Tips to Attract & Retain Your Top Talent
May 4, 2018 | Posted in Leading Hartfully | By Gaia Hart
Winning and keeping the bright stars of today requires and understanding of the shift in values and changing expectations to today’s workforce. Some of the key elements in attracting and retaining your top talent are:
* Offering a flexible way to work that allows for personal and professional work/life balance. Time spent on the job in a year has increased by 163 hours in the last 20 years, which equates to about one month per year, while our leisure time has declined by about 30%. More and more entry-level professionals are willing to give up salary in exchange for less work hours to help balance their lives. Some research indicates that it is possible to cut turnover by 50% by introducing such programs as: eldercare programs, flextime, alternate work schedules, dependent care leave, counseling, childcare subsidies, commuter subsidies.
* Tie your organizational mission to a deeper meaning so workers can gain a deeper sense of cause and meaningful work. Many employees want to make a difference more than anything – it comes up near the top of many motivational surveys. Create a sense of community among workers by giving them time to be a part of something other than their job position.
* Allow for socializing, learning, volunteering, chairing teams, and setting up your environment to compel integration of all workers and allow for interaction and brainstorming. One high-tech engineering firm in Virginia hosts Technology Tuesdays with free lunch and learn sessions on the latest gadgets or techno stuff. They also offer cookies and milk on Wednesday afternoons so employees can take a break and gather around for a quick break. One financial services company allows workers a certain number of hours off per quarter to volunteer for their favorite community cause.
* Offer personal and professional development at all levels. Allow employees to choose the training they think would benefit them and the company most. Give access to training catalogs and let them choose or work it out with their budgets so they get to decide what to cut if something else is important enough to attend. When people feel valued, they stick around. That goes with customers, employees, and personal relationships. When we don’t feel valued, understood, and listened to – we walk.
How Does Your Organization Measure Up in Employee Satisfaction?
May 4, 2017 | Posted in Leading Hartfully, Living Hartfully | By Gaia Hart
Time to take a hard look at the hard questions and maybe experience some of the hard facts that workers are not all that happy. Better to know now and do something about it than to wait until they jump ship to find out in their exit interview how you screwed up. You are doing exit interviews, aren’t you?
Answer these questions provided by the Forum for People Performance Management and Measurement to see how your organization measures up.
- Are employees empowered to service customers at the highest possible level?
- Does the company recognize the role of employees in retaining customers?
- Is the performance of employees regularly measured?
- Are internal communications truly aligned with external marketing initiatives?
- Does the company’s overall corporate objective include human resource and motivation issues?
- Is the company committed to employee development and training?
- Are employees encouraged to provide feedback and given the tools to do so?
- Is employee feedback incorporated into planning and operations?
- Can the company demonstrate a link between people performance management and sales and profit?
In an annual survey conducted by the Society of Human Resource Management, here are the results concerning work-life programs in corporate America today:
- 57% of companies now offer flextime to their employees
- 56% have wellness programs
- 36% allow telecommuting
- 20% have on-site fitness centers
- 19% offer stress-reduction tips to workers
- 13% offer massage therapy
When employees feel included when they feel a sense of belonging to an organization, when their personal values and goals are in alignment with the organizational values. In order to gain a maximum sense of involvement and engagement in an organization, here are some elements that need to be present to foster dedication, retention, and productivity:
- Intrinsic personal interest and worthwhile work
- Challenge and stimulation
- Significance
- Influence
- Creativity
- Independence
- Control
- Income
- Security
- Personal involvement
- Recognition
- Positive environment
24% of 1000 workers surveyed said they were chronically angry at work. The most common reason cited was a sense that their employers “violated basic promises” and didn’t fulfill “the expected psychological contract with their workers”. The anger problem remains mostly underground and workers simply lose interest in work and become lethargic and uncooperative. What is going on in your office to undermine expectations?
