Pyramid of Employee Engagement

Employee Engagement Coaching Tool: The Pyramid of Engagement

October 8, 2013 by David Zinger 1 Comment

Let’s achieve sustainable and good work that makes a difference

Originally the pyramid of employee engagement was designed to foster a behavioral, action and evidenced based approach to engagement that was less about feelings, attitudes, and emotions and more about what we actually do to engage. I am offering more coaching to people who are working with engagement in their organizations or people who want to improve how they work or develop their career. It became obvious to me very quickly that the pyramid is also a great model for coaching. I now take my clients through the pyramid as we work to improve and enhance their performance and the performance of the organization.

Key questions we focus on during coaching, include:

What result do you want to achieve?
What are the 2 or 3 key performance actions you need to take to achieve your result?
How will you monitor and celebrate progress and how will you manage or master setbacks?
How will you engage with the key relationships and connections to achieve your results?
Who needs to be recognized as you work towards your result? What do you need to recognize in yourself? How will you recognize others and yourself?
What are the key moments that will make the biggest difference in your work and how will you make the most of moments and short periods of time? What is the length of your maximum yet sustainable work/engagement time zone?
Are you working with your strengths daily and are these strengths fully leveraged in achieving results while building relationships?
What is the meaning that provides the foundation for your work and your career? How do you keep your meaning alive at work?
Is work making you well? If not, why not?
At the end of a working day is work more of an energy gain or an energy drain? How do you handle those things that drain your energy at work?
What block needs to be added or changed to make your work and results more powerful?

David Zinger is an employee engagement speaker, expert, and coach. If you would like to engage with him for coaching or learn more about using the pyramid of engagement for work or coaching contact David today. Visit his coaching page by clicking here.

21 Contemporary Employee Engagement Tools and Concepts

August 13, 2013 by David Zinger 10 Comments

I recently wrote a post that was very popular on 19 antiquated employee engagement tools and concepts.

It is always easier to attack, criticize, or rip apart than to offer suggestions and useful tools. So this post offers 21 contemporary employee engagement tools and concepts that can make a difference in employee engagement in 2013 and beyond.

The image below is the pyramid model of employee engagement (Click on the image to download a document outlining a model demonstrating that employee engagement is never more than 10 blocks away).

Contemporary approaches to employee engagement:

21 contemporary employee engagement tools and concepts david zinger from David Zinger

Viewing employee engagement as a rich experience and opportunity that will benefit the employee, organization, management, leadership, customer, and society.
Starting all employee engagement work by thinking about what needs to stop or end so that there is capacity and energy for engagement.
Ensuring that engagement definitions and measure are inextricably woven into performance and results.
Extending employee engagement invitations and “letting” employee engagement occur.
Determining the smallest most significant thing we can do to enhance engagement and then building in structures to ensure it happens again and again and again…
Co-creating our surveys with employees (yes, ask employees what questions should be asked on the survey) and offering real time feedback with the courage to face the challenges and the joy to celebrate the wins.
Not holding, but rather acknowledging, that we are all responsible for engagement at a certain level.
Using current social media tools to craft strategy and ensure everyone is on the same page by letting everyone write on that page. I love the line from positive deviancy, “never do anything about me without me.” This statements is especially true for all engagement work and actions.
Amplifying employee voice so that we can be heard by all and working together to respond to what we hear.
Using any signs of disengagement as a trigger for a meaningful conversation with the person who is disengaged.
Ensuring that engagement enriches the wellbeing and energy of the employee both inside and outside of work.
Recognize that engagement and effort is always under the discretion of the employee and working together to enhance their inherent discretion for work.
Ensuring senior leadership knows they are employees too, and working with them to keep them fully engaged.
Ensuring employees have their own dashboard of engagement which keeps them updated daily or even hourly.
People are very engaged with their smart phones so ensure we use smart phones as a primary tool for engagement information, measurement, and intervention.
Refusing to treat employee engagement work as a fad or bandwagon and integrating engagement so tightly into work, management, and leadership that we seldom feel the need to use the term employee engagement anymore.
Making the workplace so safe that no one hesitates to sign their name to their work or their engagement measure. We don’t foster engagement with anonymous approaches and survey invisibility cloaks.
Treating all performance variance conversations and interventions as engagement work rather than as another number, tick box, form, or something to avoid.
Ensuring that we maximize the amount of autonomy and freedom within work and that we encourage employees strengths to come to the surface, to shine, and to make our organization stronger.
Structuring work so that at the end of the day employees report that overall work is an energy gain for them not a constant energy drain.
Measure less, engage more, and enthrall often.

