Why bosses should make sure their staff like them
Employees who like and respect their bosses are more engaged, more productive, and more loyal to their companies.
And companies with engaged employees outperform the competition by as much as 202% and see a 19% increase in shareholder return, says business coach Allan Harvey.
Most South Africans are not engaged
Despite this, only 9% of employees in South Africa are engaged at work according to Gallup’s 142-country study on the State of the Global Workplace.
“The bulk of employees in South Africa, 91% in fact, are ‘not engaged,’ meaning they lack motivation and are less likely to invest discretionary effort in organisational goals or outcomes,” says Harvey.
Of that 91%, almost half (45%) are “actively disengaged,” indicating they are unhappy and unproductive at work.
Why engagement matters
Engagement drives performance and results because engaged employees contribute the most, stay the longest, and perform the best.
Gallup’s study reveals that engaged employees will try 57% harder, perform 20% better, and miss 20% fewer work days.
They are also less likely to be head-hunted by your competition, since as many as 60% of employees resign from their bosses rather than their jobs.
“If the engaged 9% are having the most positive impact on the bottom line, immense opportunities exist to improve business outcomes by influencing the hearts and minds of these disengaged employees,” Harvey says.
“Imagine increasing the engaged group by just 10% and the impact that will have on the business outcomes. That’s a total of nearly 20% more who try harder, who perform better, and miss fewer work days.”
How to improve employee engagement
Employees want their managers to care about their personal lives, to take an interest in them as people, to care about how they feel, and support their health and well-being.
A manager’s ability to build strong relationships with employees, build strong team interaction, and lead in a “person-centred” way creates an engaging environment in which employees can perform at the highest possible level.
It is also essential to work with employees to create a clear career path and set goals with a potential for growth.
“By showing team members that they are valued and have responsibility, and then to recognise and reward them for a job well done, a manager can create an involved employee.”
It is then much easier to turn that sense of involvement into enthusiasm and a sense of pride into ownership, which creates the highest levels of engagement with employees.
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