flickr.com/photos/fortphoto/

According to Shepell-fgi research group: Money not only isn’t everything - it isn’t the main thing when it comes to motivating employees.

How people are treated and how they view their managers have almost twice the impact on motivation and results compared to pay and benefits. Money does not appear to enhance productivity.

Rob Phillips, CEO of Shepell-fgi stated:

We all like some parts of our job more than others. But when overall engagement is low and when your staff prefer to not come in to work or aren’t performing at their full capacity, it costs the organization money - up to an average cost of $1.80 million for a company of 1,000 employees.

Employees want to have trust in senior management, be asked for their input, and have a clear say in decisions that affect their work.

Money is the employee engagement paradox: money is not a key driver of employee engagement for the employee yet it costs an organization great deals of money to have disengaged employees.

Get Engaged:

1. Ensure you spend time not just money with employees. Work is as much about making sense as it is about making cents.

Photo Credit: The snail and the coin (Economy goes slow) by http://flickr.com/photos/mclau/

If you are a leader here is an important multiple choice question. Your answer may indicate the role you play in your employees’ level of disengagement.

As a manager, my interactions with employees surrounding their performance is the following:

a. who has time to talk with employees about this kind of stuff?

b. we talk about how to improve their weaknesses.

c. we talk about their strengths.

If you answered “c” the chance of your employees being actively disengaged is 1%.

In an interview about the book StrengthsFinder 2.0 for the Gallup Management Journal, Tom Rath discussed the strong link between a leader’s focus and employee engagement. Here were the 3 powerful conclusions from Gallup’s research on conversation, engagement, and strengths:

1. If your manager primarily ignores you your chances of being actively disengaged are 40%
2. If your manager focuses on your weaknesses your chances of being actively disengaged are 22%
3. If you manager focuses on your strengths your chances of being actively disengaged are only 1%

Perk Up:

1. You have only one task this week. Ensure that you talk with as many people, as much as possible, about thier strengths and performance. Use strengths to muscle out disengagement!

Picture Credit: Fore! By http://flickr.com/photos/ecstaticist/

Technorati Tags : employee engagement, employee disengagement, percolator, David Zinger

Nine and thirty-nine - from http://www.flickr.com/photos/emdot/

We often think people of different generations are bad drivers. Older drivers look at younger drivers in disdain while younger drivers think older drivers should get off the road.

Yet, when it comes to employee engagement Watson Wyatt just released data to suggest that different generations share the same engagement drivers and that generational differences in drivers of engagement are not as wide as perceived.

The #1 driver of employee engagement for all ages was strategic direction and leadership. The only exception was employees between 30-39 who believed that rewards (pay & benefits) was the #1 driver. This generation rated strategic direction / leadership as the #2 driver while all the other generations rated rewards as the #2 driver.

Communication was a part of the #3 driver for all the generations. The different generations in the workplace from under 30 to over 60 and all the ages in between rated leadership, rewards, and communication as the key drivers of engagement.

Debra Horsfield from Watson Wyatt concluded: “employers should avoid an emphasis on labels and instead focus on commonalities in what motivates employees.”

This makes intuitive sense to me because even though I am 52, my three teenagers listen to the same rock music as me. At times, we seem worlds apart but often we share so much in common.

I think we often overestimate generational differences at the neglect of commonalities. If you want to read an informative book on generational influences at work I highly recommend Jennifer J. Deal’s book discussing the research on the common ground between the young and old, Retiring the Generation Gap.

Here were the 10 key principles she developed in her book:

1. All generations have similar values; They just express them differently
2. Everyone wants respect: They just don’t define it the same way
3. Trust matters
4. People want leaders who are credible and trustworthy
5. Organizational politics is a problem — No matter how old (or young) you are
6. No one really likes change
7. Loyalty depends on the context, not on the generation
8. It’s as easy to retain a young person as an older one — If you do the right things
9. Everyone wants to learn — More than just about anything else
10. Almost everyone wants a coach.

Technorati Tags : employee engagement, engagement drivers, generations, David Zinger

Do you flow into engaged activity? Dr. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi has researched flow and outlined how we can achieve flow at work. I have appreciated his ideas on flow for years and I believe flow can be seen as a close synonym for personal engagement.

You experience flow when you are fully immersed in what you are doing. You experience energized focus, full involvement, and success in the process of the activity.

Here are the ingredients to percolate flow:

1. You set clear goals
2. You concentrate and focus
3. You lessen or lose self-consciousness
4. You have an alterted sense of time while being immersed in the moment
5. You have direct and immediate feedback
6. You create balance between your ability and the external challenge
7. You act out of personal control
8. Your motivation or reward for the activity is intrinsic
9. You are fully absorbed in the task at hand.

Have you experienced flow at work? Blend the ingredient above to design your work to achieve flow - the psychology of optimal experience.

Marcus Buckingham in his latest book on strengths, Go Put Your Strengths to Work, has defined strengths in a similar way to flow. He outlines 6 powerful steps to achieve outstanding performance. Strengths are defined as an appetite for an activity, strengths strengthen us, we look forward to working on these activities, and we feel high levels of satisfaction after completing activities based on our strengths. Look to experiences that provide flow as keys to unlock your strengths in the workplace.

Like freshly brewed coffee poured into a waiting mug, flow into your strengths to experience higher levels of engagement.

Go with the flow…

Get Engaged:

1. Click here to read a more detailed outline of flow.
2. Read Steve Palvina’s 7 Rules for Maximizing Your Creative Output.

Technorati Tags : employee engagement, flow, percolator, David Zinger

The conference board published a report on “Employee Engagement: A Review of Current Research and its Implications.” Patricia Soldati summarized some of the work in a recent post at management-issues.

Looking at 12 different studies the report outlined 26 key drivers of engagement.

At least 4 of the studies agreed on these 8 drivers:

1. Trust and integrity
2. Nature of the job
3. Employee understands how their work contributes to the organization’s performance
4. Career growth opportunities
5. Pride about the organization
6. Relationships with coworkers and team members
7. Employee development
8. Relationship with one’s manager

The number 1 driver regardless of age, location or study was the direct relationship with one’s manager.

Hertz had an old slogan about putting you in the driver’s seat but it appears it is the manager or leader who really drives engagement for the organization and the individuals who report to him or her!

The conference board defined employee engagement as

A heightened emotional connection that an employee feels for his or her organization, that influences him or her to exert greater discretionary effort to his or her work.

High levels of engagement influence organization performance and enhance retention, productivity, customer service and loyalty. Highly engaged employees outperform their disengaged counterparts by 20 to 28 per cent.

Get Engaged:

1. If you are a leader, get behind the wheel and start driving engagement by connecting strongly with the people who report to you.
2. Become a back seat driver - have a conversation with your leader to ensure she or he is steering you and the organization in the direction of higher employee engagement.