December 2022 - Bay of Plenty Business News

20 BAY OF PLENTY BUSINESS NEWS December 2022
EDUCATION AND TRAINING
Employee engagement
drivers in today’s workplace
Exploring
Employee
Engagement
Drivers
in Today's Workplace
An organization has a successful employee engagement
program when its KEY DRIVERS connect emotionally
with its workforce.
MICHAEL SHAW is the
Managing Director of Dale
Carnegie BOP Waikato
dalecarnegie.com
Dale Carnegie’s business in 90 countries
has bounced back with an average
increase of over 40% in the last year due
to the heightened needs of clients.
Companies are struggling to adapt to the
new ways of working and needs of employees.
Our CEO Joe Hart said that Dale Carnegie
himself lived through the Spanish Flu, armed
conflict and two major technological changes
in his lifetime and we have done the same in
just the last 3 years!
Because of this the old ways of organising
business and doing things no longer work.
Hierarchical top-down organisation doesn’t fit
today’s business reality as people need to work
together in a matrix across departments and
external networks to be effective.
The pandemic has taught us that collaborating
online allows us to learn who we really need
to meet with in person, saving hours. We have
learnt that rather than telling a new employee
what times and places they will work, we first
learn what their personal commitments are to
enable them to give their best.
Recently Dale Carnegie conducted an
employee engagement study across 20 countries
including New Zealand. What we learned
was surprising.
In our previous study in 2016 the emotional
needs of employees included feeling valued
and empowered.
Those needs are no longer featured as
employees now know their value to the marketplace
and are empowered to leave an employer.
The organisational drivers of engagement
haven’t changed. Employees want a good
relationship with their immediate manager, to
believe in senior leadership and for their company
to have a purpose and direction they align
with.
In addition, younger employees want balance
with their personal life and an enjoyable
work environment. This is a far cry from the
good old days where if you weren’t happy you
were told to take a concrete pill and harden up!
In addition, these organisational drivers
must align with the heightened emotional needs
of employees after almost 3 years of pandemic
and change. The emotions are:
• Confidence – employees are set up for
success and understand that the work
they do contributes to the success of the
organisation.
• Secure – employees feel psychologically
safe, that diversity among associates
is embraced and have the support of
their leader. With the higher cost of living
employees are sensitive to news or rumors
that may affect their income.
• Hopeful – employees are encouraged to
grow, develop new skills, and have the
opportunity for personal and professional
development.
I would say that the Black Ferns ticked all
those boxes and made it obvious that emotions
matter in today’s world.
The interpersonal skill of the immediate
manager is a key factor in staff feeling secure,
confident, and hopeful. This is perhaps why
many businesses and organisation’s today are
focusing on providing more opportunities for
leadership development.
However, with staff shortages it can be challenging
releasing staff for training.
Businesses acknowledge that building
leadership and resilience skills are important,
When dealing with
people, remember
you are not dealing with
creatures of logic, but with
creatures of emotion.”
– Dale Carnegie
but this can only be put off so long before the
important becomes urgent. Urgent is usually
when burn out kicks in, mistakes are made,
or a competitor offers to meet our employee’s
needs.
There has been a real eagerness to return to
in-person training. Where this has changed is
in the use of technology incorporating learning
management systems that provide pre and
post training resources through a personalized
learning portal. Participants access resources
via their mobile device when and where they
need them and can customize their learning
plan and collaborate with their learning peers.
This makes training more agile and responsive
to participant needs.
As a training provider, we have become
more flexible to meet changing client needs
by introducing a rolling schedule so if a day of
training is missed due to sickness, staff shortage
or an urgent order, that day can be made up
or attended later.
Dale Carnegie is also going back to the
old, publishing revised and new books. There
is something about reading a book that slows
down the mind, enabling deep thinking, contemplation,
and a shift in mindset.
The future of work and of training is evolving,
each situation is different, and we are all
still working it out. One thing I am sure of is
that we all need the support of a partner, mentor,
immediate manager to help us through the
constant change ahead. I have been fortunate
to have had great support from Dale Carnegie
and my business partner Andrea over the last
25years to work through challenging times and
to make the necessary changes.
To be agile and resilient going forward
your people need emotionally intelligent leaders
who help them feel confident, secure, and
hopeful. With that mindset we can view problems
as opportunities and can look forward to
many positive achievements in 2023!
Take Command
At Dale Carnegie, we work with you to build courage, confidence, and compassion
among your workforce by drawing out people’s natural strengths, so they can take
command of their roles and inspire teamwork across your organisation.
Leadership Development Framework
• Step Up to Leadership
• The Dale Carnegie Course: Effective Communication & Human Relations
• Develop Your Leadership: Stop Doing Start Leading
• Leadership Training for Results: Unleash Talent in Others
• High Impact Presentations
“One of the surest ways of making a friend and influencing the
opinion of another is to give consideration to their opinion, to let
them sustain their feeling of importance” – Dale Carnegie
Dale Carnegie BOP Waikato
07 579 0484
www.bopwaikato.dalecarnegie.com