Ask burned-out employees (or less than enthusiastic family members) “What do you really want from your job/school/your life/this family?”. Write down 25 quick answers to help jostle them into thinking about their interests and desires so they can look for a way to pursue them through work/school/family life.
So how does your organization measure up? Are you incorporating these types of things into your environment? If you have other ideas that are working for you, let me know at Gaia@GaiaHart.com.
Clients Comment on Morale-Boosting Ideas
October 4, 2016 | Posted in Leading Hartfully | By Gaia Hart
I often get ideas from clients on how they boost morale in their organizations. Here are some of their ideas along with some tidbits I’ve picked up on how to enhance your work experience to live and lead Hartfully:
- Have a mascot for the office who can wear the official badge, pin, or t-shirt of the department. This can be a stuffed animal or beanbag character. Other departments have been known to kidnap the mascot and hold them ransom for pizza or candy. Sometimes the mascot sits at the reception desk to oversee visitors – it adds some playful professionalism.
- One payroll professional wore a crown and a sash that say Payroll Queen when she personally distributed paycheck stubs to the team.
- One accounting firm offered free 15-minute seated massages during the month of April when their team was particularly overworked.
- A city recreation department’s executives hosted a breakfast cooked by them for their organization to kick off the summer staff meeting.
- Another recreation department used some of their own staff in a training film with the theme of COPS – catching frontline personnel staging bad customer service for the film. They also interviewed colleagues about what they thought was good service and the best part about the film was the bloopers and outtakes that they added to the end of the film. The audience went wild as they saw their co-workers goof up and be themselves in front of the cameras.
- The admin staff at a physics lab gets together for weekly lunches during the summer to create fresh salads made from the gardens of the workers with a recipe from an Italian grandmother.
- In similar fashion – another office hosts a cookie exchange over the holidays to expand on the variety of cookies each household offers without all the work of baking different cookies. They take it one step further and deliver extra plates of cookies to the local fire department, police station, and nursing home.
- Special Events Magazine reports that two-thirds of respondents to an online poll believe that in-person interaction tops technology as a communications tool. Some 66 percent of respondents said that technology-video conferencing, Webcasting and the like-is not as effective for communication in meetings as is in-person communication.
- Eliminating just fifteen wasted minutes each day adds up to ninety-one extra hours a year, more than two full workweeks. Organize and energize your space, your stuff, and your life to gain valuable time you can use for more fun in your life.
- Ask yourself what is the best use of your time right now and then act on it.
- Create systems that work with your preferences for sorting papers and stuff – try horizontal surfaces and vertical surfaces for storage bins.
- Look at your time you have allotted for a project and then add to it – things usually take longer than you plan.
- Put your personal and professional appointments on one calendar to avoid double-booking yourself.
- Finally, decide right now to think FAT: file, allocate (give to someone else), or toss.
- Findings in a recent USA Today article: HR experts say employees exposed to stresses such as layoffs are more likely to engage in violent behavior. Nearly 35% of workers say they’ve seen an increase in anxiety and stress-related physical ailments in their workplace in the last year. 27% report a rise in emotional problems such as insomnia and depression.
Top Reasons for Turnover
September 4, 2016 | Posted in Leading Hartfully | By Gaia Hart
After spending a few decades studying employee recognition, resilience, workplace culture, personal energy and organizational moral. I’ve compiled some fun facts on the issues and top reasons for turnover:
- give meaningless raises
- give insincere thank you’s
- throw them into jobs without training or qualifications
- allow a disorganized, dirty workplace
- freak out by visits from authority
- my way or the highway – because I’m the boss
- overlook unacceptable behavior – inconsistent discipline
- ignore opinions and ideas from staff
- lack of feedback
- micromanage
- and…… drum roll please……. ugly uniforms (who knew?!)
- A Fast Company magazine reader poll asked for the wish list of their subscribers and questioned whether they would prefer dollars or downtime as a reward for a job well done. 61% said they would give up some of their pay for more time with their family. 39% said they would give up some pay for less stress. 59% of men said that given an extra hour, they would spend it with their family. 6% said they would spend the extra hour on work.
