Employee engagement is something that all organizations strive for, yet very few can keep their workforce satisfied and motivated. According to Gallup, around 70 percent of the workforce in the United States are disengaged, which means that the majority of employers are not getting the best out of their employees.
Employee engagement is essentially the commitment an employee has to the organization and its goals. Engaged employees take pride in their work and are more motivated by the goals of the company rather than the money they are being paid. Employee engagement improves efficiency in the workplace, employee retention, overall happiness, and greater connectivity throughout the organization whether figuratively or literally with smart office solutions. This is where an effective employee engagement strategy is important. Check out Cloudbooking’s tips on how you can build an employee engagement strategy, which encompasses all of your remote and general workers.
Our tips on how to build employee engagement strategies
One of the biggest challenges for employers these days is building and encouraging workplace culture and employee engagement. In fact, according to Deloitte’s Global Human Capital Trends 2015 report, 87% of organizations cited culture and engagement as one of their top challenges, and 50% said that the problem was “very important.”
You may be wondering why employee engagement is important. Research shows that companies with employee engagement programs have seen a 26% increase year on year in annual revenue compared to those without a formal program. It is also proven to help with staff retention.
With more businesses transitioning to an agile workplace or a completely remote working environment, improving employee engagement has become more relevant than ever before. Keep reading to find out how you can ensure that you have fully-engaged employees and great workplace culture with our up-to-the-minute employee engagement strategy for 2022.
What can you do to make your staff feel appreciated and improve employee engagement?
Here are a few techniques and tips that we have come up with at Cloudbooking that might help. These are all ideas that we have tried and tested as a team and have found beneficial. After all, the proof is in the pudding, as they say, and our staff retention and job satisfaction is 91%!
Team bonding FUN
It’s surprising how many people work in the same office and don’t even know one another’s name. That’s because, in today’s fast-paced work environment, we don’t even have time to stop for lunch, let alone have a chat. So, how else can we help our employees to get to know one another?
Why not hold an office game night to improve employee engagement or screen a movie in your boardroom and order pizza? Better still, how about a drinks “happy hour” once a week, where employees can have a chat and a drink for an hour? There is a range of brilliant activities and games that can help build employee engagement and create a closer bond between your employees.
If you manage a remote or agile workforce, that doesn’t mean that you should give up on team bonding exercises. Instead, you will just have to be a little more creative when it comes to the activities. A “virtual happy hour” can be just as much fun as going to a local bar, and a quiz over a video messaging service is a great way to get employees feeling more engaged while also creating a closer relationship between colleagues.
Team bonding is certainly a great way to get your employees to interact. Clever use of employee engagement strategies can build a strong unity between your staff. These achievable strategies will increase employee satisfaction and engagement and could prove valuable in building bonds, encouraging teamwork, and creating happy employees.
Be a mentor as well as a leader
It may seem obvious, but an employee’s performance can suffer if they struggle with a piece of work or don’t quite understand what they’re doing. People can isolate themselves because they’re too afraid to ask for help.
So, make it easier for your employees to talk to you! Offer a “drop-in” clinic once a month, where employees can come and talk to you about any work-related issues or worries. As a good leader, you should always strive to increase employee happiness and productivity by creating a “safe space” for employees to come to when they need help.
Having these open lines of communication and developing this bond with your team will help improve performance and show your employees that you care. Although between 38% to more than half of new leaders fail within the first 18 months, you can avoid becoming part of the statistic with our advice.
The importance of recognition
Employees all want to feel as though what they do matters. That is why employees can quickly lose engagement if they don’t feel their achievements are being recognized or their hard work is being appreciated.
Leadership should make more of an effort to highlight employee achievements. Either announcing good work through your company intranet or creating monthly/quarterly employee recognition rewards will help create more engaged employees.
Encourage Collaboration
Collaboration is a crucial aspect for any business to concentrate on improving, as it can help build ideas, cut down on wasted time, and, most importantly, improve employee engagement. Some employees will prefer to work on their own. However, by encouraging collaboration, you can get better results and increased employee satisfaction. Everyone will feel included and that they’re achieving something!
It doesn’t even have to be work-related. You could set your team a group challenge or run a sports day. Maybe even a baking or cookery class.
Driving collaboration is especially difficult when managing a remote team, yet the same principles apply. It might be a good idea to ensure employees are engaged by organizing plenty of virtual socials and video meetings. Seeing the faces of the other employees will help build a closer-knit team and more engaged employees.
