Employee-Engagement

Employee Engagementby Simon Larcombe, business culturist

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Purpose of this PresentationSharing useful insight about the meaning, strategy and implementation of seriously-effectiveemployee engagement programs, including:• Introduction to basic employee engagement• Activating the potential for genuine engagement• Essential ingredients for a successful strategy• Dynamics and key points to recognise and bear in mind• Culture, including employee and business benefits• Appropriate timing• Business-case summaryPresentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

Basic Introduction to Employee EngagementPresentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

Basic level engagement is about developinghappiness and authentic, emotionally-healthyrelationships between team-members and thebusiness. When we feel happy and connected wenaturally deliver much better results, and developthe potential to become more interested in whatour employer’s business is doing.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

To attain this we need to be empowered withautonomy and voice, which naturally begin todevelop the profound and authentic relationships– and create a sustainable effect.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

When we have autonomy and voice we can investour character into what we do - we can alsodevelop our talents more effectively.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

With more freedom and the flexibility to expressourselves we begin to develop interest with bothexponential depth and potential.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

The challenge is to create a strategy whichwill achieve this effectively.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

We develop a culture steeped in the business’values and goals -- essential for genuine employeeengagement. It’s almost a side-effect that iteliminates chaos theory, allowing us to let go ofthe reigns a little. And it creates the biggestpotential for a mutually-rewarding result.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

As we refresh our culture the space for autonomyand voice opens up, which is combined withfacilitation; and in turn cultivates the strongerrelationships, along with personal value andmeaning. Making us happier and leading to thebenefits associated with higher productivity andbusiness acumen.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

Key Points to Bear in Mind Throughout the ProcessPresentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

Bear in Mind:ChemistryIn order to establish genuine and effective relationships it'scritical that our strategy is:• Meaningful to the workforce• Appropriately timedFor example, we need to improve relationships and impart business values etc. before expecting to achieve results inareas such as collaboration. And we need to be careful not to judge activities for their value before we’re looking at ahappy, engaged workforce. We also need to take care of our existing workforce before we attempt broadening thescope of employee engagement into activities such as deep-induction for new starters.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

Bear in Mind:Rocket ScienceIndividual psychology is complex. Culture makes it easy,it’s the quick-path to engaging the workforce -- naturallyenabling a sustainable program of mutual reward.Remembering this will help us not to get tangled up in the details.If we want to understand why culture is so powerful, we can start by taking a look at Robert Cialdini’s 6 principles ofinfluence and contemplate how we feel when we come out of a task and absorb the atmosphere and experiencearound us. Then we can understand more vividly why a disengaged culture makes us complacent (and we end upfeeling we’re only working to pay the mortgage) any why working in an engaged environment can add valuablemeaning to our lives.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

Bear in Mind:Autonomy and VoiceConnection, meaning and personal value; empowered withautonomy and voice. Success is attained with cultural trust,steeped in the business' values and goals.It is interesting to note that businesses who have attained degrees of success in this area already e.g. Zappos Inc. havefound that unless we continually check our status of trust, ‘command and control’ can easily creep back in. As such,this deserves a perpetual effort.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

Bear in Mind:FacilitationThe magic-ingredient, vital within the best employeeengagement program, is facilitation… Day-to-day facilitationof projects, communication, business acumen, teamworkand personal growth.Employee engagement 101 -- and second-only to culture -- this alone is a deep subject, worthy of a great deal ofthought and consideration. The culture is enlightened with facilitation… Contemplate and brainstorm the idea ofmanagers as facilitators. Think about staffs’ personal-growth and business-acumen, look at what Zappos Inc. and Googledo here… Then go even further than that i.e. How can a manager recognise and develop each individuals full potential ina personally effective way and in a way which is potentially useful for the business too, even if it doesn’t relate to theirimmediate role and responsibilities? (this new Facilitative Manager role can be incredibly rewarding).Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

Bear in Mind:RewardingGet all this right (and with patience) the result is asnowball-effect, a constantly evolving workforce, naturallyinternalising business-acumen with deep insight: agile,dynamic and adaptable.Remembering this gives us something to aim for, and reminds us what the original purpose of the employeeengagement process was. It’s not going to happen overnight – so it’s important to stay focused. For the bestbusinesses in the world, in this area, employee engagement is an everyday investment which pays dividends… Notonly that, but it also creates a rewarding, inspiring place for everyone to work. Once the ball’s rolling, you can start totake [more] advantage of this kind of thing: click here to read an article about collective intelligencePresentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

Example ProcessPresentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

1. Workforce introIf we’re certain we’re going to go ahead anddo this, it would be in our best interests totell everyone about it (in detail) and ask forany initial thoughts. Authenticity andcommunication at this point will paydividends in trust, compliance and feedback.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

2. StrategyWhat are the ingredients of our new culture?And what are the appropriate stages oftransition we need to go through?Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

3. CultureImplement the new culture with ourexisting workforce. Including businessvalues, goals and vision; activatingfacilitation, embracing trust andhappiness. Leading to empowermentwith autonomy and voice.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

4. LifecycleHaving settled our workforce in withcultural changes -- and feeling moreconnected -- we can now start to extendthe scope of employee engagement toreach our new starters i.e. deep induction.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

5. Feedback LoopOpen up avenues to listen to employees’ feelingsand ideas about the culture; also levels of trust,engagement, facilitation, authenticity etc. So wecan validate and personalise the experience moreand more as time goes by.If the changes have been profound we need to wait until at least this point,because considered views take time to form. We should explain that we’regoing to do this at the start, though. It is a question of authenticity – if we saywe’re going to take feedback too early we’ll be wasting everyone’s time.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