- In another Fast Company reader poll: 10% of Americans say stress-induced physical violence has occurred in their workplace. 42% have experienced yelling and verbal abuse in their workplace. 52% sometimes have to work more than 12 hours a day to get their job done. 26% say it’s time for their employer to redecorate. So if you’re spending so much time at work and getting yelled at to do it – you may as well be in a nice environment for most of those hours. The civility of colleagues sometimes goes out the door when placed under stress. When things get heated, be aware of the humanity in the workplace and consciously try to keep it in the workplace for everybody’s sake.
- Stress costs US industry over $150 billion yearly. Stress-related products and services are a $9.4 billion industry. (The GDP of El Salvador is only $11.4 billion.)
- Gallup interviewed two million workers at 700 companies and their conclusion was “The length of an employee’s stay in an organization is largely determined by his relationship with his immediate supervisor.” This translates to people leaving managers, and not leaving companies. What are you doing to pump up your managerial and people skills in order to retain your top talent?
- Some questions to ask your team in order to gain some insight into their most important issues and engage them in meaningful conversations:
- What is the one thing I could do better for you?
- If you were CEO for the day – what would you change to improve the quality of life here?
- What motivates you?
- How would you like to be recognized when you do good work?
- What would a good job look like?
Incentive Insights
June 4, 2016 | Posted in Leading Hartfully, Living Hartfully | By Gaia Hart
The magazine Business 2.0 conducted a reader survey of 6439 people on the single factor that most heavily influences job satisfaction which, by the way, influences life balance:
- 60.3% the work I do is interesting/engaging
- 26% size of my salary
- 7.5% getting along well with colleagues
- 6.2% getting along with my boss
- From a survey of work/life balance by careerbuilder.com; 4 out of 5 respondents expect at least some flexibility from their employer when arranging daily work schedules. Over 29% would like to be able to set their own hours, while 52% would like the ability to negotiate their own hours.
- Many organizations are offering online incentives to make it easier to administer a reward and recognition system that is fresh and timely. Here are some sites that offer the gamut of corporate gifting and incentives:
- www.wishlist.com
- Some of these sites offer just gifts while other offer value-added services such as incentive program setups and program consultants to help you launch your program or pump up your morale with their services. With some of these sites, you can let the recipients choose their incentive or gift that enhances the motivating factor.
- Don’t think incentives and rewards are important? Did you know that?
- 46% of employees leaving a company do so because they feel unappreciated
- 61% said their bosses don’t place much importance on them as people
- 88% said they do not receive enough acknowledgment for their work
- Think again about your organization – what gets rewarded, gets repeated
Things About Energy, Empowerment, and Employee Retention that Make You Go Hmmmm
March 4, 2016 | Posted in Leading Hartfully, Living Hartfully | By Gaia Hart
Work-life programs are keeping workers at work and experts are attributing fewer sick days to these programs. With more flexibility to arrange their schedules and more workplace help with dry-cleaning, day-care, and car washing; workers aren’t as tempted to take “mental health days”. According to a CCH, Inc. survey of absenteeism, it declines to 2.1% as compared to 2.7% last year and 2.9% in 1999. Absenteeism costs companies more than $600 per employee per year which translates to $9000 for a 15-person operation or $3 million for a 5,000 employee organization. Research shows that only 40% who call in are really sick – the other 60% are taking care of personal business.
* According to www.realage.com, laughing can make your “real age” up to 8 years younger.
* What steps does your organization take to help keep workers at work by offering some conveniences or assistance for staff so they can handle life’s responsibilities? Some organizations: have a car detailing service 1-2 times per week in the parking lot, have a corporate concierge who arranges to meet plumbers or the cable guy at a worker’s home while the worker stays at work or makes dinner reservations or arranges for concert tickets, have a dry-cleaning operation on site, have pet-care centers, have arrangements for eldercare options, have a massage therapist come on site for breaks, or have take-home dinner options available from the employee cafeteria.