Engage along with me, the best is yet to be.

David Zinger is an expert global employee engagement speaker and consultant who uses the pyramid of employee engagement to help leaders, managers, and organizations increase engagement.

Lesson Three from David Zinger Employee Engagement Speaker: 9 Ways to Engage the Audience

May 28, 2013 by David Zinger Leave a Comment

A good employee engagement speaker engages

I have been to a lot of conferences and witnessed many presentations on employee engagement. I have spoken on employee engagement on at least 200 occasions. The best presentations engage the attendees with each other and with the topic even in a one hour keynote. We don’t need 100 PowerPoint slides and the speaker rattling off statistics about engagement like an auctioneer voicing bids at an auction. We need to ensure that employee engagement sessions transform the noun of engagement into the verb of engage.

Here are 9 things I do to make sure they speech is engaging.

I use just one slide or no slides. This also help me to ensure that I don’t try to cover too much. Many times I tell audience when I show my first slide that this is my first slide and only slide. I have had audiences applaud then they hear it is just one slide. I find that audiences often prefer one slide to no slides because it gives them something to look at. This slide I use most is the Pyramid of Employee Engagement. See this slide at the end of these 9 points.
Within every 15 to 20 minute period I encourage the audience to engage in an exercise to bring the concepts or practices to life.
I never make my audience engage in an exercise or meet with a partner. I invite them to do this and respect their choice not to engage. Real engagement starts with authentic and compelling invitations.
I offer online resources people can use to get more information after the speech/facilitation so that they don’t feel compelled to write everything down.
I rely more on stories than statistics and each statistic should have a story behind it.
I voice tentative statements so that audiences can determine for themselves if the ideas or practices are viable or valuable. We learn in a richer more expansive way when we are given good tentative information.
I honor the experience that many people will learn more by what they say than by what they hear.
My VIA signature strength is humor and playfulness so I ensure my speeches have both humor and playfulness built in to the design and delivery of the session.
By the end of the speech I know I have been successful if I have a hard time getting the audiences’ attention back from an invited exercise because they are so engaged with what they are doing.

David

David Zinger is an expert global employee engagement speaker and consultant who brings the engagement down to earth while striving to enliven the pyramid of employee engagement to help leaders, managers, and organizations increase engagement and results while also building relationships. David has worked on employee engagement from Winnipeg to Warsaw, Saskatoon to South Africa, and Boston to Barcelona. In 2013, David has spoken in Delhi, Mumbai, Pune, Berlin, New York, Chicago, and Toronto.

A Design Conundrum: Employee Engagement and a 2-Day Employee Value Proposition Workshop

April 9, 2013 by David Zinger Leave a Comment

How do you view the connection between employee engagement and the employee value proposition (EVP)?

Last year I was invited by an Asian client to propose a two day workshop on an employee value proposition. This is not my usual work but I was intrigued by the connections between employee engagement and the employee value proposition. Because of other circumstances I was unable to deliver the workshop. I encourage you to read the proposal and offer your comments about connections between EVPs and Employee Engagement.

Capitalize on expert knowledge to gain maximum value on these vital issues:

Examine the current state of employee value propositions including strengths and limitations.
Assess and apply the key criteria for effective employee value propositions.
Determine best and test practices in creating a compelling workplace for employees.
Review the current status and impact of your organization’s implicit or explicit employee value proposition.
Ensure the EVP moves from a strategic exercise and cogent written document to an action promise within the organization.
Focus the EVP to ensure it meets the actual perceptions and needs of employees.
Overcome roadblocks and barriers to effective employee value proposition adoption.
Leverage Zinger’s ten- block pyramid of employee engagement to create a robust eclectic and evidence based approach to an engaging and powerful workplace.
Ensure the employee value proposition acts as a powerful tool to help your workplace master the way work is approached and achieved in this decade.
Map out your EVP to improve the development process and enhance the outcomes expected from a solid EVP

Workshop Overview

The relationship between employees and organizations has been shifting over the past dozen years. Organizations are witnessing and experiencing disconcerting levels of disengagement that can range from 20% up to 70%. The annual economic toll of this lost productivity around the globe is over $600 billion dollars.

