Disposing of Disengagement – What We Can Do to Create a Happier, Healthier, and More Effective Workplace
Originally posted on September 9, 2011 on Jeffthehrguy.com
Most of us hate our jobs. It’s sad but true. We all work so hard to climb the corporate ladder and achieve wealth, power, and success, but we are rarely satisfied or happy. Turn on the T.V. or go to the movies anywhere in America, and the evidence is astounding. Shows like The Office and movies like Horrible Bosses and Office Space make us laugh at situations where average people reluctantly trudge through the workday and have to cope with their mean or incompetent superiors. The fact of the matter is most of us are just as unhappy and disillusioned as what we see on film and T.V.
If you think that workplace woe is not a big deal, consider this. According to a recent survey from Gallup.com, the ratio of engaged to actively disengaged employees is 1.83:1 in most organizations. That amount of disengagement is costing U.S. businesses over $300 billion per year in lost productivity, and the problem is getting worse. A recent article from Cnn.com states that job satisfaction in the U.S. hit a 22 year low last year with less than half of U.S. workers satisfied with their jobs.
So what’s causing this level of detachment in the workplace? The reasons may vary slightly from workplace to workplace and industry to industry, but according to The Seven Hidden Reasons Employees Leave by Leigh Branham, there are some usual suspects, such as lack of training and feedback from management, overworked and under-appreciated employees, and a loss of trust in management.
The common thread here is that most of us don’t feel like we are treated like people. We expect training and feedback, but management expects us to hit the ground running and be productive with little or no time to overcome the learning curve. We expect to have a work-life balance, but management expects us to work over forty hours a week, even if that was never discussed in the hiring process. We expect to have supervisors or managers we can come to with suggestions or ideas, but management—despite their alleged “open door policy”—never listens, or worse, disciplines or terminates us when we have a difference of opinion.
It seems we’re treated more as resources, not human. So what should our organizations do to fix the problem? Here are a few suggestions…
1) Understand that employee disengagement is an epidemic
It’s a proven fact that disengagement is the leading cause of Dontwannaworkitis, a debilitating disease that causes employees to call in sick, often just minutes before their shift, and can only be treated through wearing pajamas all day and watching re-runs of Judge Judy. However, the treatment is by no means a cure, and some employees will require repeat treatments, sometimes several times per week.
Other employees may power through Dontwannaworkitis and may actually report to work, but be very wary of these employees. Their ailment is contagious, and by being in the office, they may pass the disease to co-workers.
Whether Dontwannaworkitis is quarantined at your employee’s residence or if they report to work, the effect is always negative. It causes low morale in the workplace which leads to lower productivity and in turn negatively effects the bottom line. Also, the Judge Judy treatment is very ineffective in long term situations. Cases of Dontwannaworkitis, if left unchecked, will only get worse and will become more contagious. It can only be cured through a dramatic change in the workplace environment.
Granted, I’m being highly sarcastic, but it’s beneficial to think of disengagement as a disease. It contributes to an unhealthy environment, and it needs to be treated and cured like any ailment. Like most diseases, it will take more than one doctor visit to effectively combat it. Getting rid of disengagement once and for all may take weeks, months, or years, and supervisors, managers, executives, and employees must all be committed to solving the problem together.
2) Tell it like it is during the interview process
Early in my recruiting career, I interviewed for a recruiting job at Aerotek. Aerotek is one of the largest staffing agencies in the United States, and while they specialize in recruiting for aerospace and technology companies, they also have a division that recruits for accounting, finance, Human Resources, and administrative roles. As all of my recruiting experience up until that point involved admin and finance roles, I was most interested in working in that division of Aerotek, and during the interview process, I was told time and again that I would be recruiting for those roles. I received an offer from Aerotek which I excitedly accepted, but after two weeks of training, I was informed that I would be recruiting for software engineers, not admin or finance professionals.
I had been hoodwinked. I fell for the ol’ bait n’ switch. The misinformation provided to me during the interview process made me feel like I had been downright lied to, and I immediately lost all of my trust and respect for the company and for my supervisor. I quickly went from an excited, eager worker to a disengaged one, and for those reasons and a few others, I quit six months later.
The moral of the story for employers: Don’t pull the bait n’ switch. Be open and honest during the interview process. Lay it all out there, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Don’t sugarcoat the long hours, the cost of benefits, the lousy pay, or the demanding executives. Applicants will appreciate the honest approach and even if your honesty costs you a candidate, it’s often easier and less expensive to move on with the interview process and try to find another person for the position as opposed to hiring someone who quickly becomes disengaged. In addition, being honest and documenting that accurate information was given in the interview process may cover your derrière if anything (God forbid) goes to litigation.
3) Be in tune with the energy in the workplace
Misery indeed loves company, and in your company it may flourish. If you are a supervisor or manager, you should try to read the energy in your office. If you’re seeing a rise in absenteeism, tardiness, workplace injuries, even more frequent visits to the vending machine, you’re seeing signs of disengagement. Even the frequency (or infrequency) that certain simple phrases like “Please” and “Thank you” and “How are you doing today?” are said in your workplace can be an indication of how engaged your employees are to the company and to each other. Pay attention to the warning signs and follow the other tips provided here to fix the problems.