Health and well being
We are all susceptible to stress in everyday life, and sometimes this can get in the way and cause us to become less productive at work. A good way to counteract this is to offer your employees help with their health and fitness – after all, the best antidepressant is exercise!
Fitness is essential for the mind, body, and soul and will help improve an employee’s concentration and energy levels, as well as help them feel part of the team.
Maybe start a lunchtime running club or exercise class once a week? Yoga or Pilates is also great for calming the mind. You could get a yoga instructor to come to your office once a week if you have space, or you could take your team to a class locally.
Another idea would be to get a beauty therapist to come in once a month and offer short taster sessions to employees. A head massage or a shoulder, back, and neck massage can feel like bliss if you’ve been sitting at a desk all day.
Mental health
It is no surprise that around one in seven people in the UK experience workplace-related mental health issues. Employees may spend over eight hours a day in front of a computer screen, working long hours to meet deadlines, or they may suffer from financial worries. Work-related mental health issues should not be taken lightly, as they can have huge impacts on employee satisfaction, engagement levels, and productivity.
Raising awareness of mental health is the first step to ensure that your employees are happy. You can also organize events with mental health professionals who can teach your employees how to improve their mental health.
Make sure that your employees take time off from their current job. Each of us needs a break from the day-to-day stresses of work. By ensuring that your employees are taking their annual holiday, you guarantee that your workforce is well-rested and able to be productive.
With a healthier frame of mind, employee engagement and job satisfaction will see a major boost.
Nutrition
When at your desk, it’s so easy to forget to drink water, have copious amounts of coffee, and snack on unhealthy comfort food. Most employees these days will even eat lunch at their desk — taking no time to digest their food and let their brain connect with what they’re eating.
This, in the long run, can impact performance and a person’s mood. You can help to change this as an employer by offering free nutrition classes. Your aim is to get employee commitment to healthy eating, so getting a nutritionist to come in once a month or even sending out a newsletter with hints and tips every month, can help achieve this.
Cake — Everyone loves cake!
Thanks to the likes of The Great British Bake Off and other baking shows, people’s love for baking has been reignited. So, why not make the most of it and encourage the keen bakers in the team to take it in turns to bake cakes? There are few better ways of ensuring an engaged workforce.
For those who can’t bake, they can cheat and just buy some cake. But, sweet treats are an excellent way of getting people together and feeling rewarded and appreciated. Everyone loves a bit of a sugar rush on a Friday afternoon when their energy levels are starting to slump, right?
However, if this doesn’t fit in with your commitment to healthy eating, you could encourage employees to create more nutritious alternatives. This tasty employee engagement strategy will certainly make the breakroom a more exciting place to visit. The adoption of the agile office means that organizations can make use of spare workspace to create vibrant, attractive places for coffee, tea breaks, and lunch. An appealing breakroom can increase employee satisfaction and wellbeing, thus increasing employee engagement.
Learning never stops
They say that we learn something new every day. Employees like to feel as if their career is progressing and that their job helps them to be the best version of themselves. So, why not help your employees to keep learning and bettering themselves by offering education classes or sending them on courses? Help your employees feel engaged by developing new skills or experiences.
You could allow them to take time out of work and volunteer for a charity of their choosing. These are all valuable skills that will make employees feel that working for your company is more than just a job.
Helping your employees become better at their job will have a hugely positive impact on job satisfaction and retention. Giving your employees a budget for education is a fantastic way to build a better workforce.
“Bring Your Pet to Work” Day
Most people love pets and will probably have a cat, dog, guinea pig, or some other small creature. It’s been proven that pets can be incredibly therapeutic and a great way of getting people to communicate. Okay, you can’t turn the office into Old MacDonald’s farm, but maybe you can have a “bring your pet to work” day now and again, with T&Cs attached, of course.
One size doesn’t fit all!
Here at Cloudbooking, we understand that every team is different, and some, or maybe all, of these ideas won’t work for your team. But, it has been proven that improving employee engagement does improve the overall efficiency in the workplace, so it’s worth looking into what works for you and your company.
Building the best workplace with employee engagement is key to a successful company. At Cloudbooking, we know how to solve a range of workplace challenges, thanks to our workplace management solutions.
Want to find out how technology can solve your workplace challenges? If so, get in touch with our Cloudbookers and learn more about our workplace management solutions. Contact us now for a no-obligation product demo.
