Disengaged Employees? Why should you care?
If employee engagement is such an issue within American corporations, why are so few making any headway in correcting the problem?
A number of years ago, the CEO of a very large company had heard that employees of his company were not happy, so he commissioned an employee survey which then confirmed those rumors. His reaction to the survey results? ‘Well, if they don’t
like it here they can leave.’ I’m not exactly sure why he even bothered with the survey as he obviously didn’t care what his employees thought.
Why should companies care whether or not their employees are engaged? Well, a few reasons come to mind – all of which impact the bottom line.
1) Turnover. If you have disengaged employees, there’s a greater likelihood you’ll see increased turnover; if not now, certainly at some point. Turnover is costly. You may lose some people you don’t care if you lose, but more likely you’ll lose a fair number of those you’d rather keep on board.
2) Decision making. Disengaged employees are more likely to make poor decisions or perhaps no decision at all. Why? They don’t care. How do you think that will affect your bottom line?
3) Innovation. Disengaged employees are less likely to be innovative. How do you think that will affect the future of your company?
4) Customer relationships. If your employees are disengaged with your company, there’s a high likelihood they will reflect that apathy toward your customers. What do you think the consequences of that are?
Perhaps you think you have strong leaders who care, so why should it matter if the rank and file employees are disengaged? Well, when you get right down to it, it’s the rank and file employees who get things done. If you have disengaged employees, you may want to take a look at the leaders and management throughout the company and their behavior toward employees. That’s most likely where your problem lies.
So if you think all this talk about employee engagement is just a bunch of HR hooey, go ahead and keep ignoring the people side of your business. Your competitors will thank you for it.