4) Show that you appreciate your employees
I’ve heard countless people say something along the lines of, “My current company doesn’t give a crap about me. They just expect me to come in, work, and leave.” Investing just a little bit of time in showing your appreciation can make a huge difference to employees. When I worked at the corporate office of Forever 21, each employee received a complementary Thanksgiving turkey the day before Thanksgiving. It was a small and relatively inexpensive perk, but it made a drastic change to morale as we entered the holiday season, a time that is incredibly stressful to all people, especially those who work in retail. I’ve also heard of a manufacturing company where the staff spends all day in a factory setting, doing assembly line work in a warehouse where the heat often reaches triple digits. Despite the inhospitable conditions, the company’s turnover is incredibly low. Why? Well, every day at 5pm, the entire C-suite comes down from their offices, stands by the door of the warehouse, and shakes hands with every worker, looks them in the eye, and says, “Thank you,” as the workers leave. With a simple gesture, each worker is told that the organization cares about them and appreciates them.
I think we’ve all been told we’ve been appreciated by our supervisors or managers, but when was the last time one shook your hand, and was it a daily occurrence? Probably not. Appreciation is free to give but extremely costly if not given.
5) When in doubt, ask, and listen
If you notice signs of disengagement in your workplace, there’s always one place you should consider going to investigate your problem: your employees themselves. Asking your employees for their thoughts, feelings, opinions, and feedback may make it much easier for you to identify the root cause of the problem and may illuminate which possible solutions would be the most effective. The act of reaching out to your employees and asking for their help may also re-engage them.
This must go deeper than a written open-door policy and a suggestion box on the wall. Many employees will not share their thoughts and feelings voluntarily, so that means you must take an active role in speaking with your employees. I have a current supervisor who stops by my desk every day, says hi, and asks how I’m doing. Our conversation usually lasts a minute or less, but I definitely notice it, and it reinforces to me that she cares and I can go to her if I ever have a problem or concern.
Be careful though. Asking for thoughts, feelings, opinions, ideas, and feedback doesn’t matter at all if you refrain from listening or acting upon the information. I’ve had managers before who when presented with a new idea would say, “I can’t take that to upper management. They’re set in their ways. We just have to keep doing the best we can do given the circumstances.” I’ve also heard of managers who would place an employee on an involuntary leave of absence if that employee presented them with a new idea and would claim that the employee was being “insubordinate.” Obviously each of these tactics will drive employees away and will make them disengage even more, so be careful of how you react to the feedback you receive from your staff.
6) Embrace and allow occasional, strategic disengagement
Let’s face it. We all need to disengage from time to time. Some occasional disengagement from work is good. It can rejuvenate us, give us a needed energy-boost, and can actually increase productivity.
Case in point: I once worked for a company who had a strict, no excuses “Beer Friday” policy. What is Beer Friday, you may ask? Well, my company would shut down the office at 4pm every Friday and pass out beer to everyone on staff to thank them for another productive week. We’d all drink and socialize for a few hours and then go home. Not only was this a cool perk that everyone looked forward to every week, but it actually made people work harder on Fridays since all work had to be completed by 4pm that day. While Fridays are usually slow, unproductive days in most offices, people at this company worked at breakneck speeds on Fridays so they could enjoy their end-of-the-week beer.
While this might not be an approach your company will implement for legal reasons, the results were astonishing nonetheless. Allowing employees to disengage, let loose, and relax fostered a stronger, more cohesive team that worked hard and thoroughly enjoyed working for the company.
7) Re-brand Human Resources (at least in your workforce’s collective mind) as Humane Resources
Human Resource Departments often get a bad reputation among the eyes of employees, and I for one can’t blame them. While HR should be the liaison between the C-suite and staff and should consider the best interests of both, more often than not HR is the Corporate Police Department. They issue tickets and warrants in the form of written warnings and disciplinary actions. They deliver iron clad rulings in the form of suspensions and terminations. In short, Human Resources often focuses on the resources piece as opposed to the human piece, and thus employees are often treated as things or property rather than people.
And here’s an interesting idea to ponder: things and property can’t and won’t speak up and can’t engage with your company, but people can, so to engage your work force, make sure they are treated like people. Re-brand Human Resources as HUMANE Resources. Make sure that HR initiatives don’t carry cold, impersonal, or negative labels.
I once worked for a company that would roll out specific, tailor-made action plans to any employee who deserved disciplinary action. The idea was to improve actions and outcomes through training so the employee could be retained rather than terminated. It sounds like a great idea, right? Well, that great idea doesn’t sound so great when it’s labeled a “Corrective Action Plan.” If I was an employee who was told by HR that my action needed to be “corrected,” I would immediately become disengaged. I’d also feel like my place of employment had now become a Correctional Facility.
On the flip side, I know of another company that had the same exact idea, but theirs was called a “Success Plan,” and their Success Plans were incredibly…well, successful. Employees who were given a Success Plan by HR felt that the company was still greatly invested in them as an employee, and in turn they became more invested in the company.
It’s amazing how important branding and rhetoric is in HR, and therefore it is imperative that you do everything you can to make employees feel that they are appreciated and heard.
So there you have it, my 7 point manifesto on how to combat the epidemic of workplace disengagement. By looking for root causes of disengagement, communicating effectively with employees, and showing your appreciation, you can create and cultivate an engaged and productive workforce.