6. RepetitionThe new culture needs constant attention, muchlike a garden. Ensuring trust requires awareness,“Do we trust each other? Are we happy?”. Wealso internalise accessible understanding of thebusiness’ values, goals and vision by coveringthe subjects regularly in a variety of contexts.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

7. Innovation & CreativityBegin to think about how innovative and creative activitiescan be brought into the mix.I would like to say much more about this within the presentation, because it’s incredibly valuable.Underrated even. From the business’ point of view the potential is very rich indeed, and from apersonal point of view -- although it doesn’t tend to be widely appreciated -- innovation and creativityhave real potential towards happiness. Even Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs contains thissubject (in summary because of the personal meaning and value that can be attained, simply frombeing involved).But it’s such a deep subject, and implementation of these activities is too bespoke to be able to coverit concisely… While I figure out a more direct way to demonstrate the idea, you may wish to read thefollowing article and think about how you could apply what I’m saying to everyone in various contexts:Lateral Thinking – Let the Fool InTo get here in any meaningful way; trust, autonomy, voice, facilitation, values, goals and vision areessential within the culture.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

8. PressThe reality is that most businesses still operate froma system known as Scientific Management (a.k.a.Taylorism, 1911) and because of this only a very lowpercentage of employees are even basic-levelengaged. So, why not get some recognition for theachievement?Zappos Inc. and Google do!Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

Core EngagementInto the business’ blood-stream…Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

In summary:The foundation for cultivating authentic employeeengagement is to combine factors which genuinelypromote happiness with core business values,facilitate day-to-day, and develop this as aperpetual theme within the business’ culture.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

By concentrating on the core of engagement: theexternalised behaviours, situations and activitiesdevelop authentic, sustainable effectiveness andexponential depth.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

the Business-CasePresentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

the Business-Case:Effectiveness• Higher productivity• Better internal and external communications• Lower staff-turnover• More agile, adaptive, dynamic workforce• Potential for exponential business-acumenPresentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

the Business-Case:Environment and Relationships• Emotionally-healthy, fulfilling working-environments• More effective and appropriate behaviours• Passionate, authentically loyal workforce• More engaging for everyone(including customers & company executives)Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

the Business-Case:Professionalism• Overall client-facing potential• Better, more insightful customer service• Responsiveness and authenticity in all areas• Business presence• Feeds into likeability and influencePresentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

the Business-Case:Human Resources• HR become a revenue-centre• Attract top talentPresentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

the Business-Case:Further• Innovation and creativity• Cutting-edge management practices• Marketing potential(pioneers of Employee Engagement)Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

Food for ThoughtBefore you move on to something else,we’d like to leave you with a final thought…Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

Employee engagement contains elusive depth.If you want to implement an effective strategy, authentically tackling the subject,and you haven’t done already, you’re going to need to reflect on this subject deeplyand devote significant resources for planning, implementation and beyond.There is so much disengagement in the world that we decided we would like to give all of our knowledgeaway for free, for reasons of morality and logic. We guess if you appreciate our insight, have enoughresources to include us, and need additional resources on the project that our additional resource wouldbe naturally attractive to you. It’s not the easiest thing in the world to do (to explain the entire subject andhow to do it completely) because there is so much information to cover i.e. background, context,sentiment, history, psychology, troubleshooting, strategy etc. However, we continue to endeavour to fulfilour aim. As such, the totality of information included on our website (including resources such as thispresentation, and our homepage) are literally designed to empower you to be able to do this yourself.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

Linking to our presentationfrom your website, and why you might want to.To set the context, Google’s search-results-software looks at these links in the same way people look at recommendations.Simplified (and in summary) a combination of the number of independent links pointing to a particular webpage and the credibi lity of each independent link,determines how highly-recommended Google perceives that webpage to be (if you’d like to know exactly how this works please write to us and we’ll explain).Today, our presentation is displayed within the first page of Google’s search results. For example, if you search for “EmployeeEngagement Presentation” you will see this presentation as around the 9 th or 10 th result returned. That seems great. However,most people only click on the very-first results. For example, this month only 4% of the people who searched for this presentationfollowed our link – and that’s despite that it’s more clearly described than some above it. If you search for “Employee EngagementPowerPoint” it gets even worse, because Inc. Magazine have an article above ours that positively-reinforces mainstream inactionon the subject, telling you why Employee Engagement Programs fail. The other entries ahead of us present lots of statistics, butwe believe these statistics to be flawed -- click here to see why -- whereas we primarily concentrate on the solution, onunderstanding the solution; and on how you can take real, positive action. We also decided not to withhold any information withthe intention to influence the sale of our services, because we believe there is so much disengagement in the world that it wouldbe more ethical to help people to do it themselves, for free.In summary, if you believe our presentation covers the subject favourably, you will help more people to find this information bylinking to our page (there are details about how to do this on the next slide). Similarly, if you like our ethos, you would helpachieve the same thing by linking to our homepage… Many thanks for your consideration!

Linking to our presentationfrom your website?If you would like to link to our presentation from your website,please ask your IT department to click here for resources.If you just want the link, here it is:http://AlchemyEngagement.com/employee-engagement-presentation.phpPresentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

Thanks for checking-out our presentation!Perhaps we've given you some ideas about how to engage your staff, or onhow to define employee engagement?Alchemy Engagement are a business culturist, specialising in employeeengagement, who can help you to take your success to the next level.If you have any questions you’re welcome to get in touch, you can contact usby email info@AlchemyEngagement.com and we’ll get back to you within onebusiness day.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement

Keep it real.Presentation by business culturist Simon Larcombe, courtesy of Alchemy Engagement