Today’s workforce is looking to receive value and organizations are struggling to determine how best to attract, retain, and engage the workforce in this decade. Just as the organization is striving to derive value from employees, employees are expecting to derive value from the organization. Although the value employees want to derive still includes monetary compensation it has become a potential bundle of benefits, perks, and ways of working.

The employee value proposition (EVP) is a powerful tool and practice that has been used the last decade to make an organization more attractive to its employees. A well-constructed and delivered EVP offers a systematic way to weave together talent, internal brand, engagement, work, leadership, recognition, rewards, behaviors, and other elements to attract, retain, and engage employees.

Organizations that had an EVP had 4 times the commitment level at commencement; the commitment was sustained over time and the salary premium required to attract employees was about half of other organisations that lacked a clear EVP according to research from the Corporate Leadership Council,. An excellent EVP also doubles the likelihood that employees will act as advocates for the organization. According to Towers Watson only about 1/3 of global firms have an EVP and 39% of organizations in Asia have an EVP. Yet, high performing firms are 10 to 18% more likely to have an EVP than average or low performing firms.

Weaving together the diversity of talent, brand, engagement, and work practices the EVproposition is a strong declarative branding statement and practice of what you offer employees who work with you. Through a combination of presentations, stories, tools, practical exercises, and recorded interviews with EVP practitioners this workshop is designed for senior managers, directors, and key decision makers. The workshop will help you address the real issues and challenges you face in engaging, retaining, and developing staff.

Day 1

Session 1: Setting the context: Reviewing the background, benefits, terms and research on EVP

Welcomes and introductions
Course overview and introduction
The meaning of value and proposition
The advantages and benefits of a strong EVP
The history and research for EVP
Tangible and intangible approaches to EVP
The paradoxical closed nature of many organization’s EVP process and statements
Succinct way to weave together disperse element into an authentic and declarative proposition
EVP mapping activity: The map is not the territory
15 minute recorded interview with an EVP practitioner
50 Word Discussion Case #1: Why bother?

Session 2: Examining the fundamental elements of the EVP

Are you value-able?
Assessing value, values, and statement of core values
Developing your EVP with a “smart” or an effective model
The function of work itself within the EVP context
The role and function of the employer brand and branding
The current state of talent management
Applying the 10 principles of employee engagement to EVPs
Simplifying your EVP without making it simplistic
Ensuring your EVP is employee centered
The role of rewards and recognition within the EVP
Distinguishing between intent and impact
Measure and benchmark against your own experience
Example 1: Apple Inc. and the day one memo.
Example 2: McDonald’s Canada and worksforme.ca
EVP mapping activity: Determining key concepts and attributes for your map
50 Word Discussion Case #2: Where do we start?

Session 3: Look around and looking in: Examining other EVPs and Assessing the Current State of your EVP

Implicit and explicit EVPs
Examine other organizations EVP
Do you have an EVP champion/champions?
Assess your current state
Assess weakness and strengths
Determining a viable EVP template
Example: EVP statements and diagrams.
EVP mapping activity: Our current location and ETD (estimated time of departure).
50 Word Discussion Case #3: Is there a best EVP?

Session 4: Working with the EVP toolkit: Using key tools in developing and delivering an effective EVP

The importance of co-creation in the EVP process
The concept of the holographic organization as each part plays a role in the EVP
Coaching and mentoring for employee development
Examining social media tools as part of the EVP framework.
Viewing our organization as invitational hosts to employees.
What is the brand and brand promise.
EVP and the recruitment process
The shifting landscape of employee loyalty
Narrative approaches and the hero’s journey as EVP tools
Recorded interview: Organization’s experience with EVP development and delivery
Visual approach to EVP – draw it out
EVP mapping activity: Tools and locations for the journey
50 Word Discussion Case #4: What is your story?

