5 Tips for Better Employee Engagement in 2022

Posted on: December 24th, 2021 by roger

According to a Harvard Business Review article, employers may be in for a rude awakening over the next year. The article referenced a study which estimates 55% of employees intend to start a job search in the 12-month period between August 2021 and August 2022. This staggering figure would be devastating to many businesses, as high employee turnover rates can wreak havoc on your ability to deliver the high-quality products or services you provide.

The best way to combat this upcoming wave of employee turnover is to prioritize improving your employee engagement. Focusing on better employee engagement can pay huge dividends for your business:

Engaged employees are 17% more productive
Engaged work environments experience 41% lower employee absenteeism
Engaged employees are less likely to experience burnout
Engaged employees tend to stay at their jobs longer

In spite of these important benefits, Gallup’s State of the Global Workplace report found that only 15% of employees are highly engaged. This presents a huge opportunity for your business. Below are some tips that can help you achieve better employee engagement in 2022.

Help Employees Connect What They Do to What they Care About

More than ever before, employees want to know that they work for an organization that is committed to a bigger purpose than simply making money and improving their own bottom line. This has resulted in an increasing number of individuals prioritizing company values and mission when choosing their next job.

There are two important components involved in improving your ability to help your employees feel that their job is connected to their own personal values:

Revise your mission statement to more closely align with your employees’ values, especially as they relate to social and/or environmental change – If your employees align with your company values, they are more likely to feel like they fit in. This will improve their engagement and increase the likelihood that they’ll want to stay longer.
Show your employees how their work relates to your company’s purpose – Having a mission that aligns with employee values isn’t enough. It’s important to go a step further and demonstrate to your employees that their day-to-day responsibilities directly contribute to achieving this purpose.

Reduce Stress Associated with Your Work Environment

No one wants to work in a highly stressful environment. These situations tend to have a negative impact on employee engagement since one of the easiest ways to cope with stress at work is to simply check out.

There are several steps you can take to reduce stress in your work environment:

Improve workplace efficiencies – This can be accomplished by updating the technology your team uses, creating more uniform and streamlined processes, and making sure employee workloads always remain manageable.
Improve communication – Good communication is a crucial component to every work environment, and it can go a long way to reducing the stress experienced by your employees. It’s important to work with your team to establish communication methods that are positive and non-confrontational. While this can be challenging in situations involving employee disagreements, reducing confrontation will help keep employees feeling less stressed. These communication tools should be used when managers are speaking with their team and when team members communicate with one another.
Engage in teambuilding – Employees collaborate more and experience lower levels of stress when they are invested in each other. Take the time to include teambuilding activities in your schedule that will foster closer relationships among your employees. Give them opportunities to talk about items unrelated to work so that they can get to know one another on a more personal level.

Provide a Thorough Training and Onboarding Experience

The onboarding process sets the tone for a new employee’s experience at your company. As a result, it has a significant impact on employee engagement. The onboarding process is a great opportunity to help new employees connect to your company’s mission, vision and core values. This will allow them to more easily see how they fit into your company culture.

As part of the onboarding process, make sure you help your new employees understand how their role will impact the team and the company culture. Provide detailed information regarding the expectations and responsibilities associated with their role in order to set them up for success.

While it’s important to hire individuals who possess the skill set necessary for success in their role, it’s rare to find someone who has the total skill set you’re looking for. Whether it’s understanding how to navigate specific technology used by your company or providing institutional knowledge about your processes and systems, some training is likely going to be necessary when you hire new team members. Work with your managers to establish a training plan that will get all employees up to speed so that they can feel confident in their ability to perform their role. This will significantly improve their engagement at work.

Recognize Your Employees for Their Accomplishments

It’s natural for employees to want to feel appreciated and be recognized for their hard work. When people receive this recognition, they tend to enjoy work more, be more engaged, and feel motivated to work harder. This is one of the easiest ways you can improve employee engagement.

Some ways to recognize your employees include:

Celebrate innovative ideas, the completion of large projects and significant employee milestones
Give specific credit to every team member involved in achieving success on a particular project
Create a shout out system that allows team members to recognize each other and show appreciation when someone else helps them to more effectively achieve their goals

Reward Employees with Extra Time Off in Addition to Financial Incentives

Working long hours is common at many companies, and paid time off benefits often fail to be sufficient to provide employees with the ability to recharge. When working 40-50 hours a week (or more in some instances), 2-3 weeks of PTO will simply not be enough to prevent burnout. This is especially true now, as studies have shown the average work day has increased by 48.5 minutes during the pandemic.

One way to combat burnout from long work hours is to provide extra time off to employees. Rewarding your team with an additional week of time off can give them the ability to recharge and focus more energy on their passions. Ultimately, this will help them be more engaged when they return to work.

PassioHR Can Help You Improve Employee Engagement at Your Company

None of the tips listed above are difficult to understand, but implementing them at your company can be more challenging than you might expect. It involves taking a hard look at your company culture and policies in order to make adjustments that will improve the experience of your employees. If you feel you may benefit from a third-party professional who can guide you through this process, PassioHR can help.

At PassioHR, we provide comprehensive employee engagement services that will help you attract and retain the talent you need to grow your business. Our exclusive Elevated Engagement Plus™ approach has been crafted to help you create a more successful and inspired organization. We help you achieve this by working closely with you to understand your unique workforce dynamic and the challenges your team faces. This information will drive the creation of customized recommendations to help you improve employee engagement at your company.

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roger

Roger Hays currently serves as President and CEO of PassioHR, Inc., based in Englewood Colorado. PassioHR was founded in 2021 by Roger after having spent over twenty years working in various positions in the Professional Employer Organization (PEO) market.

His areas of expertise are Human Resources management; Benefits Administration; Government Affairs; and Business Management.

Mr. Hays currently serves as the Chair the Leadership Council for NAPEO in Colorado and serves on their PAC committee, Federal Government Affairs and State Government Affairs Committees as well. In addition to NAPEO Roger is a past Leadership Council Chairman for the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) in Colorado and serves on their PAC committee as well (NFIB is the voice of small business, advocating on behalf of America’s small and independent business owners, both in Washington, D.C., and in all 50 state capitals). He is a past Board President for the Colorado Civil Justice League (Colorado Civil Justice League is the only organization in Colorado focused exclusively on limiting unreasonable lawsuits and preserving common sense in the courtroom). Roger has been appointed by the Governor of Colorado, three times, to serve as a Board member on the Colorado Uninsured Employers Board. (The CUE board was established by the CO legislature to provide financial assistance to individuals injured while working for employers who did not carry workers’ compensation insurance in violation of Colorado Statute.)

Roger spends many hours each Legislative session working with state Legislators in Colorado on behalf of the PEO industry as well as small business in general testifying in front of committees or just interacting with individual legislators on issues important to those groups. He also works with the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment, serving on a number of taskforces to help guide the department in dealing with Unemployment and Labor issues.

Mr. Hays Graduated from North Dakota State University with a BS Degree in Political Science and is an avid Bison supporter.

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