There was a time when the fitness of the employee base was virtually invisible, when the only things worthy of attention were turning up on time and doing as you were told. 'Mental health' was assigned to mad people and 'welfare' a mark of your ability to eat.
That was where Industry was born, hot off the back of the slave trade, growing fast into sweat shops. You had to give people breaks or they'd keel over from thirst and exhaustion. Things like 'work-life balance' weren't even in the vocabulary and 'engagement' was what happened before you got married.
Human history is, let's face it, a rapid account of several aeons on a planet whose age is quite hard to define (estimates favour "4.5 billion years"). We're talking about a fairly short aeon here, then, beginning in the 1700s and progressing unhindered to the present day. The Industrial Age swept across the world from its origins in the British Isles, and now we are left with the vestiges of a tradition that, like others of its kind, is dying very hard indeed.
This current era represents perhaps something of a bifurcation point in terms of social evolution as we're called upon to urgently re-examine vestiges in the vestibules of power; well-worn approaches to personnel management that have survived intact since those days of yore. The British have a fondness for tradition that sometimes proves to be their undoing - this instance may be no exception - our country ranks sixth-lowest in the world on employee engagement according to Gallup.
Not a statistic to be proud of, one has to admit, with 90% of our workforce disengaged and demoralised. What's stopping CEOs from brushing off the dust of antiquity and setting out to change things? One possibility is fear. In fact it's probably the only one.
One thing is certain - engagement is profitable. That alone should be an irresistible incentive. People bringing "a spring in their step" to the day ahead will raise productivity and innovation effortlessly without anyone breathing down their necks or sending out micro-management memos.
Engagement is profitable because it works on the same premise of physics as electron behaviour. Left to its own devices with an identified source of energetic input (positive or negative), a system will obligingly produce generally expected results. Over-monitored and micro-managed, a system loses integrity due to two primary factors - observer effect and retroactive interference... undeniable issues rooted in scientific study and evidenced by professional experts. So let's consider what does work, and why.
Healthy learning processes - they work. Opportunities for self-discovery highlight the benefits of advanced self-management (the root of WorldLine's foundation courses). This inevitably boosts confidence, enabling people to see the workplace through fresh, inspired eyes. Familiarity breeds contempt for a very good reason - negativity = the path of least resistance. Positive productivity is a principle waiting to be discovered - once grasped, it's not going to abandon anyone because it works to everyone's advantage and leaves negativity where it belongs.
Autonomous groupage - that works. Bringing people together from all walks of company life to learn about themselves represents a positive turning point for all involved, allowing co-operative processes to fuel a sense of equality and appreciation for each other's roles. Gathering participants from across the matrix who don't usually work closely together breaks down silos and blame culture through collaborative progress.
Proactive leaders - they work, too! The best results in programmes inevitably come from those involving the CEO... leaders who are prepared to approach change with a healthy, open-minded optimism are those who most quickly effect positive causes to be adopted by their teams. A proactive leader will help to sustain profitability simply by being aware, maintaining empathy and understanding that uncertainty is inevitable -learning how to deal with it effectively is what everyone needs to do, then everybody gains exponentially.
Evolution isn't rocket science, it's something that happens naturally given the right conditions and an appropriate source of energy. Your company could be evolving into a trailblazer of profitable, ethical self-management that sees its people happily walking in with a smile every morning, loyal to the core and loving the excitement of being there with you. Money ranks very low on the scale of incentives - This Harvard article was written 20 years ago, and cites an article written 40 years before that, but it's still relevant to working out solutions for ourselves. No time like the Present!
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(Visit https://www.linkedin.com/company/82163290 for more good stuff on engagement and where to find it
