A recent Deloitte study goes into detail about the worker-employer relationship and the ways in which leadership plays a role in employee engagement. Deloitte explains succinctly, “Workers look to their leaders for clarity and expect them to model commitment to purpose.” In other words, employees depend on those in leadership roles to pave the way for them to properly carry out their work. Leaders have the responsibility of executing whatever is necessary to fulfill their goals. They are expected to adapt to their business environment, shifting gears wherever necessary.
Engagement Starts from the Top
Employees are much more likely to be engaged when they have a strong leader before them. Even if a business appears to be a well-oiled machine, there is always a need to constantly evolve and take new things into consideration.
It’s important to build strategies with evolved metrics that consider things like:
- -Diversity and inclusion
- -Societal goals
- -Community involvement
Like many things, engagement starts from the top, and the same Deloitte report explains how 80% of executives in the focus group claimed “leadership readiness” as one of the biggest barriers to evolving current business strategies. As a result, it’s becoming increasingly important that leaders take the initiative to be educated on these evolving metrics and find a way to implement them into existing strategies or create new ones.
A Common Commitment to Purpose
Howard Shultz of Starbucks loves to remind his audience:
“When you’re surrounded by people who share a passionate commitment around a common purpose, anything is possible.”
For everyone to get on the same page so that a common purpose can be fulfilled, you need to connect with your team. To put it simply, if you want your employees to engage better at work, you must make sure you’re communicating in ways that resonate with their unique needs. There are a few different ways to create a purpose-fueled work environment”
- Encourage others to express their passions, especially in connection with their work.
- Ensure those from diverse backgrounds feel like their needs are being met.
- Empower people for being different—make everyone feel seen and heard.
- Gain an understanding of everyone’s social goals and concerns.
- Focus on the meaning of what you do when communicating tasks.
A Purpose-Fueled Experience
Once you come up with a strategy for those in leadership positions, you can get the ball rolling for the rest of your staff. You want to make sure all leaders are on the same page when it comes to your purpose. After all, your employee engagement depends on this connection and tangible commitment to purpose. Once your employees feel the effect of your changes, you can expect:
- Employees acting more present in their work.
- Better collaboration among teams.
- Smoother communication between different levels of employees.
The Bottom Line
When you focus on how leadership affects employee engagement, you are putting yourself in a much better position to get positive long-term results. Energy is passed down from one level to the next, so you can’t expect your lower-level employees to exhibit impeccable engagement without addressing the engagement of your leadership first.
The Great Engagement: Engage and Mobilize Employees Training Program
To develop more strategies our Great Engagement: Engage and Mobilize Employees Training Program focuses on simple but powerful behaviours that will have maximum impact on a leader’s ability to engage his or her employees.
For more information and to register: https://redworkscoaching.com/services/executive-coaching/engage-and-mobilize-employees/
Your organization may be eligible for funding through the Canada Job Grant program. Employers may be eligible to receive two-thirds of the training cost.
