Tag: #diversityandinclusion

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Redworks Blog (all posts)

Your Path to Excellent Employee Engagement Starts with Mental Health

If you’re having trouble with keeping employees engaged in the workplace, you’re actually in the majority—marketing research firm Gallup reports that only 20 percent of global employees are engaged at work. This isn’t specific to any particular industry either, but the one common thread seems to come down to mental health.  

From a numbers standpoint, the impact of mental illness is impossible to ignore—costing the global economy upwards of $2.5 trillion annually. Before you can start making any changes, it’s important to understand the current state of your workforce and take note of any existing signs of disengagement. 

Once you have a better idea of what you’re working with, you can start to take action and implement changes that will create long-lasting positive results.   

What is employee engagement?

Employee engagement might look different based on your organization. In general terms, Quantum Workplace defines it as: “the strength of the mental and emotional connection employees feel toward the work they do, their teams, and their organization.” You need to look at your workplace as more than just a place for people to do their jobs. If you want to create an environment that fosters growth and creative business strides, you need to pay more attention to engagement.

When your employees are engaged, you can expect them to be:

–       Team-oriented and purpose-driven.

–       Driven to meet goals and come up with solutions.

–       Adaptable to changing business environment.

–       Focused on learning, growth, and improvement.

Disengaged behaviors can look more like: 

–       Negative outlook and overall pessimistic attitude.

–       Happy to take credit when something goes right but quick to shift blame if something goes wrong. 

–       Increased absenteeism or tardiness.

–       Focused on monetary value rather than reaching business goals.

Why is employee engagement important?

The more disengaged your employees are, the more it’ll cost you down the road. According to data collected by McLean & Co., for every $10,000 in annual salary an organization loses about $3,400. Multiply this by the actual salary and number of employees and you’ll get an idea of how much you’re losing by not taking action to improve engagement. 

How you can start to improve your employee engagement

Acknowledge the importance of mental health

The sooner you make it clear to your employees that you value their mental health, the faster you’ll see results. Even with the growing demand for mental health services, it’s often very difficult for people to get the help they need. Try to ease this dilemma as much as you can. 

Conduct an honest assessment

You need to know where your employees stand—engagement surveys are a great way to start out, asking for direct feedback and honest opinions. Don’t hesitate to conduct one-on-one meetings either, and make sure to make it clear that you value any feedback you can get, even if it’s negative. Frame the discussion in a way that the employee feels compelled to help you make viable changes.

You might also want to task someone with monitoring performance over time to gain a better understanding of areas that need work. 

Create lasting changes

You might think the cost of mental health benefits is too high for your organization to offer but think about all the money you’ll save if you aren’t losing hours of productivity each week. Aside from formal benefits, you can also focus on:

–        Recognition: make sure to give positive reinforcement when possible and show your appreciation.

–        Resources: employees are more engaged when they feel they have everything they need to do their job.

–        Connection: practice inclusivity and build strong relationships through collaboration.

Question for leaders

1.     What are you doing to support the mental health of your employees? 

Registration is now open for our next Great Engagement: Engage and Mobilize Employees Training Program, starting January 25, 2023.

For more information and to register:https://lnkd.in/gaSm-2vn

Your organization may be eligible for up to two-thirds of the training cost through the Canada Job Grant program.

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Redworks Blog (all posts)

Diversity and Inclusion Best Practices for Employee Engagement: Pay Equity and Transparency

It should come as no surprise that people want transparency and pay equity, and as an ethical business owner, you should want to provide that. When it comes to diversity and inclusion practices, pay equity is at the top of the list.

Pay equity affects an organization’s reputation, and you can’t expect your employees to be engaged in their work when they don’t feel fairly acknowledged for their work. So where do you start?

–        Gather information to identify pay gaps

–        Identify potential areas of risk for pay gaps

–        Evaluate opportunities for equity as it pertains to race, gender, or LGBTQ+ status

Compensation affects your employees every day and it can affect their personal life if they’re unable to make ends meet. If someone is under the impression that someone who completes an equal amount of work to them gets more compensation, you can’t reasonably expect them to be equally as engaged. If you aren’t implementing practices to gather insights on this yet, now’s the time to ask yourself what you can do.

Questions for leaders:

  • What measures do you take to ensure transparency and pay equity?
  • Do you think you could do more?
  • Does this present a notable challenge to leaders? 

Registration is now open for our next Great Engagement: Engage and Mobilize Employees Training Program, starting October 12, 2022.

For more information and to register: https://lnkd.in/gaSm-2vn

Your organization may be eligible for up to two-thirds of the training cost through the Canada Job Grant program.

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Redworks Blog (all posts)

Diversity and Inclusion Best Practices for Employee Engagement: Reduce Recruitment Bias

Diversity and inclusion are imperative for employee engagement. There’s no such thing as a healthy workplace that doesn’t place value on diversity and create a culture of inclusion. It’s natural to gravitate towards people and energy that seem familiar, but it is imperative that your recruiting team is trained against unconscious bias.  

These days, there are all types of programs that HR departments can use for recruitment processes. You can do things like filter candidates strictly by their skills and experience, so you know that each candidate is being evaluated solely on their ability to do the job. 

Questions for leaders:

  • What programs do you use for recruiting?
  • Are you screening candidates based on skills before they come in for an interview?
  • What are you doing to ensure an inclusive recruitment process that avoids any bias? 

Registration is now open for our next Great Engagement: Engage and Mobilize Employees Training Program, starting October 12, 2022.

For more information and to register: https://lnkd.in/gaSm-2vn

Your organization may be eligible for up to two-thirds of the training cost through the Canada Job Grant program.

Categories
Redworks Blog (all posts)

Diversity and Inclusion Best Practices for Employee Engagement: Improving Visibility

The engagement culture you create in the workplace trickles down to the experience you give to your customers, and ensuring diversity and inclusion is more important than ever. While it might seem easy enough to talk about diversity and inclusion, it’s an entirely different thing to take actionable steps toward creating an ideal work environment.

The first thing to consider is visibility—identifying the diversity of your workforce in order to better understand where your efforts should start.

When you take advantage of diversity metrics, you’re in a much better position to implement new initiatives to promote a culture of inclusion. 

Questions for leaders:

  • Are you currently taking actionable steps towards improved diversity practices in the workplace?
  • Do you have anything in place to gather important metrics of your workforce? If not, what is your plan?

Registration is now open for our next Great Engagement: Engage and Mobilize Employees Training Program, starting October 12, 2022.

For more information and to register: https://lnkd.in/gaSm-2vn

Your organization may be eligible for up to two-thirds of the training cost through the Canada Job Grant program.