Look it up in a dictionary and you will find ''Engage: Occupy or attract (someone's interest or attention). Participate or become involved in". A lovely word. A fantastic idea. A dream for many businesses. A reality of everyday life for others. But above all, a goal to keep in mind if you want your company to be healthy and fit.
At this stage of incipient economic recovery, experts in people management, HR managers and a wide collection of surveys agree that there is a reactivated war for talent, and the risk is that the best employees leave organizations.
In this scenario, it is highly useful to keep focused on employee engagement. Companies that have not done it so far, may now suffer a boomerang effect and lose some of their best human capital.
The certified Top Employers, aware of the importance of commitment, have been cautious and have placed it as one of the main priorities within Human Resources.
These companies prepare action plans to improve employee engagement, evaluate it, communicate it and even allocate a specific budget to get it. The data is overwhelming:
98% of certified Top Employers in Spain measure employee engagement at least once a year and also oversee the implementation of the action plans in this area, a percentage above the European (94%) and global (95%) average.
In addition, 100% formally communicate to employees the results on the level of commitment and develop action plans for improvement. Even 82% allocated a specific budget to implement action plans.
We can list a number of good practices used by companies to place Top Employers commitment in the strategic focus of the organization. Amadeus, for example, has the Engagement program, including the various actions throughout the year to engage their employees, and Introduction programs, which are committed to the organization as well as informing the employees of the ethical code values.
Leroy Merlin manages the commitment of its employees with various initiatives such as the Company & Values Project, the Vision Process, or their day-to-day Participation Policy.
Goodyear also shows high organizational commitment to all its employees, evaluated in the Engagement Survey. This company fundamentally stands out with values like teamwork and the development of a culture in which people are extremely important, summed internally with the slogan "First with people."
Virtually all Top Employers companies measure employee engagement. They can be named differently: Engagement survey (Orange), Satisfaction survey (Canon), Opinion Polls (Sabic), Global Employee Survey (Novartis), or Pride and Commitment Survey (Makro). No matter what you call it, an overall high level of employee engagement is evident.
This commitment is achieved through programs such the ones applied by ING Direct, which focus on leadership as the key to the commitment and motivation of employees. This financial institution has deployed a full in house program to convert the "bosses" to true leaders and mentors to their teams. Thus, every leader achieves the development of their team members and makes the best of them, maintaining a high level of commitment.
The key for commitment for BSH lies, however, in areas such as relationships with society, or contribution to the social, environmental and cultural aspects.
Whatever you do, or whatever you call it, it is essential that the people who make up the company really feel part of it. Not just a piece of the jigsaw puzzle but "the" piece needed to complete the picture. Make sure that each and every individual is feeling that commitment and, if you notice that something is wrong, get them to fall in love again with their environment. Engage, commit and be proud. Always with a smile.