Day 2

Session 5: Leveraging the ten key blocks of the employee engagement pyramid to enhance your EVP

Outline 10 building blocks of engagement
Focus on achieving results, mastering performance, ensuring progress, building relationships, fostering recognition, mastering moments, leveraging strengths, making meaning, enhancing wellbeing, and enlivening energy
Creating a success model outcome focused approach before competencies and actions
Determine EVP action strategies based on the 10 blocks
Build your own key 3 block pyramid of actions for EVP
Working examples from your facilitator’s global experiences
50 Word Discussion Case #5: Overwhelmed with too much to do

Session 6: Overcoming the barriers and challenges that may occur with EVP work

The limitations of not involving employees fully
Generating work: Individual and generational differences
Challenges in capacity, support and accountability for the EVP process
Organizational inertia and transitional challenges
Official truth versus ground truth
Can we be the key for every door?
Is your EVP relevant and real?
EVP mapping activity: Determining roadblocks and barriers
50 Word Discussion Case #6: We can’t get buy in.

Session 7: Working the promise: Transforming your proposition into an organizational promise

How to move from proposition to promise
The power of small bets and small wins in EVP work
How to influence and trigger EVP actions
EVP mapping activity: Fusing the map and actual journey to the destination
50 Word Discussion Case #7: Working with a small win

Session 8: Completing the proposition: Complete the outline of a working draft of the EVP and outline next steps and future actions

EVP checklist
Change Management
Accountability and next steps
EVP mapping activity: Finalizing your map and making course corrections
50 Word Case #8: Accountability and managing a broken promise
Additional resources to enhance your practice
Conclusion to the course

Why you should attend

The workshop will help to improve where you work. Bringing clarity to the value proposition can improve current practices, determine gaps, and help set future directions to enhance the connection between employee and organization. This workshop offers you a unique opportunity to work with David Zinger. Mr. Zinger brings a fresh and powerful approach to EVP that goes beyond HR, branding, marketing, and communication tactics. He knows the workplace from the inside out as the former employee assistance counselor and career development coach for Seagram. David Zinger offers no nonsense, creative and practical tools that will enliven the two days and enrich the action learning you take with you back to your organization You will be given time, connections, and tools during the workshop to draft an EVP or to review and overhaul your current EVP. You will map out your current state, your desired state, and address roadblocks that may prohibit or inhibit successful application of the EVP to acquiring, engaging, and retaining valuable employees.

David Zinger is a global employee engagement expert who in 2013 has already done engagement work in Delhi, Mumbai, Pune, Berlin, Prague and New York. Contact him today for education, speeches, consulting or coaching on engagement.

An employee engagement lesson from Berlin: It is the cook and the recipe.

April 2, 2013 by David Zinger Leave a Comment

How to create employee engagement.

I presented two sessions on employee engagement in Berlin on March 13 & 14 sponsored by the Connecting Group. The speakers and participants were exceptional. Certainly a major benefit of presenting at conferences is learning from all the other presenters. I was inspired by the engaged and passionate presentation of Ramiro Garces, Vice President Human Resources Latin America at Kimberly-Clark. I previously blogged about his Sunday Question Lesson.

During his presentation on employee engagement at Kimberly-Clark he frequently said employee engagement work is not about the what it is about the how. He used the analogy of eating a great meal, asking the cook for the recipe, taking the recipe home, making it, and finding out it does not taste as good as the original. Although we can copy a recipe it does not mean that we can replicate the recipe. Good cooks “own” what they cook by adding their own flair and “how ” of cooking.

Many of us in employee engagement are in pursuit of best practices or good recipes to improve or increase employee engagement. Many times these recipes fail to work the way we expected. For example, Gallup has demonstrated the power of holding strength based conversations with employees about their performance. This is the what (strength base conversations). But without the how (having the readiness, willingness, and ability to hold these conversations) the approach can feel creepy, be inauthentic, miss the mark, or lack impact.

By all means find out the top recipes in engagement but when you start to “cook” engagement at work, own it. Make it specific to your organization and culture. Change a few ingredients if that works better. And by all means keep tasting or testing what you are cooking for engagement.

David Zinger is a global employee engagement expert who has packaged his recipes in the Pyramid of Employee Engagement. If you decide to unpack these recipes make sure you own it because it is less about the recipes and more about the cooks.