Do All Disengaged Employees Matter?
While all people should be treated fairly and respectfully at work, do all disengaged employees matter equally for every company and every talent management strategy?
What happens when your employees don’t feel the love? According to research, your customers don’t either.
Customer First Approach
There have been many organizations that espoused the customers first approach to leadership that was prevalent in the last ten years or so. And, for many, putting customers first has resulted in success.
Employee First Approach
But there’s another way to think about how to win in this competitive environment…it’s putting employees first.
The rationale is that, if your employees are not happy at work, they won’t care about making your customers happy. And if customers don’t feel as if their needs are being met by your employees, you will lose them; they will go elsewhere, probably to your competitors.
Here are some research-backed statistics from Forbes, the WSJ, Gallup, the USA Today, and the Rand Corporation that should worry any leader who is concerned about whether all disengaged employees matter:
• Companies who have happily engaged employees outperform their competitors by 20%
• Engaged salespeople are 37% more productive than those who are disengaged
• Over one-third of employees would sacrifice $5,000 per year to be happier at work
• Fortune’s 100 Best Places to Work enjoyed a stock increase of 2.3-times the overall market
And the most telling is that almost one-third of employees don’t really care about the work that they are doing.
What Do These Employee Engagement Statistics Mean to Business Leaders?
They mean that YOU should really care about your employees’ attitude toward their work. It is not rocket science to realize that if you are served by a lackadaisical employee, you are less inclined to buy. Employees significantly affect the customer experience…whether they work in customer service, sales or production.
To truly succeed in business over the long-term, you need to be deeply concerned about whether your employees care enough about the customers they serve, the solutions they sell, or the quality of the products they make. Your organization’s business success depends upon it.
What Can You Do to Find Out the Level of Your Employees’ Engagement? Ask them.
You can do this in open forums or focus groups (though you may not get honest answers if they suspect there will be repercussions for negative comments). Or you can conduct an employee engagement survey that assures anonymity.
But be sure that, if you ask your employees for feedback that you intend to act upon the engagement results. Do not implement a survey out of simple curiosity; only conduct a survey if you plan to make meaningful and visible changes depending upon what you learn. This must be your promise as you ask your employees to participate in the process.
The good news is that employees who see meaningful results from engagement surveys are twelve times more likely to be more engaged.
So, Back to the Fundamental Question: Do All Disengaged Employees Matter?
The short answer is yes. Disengaged employees negatively impact your customers and your people. The longer answer is that not all employees and not all jobs are of equal value to a company’s strategy or as easy to replace. Focus first on compassionately exiting toxic employees for the good of your customers and their coworkers. Then invest more time, energy, and resources on engaging an retaining your top talent that matters most.
Put them first. Understand what they think, what they need, and how they feel. Your success, and the success of your customers, depends upon their engagement in the work they do.
To learn more about if all disengaged employees matter, download this proven employee engagement and retention toolkit for leaders