Why it is vital to know about your employee engagement

The pandemic has resulted in some significant changes in the workplace both in terms of employee expectations and an employer’s ability to meet those expectations. In many cases the expectations are “unspoken” which makes responding to them impossible. Employers are not mind readers and therefore they need a mechanism to understand what their employees are thinking and what is necessary to retain existing employees and attract new employees.

According to research by LinkedIn, 33% of Australians will be actively looking for a new role this year. Although some level of turnover is not only normal, but desirable to keep new ideas flowing, high levels of turnover can create risk for employers, not to mention add significantly to the cost of running a business. Therefore, now is a good time to understand your workforce, their level of engagement may determine what you as an employer might be able to do to retain your most valued employees and position yourself as an employer of choice. 

In most businesses employees are our most valuable asset, and losing valued employees has an impact on the business in the short term and in some cases the long term. Therefore, knowing what you need to do to retain these valued employees, makes good business sense.  As we emerge from the Covid crisis the competition to attract the best talent in the market will be fierce and we are already seeing this in many sectors, where finding skilled and experienced employees is becoming more challenging and more expensive. Turnover costs can be as much as 33% of the employee’s annual salary when you consider all of the steps necessary to conduct a sound recruitment process as well as the cost of lost productivity.   

What can employers do now to prepare themselves for the future?

One simple thing that empowers employers with the ability to attract and retain top industry talent is to implement an employee engagement survey and learn from the results. Such a survey will give employers real time information and insights into where they should focus their efforts to reduce turnover, increase employee performance and implement strategies to be an employer of choice for the future.

Engagement surveys measure the engagement levels of an organisation’s employees, providing employers with invaluable and comprehensive insights into the organisation’s strengths, opportunities, and drivers of engagement.

Engagement surveys are crucial as they provide employees with a safe and structured way to provide open and honest feedback which can be turned into valuable insights. The responses provided by employees allows for real-time analytics which help identify at-risk employee populations with low engagement and who are therefore a serious attrition risk. Employers who understand their attrition risk can take proactive steps to minimise this risk and implement targeted strategies to retain their valued employees.

It is too late when you gain an understanding of your at-risk employee population by way of resignations. This means you have missed out on the opportunity to convert their feedback into positive change and therefore, minimising attrition risk.

The vast majority of the work we do in the field of engagement surveys is directed at helping organisations understand what is most important to their employees, with the goal of making improvements to increase engagement, improve productivity and reduce unwanted attrition. We are continually surprised at the simple steps that can be taken to reduce risk once that risk is identified. Expecting employees to share their views openly and honestly in the absence of a structure such as an engagement survey is a fool’s errand. However, obtaining the information you need is quite simple through an engagement survey.  

If you would like more information on our engagement surveys or how they can assist your business, please contact our HR Consulting division via the form below or on:

Author: Cheryl-Anne Laird 

Published: 26/08/2021 

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