* The National Association of Colleges and Employers reports that 62% of recent college grads expect to leave their first job in 3 years. What will you do to retain your top talent when they come to you with this expectation?
I wanted to share some energy boosting tips to improve your personal energy and keep stress at bay:
- Spend time deep breathing to oxygenate the body.
- Get fit in bits – even bursts of 10 minutes three times per day will help.
- Mind your posture and stand or sit straight to help your diaphragm and aid in deep breathing, it is also less fatiguing on your back.
- Sit properly with your knees at right angles and feet and back flat. Pat attention to your chair or elevate your feet to help your back – stretch and move often if you sit at your desk for long periods.
- Get outside for fresh air and sunshine.
- Learn to use acupressure points to release more energy doors for better energy flow throughout the day.
- Practice yoga for body movement and breathing techniques – it helps relax you, tone and strengthen muscles, and add flexibility to aid in energy flow.
- Laughing reduces stress hormones and invigorates the circulatory system, the respiratory system, and muscles throughout the body. Contrary to popular belief, it does not release endorphins, but it does have other healthy effects.
- Dance and since for physical and emotional release.
- Rest with intensity – get plenty of sleep nightly to rejuvenate and refresh.
- Eat smaller meals and eat more frequently to keep your blood sugar stable and your metabolism on track to help balance your energy levels.
Your Values, Feel Valued, Give Value & Matching Values
May 10, 2010 | Posted in Leading Hartfully | By Gaia Hart
Comments Off on Your Values, Feel Valued, Give Value & Matching Values
There’s a lot of talk about value these days. Whether it’s knowing your own priority of values, feeling valued by others, adding value to a sale or service,s or matching values with your partner or your workplace. Is there alignment with your values and those you choose to deal with in your work and home life?
If we don’t feel valued, we walk. Whether it’s in our personal life or in our professional life. If our partner isn’t valuing us or our values don’t match with them, there is a good chance the relationship will fizzle or you will walk away before the big downward spiral.
In business, it’s the same thing. If we don’t feel valued as a client or customer by the service, attitude or inferior products or behavior – we take our business elsewhere. If we’re mistreated, not honored, patronized, ignored, spoken to in a rude manner, experience unacceptable or sub-par service, we walk. It takes just one person in the service delivery chain to really screw things up for a business owner or company. Your font line is your bottom line where the rubber meets the road in customer retention and one surly, sour receptionist/cashier/call center rep/sales person can ruin it for you. And there goes the lifetime value of that customer.
It pays you dividends many times over to train your team in the manner you wish to be treated and wish them to treat your customers. It starts at the top – how they are treated is how they will treat your clients. Value your team and they will be more likely to value your consumers. It sure helps to hire them with positive dispositions in the first place. You can train skills, but it’s much harder to train attitude and outlook.
Matching your values to your workplace or to your preferred providers of service is critical in maintaining a long-term happy partnership. Before deciding upon a career path, job or personal or business to business provider, get clear on how your values match the values of that other business. If there is a big discrepancy, then it will create tension, strife, frustration and ultimately a deterioration of the connection. It is not a pretty sight. If you can determine some of the foundational values of your chosen business, then you’re one step ahead of the game.
Clues as to what a company values is in their marketing materials, how they treat their team members, how they treat their customers, what type of business they are in and who is running the show. Make sure there is a good match between what you value and who you spend your time and money with to ensure smoother sailing in future endeavors.
How are you offering value to your customers, your employees or business partners? How do your personal values spill over to your work? How about your friends, family, loved ones? Is there a good match between what you hold in high value and what they hold in high value? If not, there may need to be some tough decisions ahead.
Is there an alignment with your values and what you do for a living? Or your values and how you treat your customers? If things are out of alignment, you will know something isn’t right. Take stock of your values and how that colors your choices in your personal and professional life and make changes to align them to feel more energized.