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Customer Engagement
BI moves customers to improve your market share. By identifying the messages that speak to customers’ needs, wants and preferences, BI gives you the best chance of succeeding in a message-a-minute marketplace. We move your customers closer to your brand.
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Sales Channel
BI moves your sales channel so they can move the needle. The objectives are universal: increase sales and profits. BI tackles these challenges using creative ideas, powerful technology, proven methodology and market adeptness to help you deliver results.
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Employee Engagement
BI moves people to create a competitive advantage. Your employees are at their workstations, with your customers, in the field or factory and at job sites worldwide. Are they focused on what’s important to achieve your vision? BI helps translate that vision into action.
Engagement Strategies : When Fear Paralyzes Performance
Use frequent communication and effective recognition to minimize stress and maximize employee engagement
"Many people suffer more in anticipation than they do under the actual blows of misfortune."
Those words were written by Eleanor Roosevelt during times that, unfortunately, may be too similar to what many people are experiencing today.
People are afraid and fear makes people cautious. According to a study of 450 U.S.-based medium and large companies conducted by Towers Perrin in December 2008, almost half (45%) of respondents believe they face greater risk that their job will change or be eliminated and a full 55% believe that their future earnings will at best plateau and more likely decline.
The position of "I'm going to keep my head down, stay under the radar, do my job and hope for the best" is driving even the most engaged workers to be careful in what they say and in what they do...and don't do.
This cautiousness is sapping energy in the workplace. It is eliminating creative-thinking and innovation. It is building walls and causing people to avoid taking any risks to develop new and better ways of doing things. Who wants to be the one to push a new idea that fails right now?
This collective fear is paralyzing. It creates a depressive workplace where people are stressed, edgy and absolutely not performing at peak capacity.
De-stressing your workplace
The best way to relax your workplace and get people focused on action again is through communication and recognition. Both of these strategies are:
- Easy
- Cost-free
- Highly-effective
COMMUNICATION
Employees want to know what is going on — both the good news and the bad news. If leadership doesn't tell them, the grapevine will and grapevines are generally tangled messes of misinformation that are difficult to straighten out. Here’s what you can do:
Abandon your "open door policy" and get out there instead. Don't wait for employees to come to you, go to them. People who are trying to keep a low profile are not going to seek you out. Walk the workspaces, stop and talk to people, ask them questions and let them share. LISTEN. Make it a daily habit.
Be open and honest. Share good news. Be truthful about the bad news. When you don't have the answer, say so; being honest shows employees that you respect them. No one knows what’s going to happen, but you alleviate fears when employees feel confident that leadership is taking a proactive stance to working through these tough times.
Know your audience. "One size does not fit all." You may need to communicate one-on-one with some employees, in writing with others and in meetings for certain groups. Imagine that you are a particular employee or employee group. When wearing their shoes, how would you like to best hear the message?
RECOGNITION
The importance of recognition is even stronger in a down economy. You may not have the resources right now to host big parties, send employees on incentive trips or even offer days off with pay. But you always have the resources to say "Thank you", "I appreciate your work" and "You really matter". Here are ways to recognize employees that cost nothing but your time:
Name it. Smile and greet every employee every day by name. People truly appreciate being acknowledged by name. It communicates that they are important to you.
Take ONE minute to praise. Make it a priority to spend one minute a week with every employee and offer some form of specific praise. It should be more than just "good job." Make the time to find out and know what the person is doing. It doesn't have to be monumental praise; it can be as simple as "I really appreciate how you maintain a positive attitude every day. It helps everyone to see you smile."
Be the role model. From infancy to old age, people imitate the behavior of their leaders. The golden rule always applies. When you show appreciation to your workers, when you maintain a positive attitude and when you treat employees with the same respect you would treat a customer, you are creating a positive work experience.
Encourage employees to pay it forward. After you set the tone with your behavior, encourage employees to recognize each other. This can be as simple as asking everyone to mention a positive experience they recently had with a co-worker during a staff meeting.
There’s no doubt about it, times are tough. Budgets for formalized communications and recognition programs are being slashed making it more difficult to keep a workforce engaged and productive. However, you can avoid a "duck and cover" environment by communicating openly and recognizing frequently...best of all, it’s free!
