It's better if they give a damn
Do you have a best friend at work? If you have never been asked, you might think it an odd question for your employer to include in an employee survey. Why do they want to know, you might wonder. What business is it of theirs?
Standard Life, the life assurer that demutualised and floated on the London Stock Exchange last month after a painful restructuring, found the question was very much "its business".
Two years ago it experienced a huge drop in "employee engagement", as measured by a regular survey designed to identify whether staff felt part of the business, understood its goals, and were willing and able to contribute their best to achieving these.
It was the biggest fall that Gallup, which administers the 12-question survey, has ever seen in a company. The worst scores were on employees' understanding of what the organisation stood for and what it expected of them. Stephen McCafferty, human resources director, says this demonstrated how badly their trust had been damaged by hefty job cuts and the group's decision to shed its longstanding mutual status.
"Employees were saying: 'We're not sure we trust the business any more. We thought this was a stable business - we don't understand why things have changed,' " he says. "You get pulled up sharply by these scores. It's a bit of a shock, but in some regards it's a good thing."
Among the dire results was something more positive: responses to the item stating "I have a best friend at work" were less badly affected. Relationships within teams and between individuals remained good, despite the departure of long-serving colleagues and loss of faith in the company.
"So this question is very much the company's business - it has huge value in sustaining a level of engagement through very tough times," says Mr McCafferty. "When you come to rebuilding, you are rebuilding from a sound base."
Identifying where the worst scores were helped the insurer to understand what action was needed most urgently. As a result, senior managers changed the way they developed strategy, asking for employees' input before setting it in stone.It reviewed the appraisal ???-process to make individuals' objectives clearer and overhauled the handling of customer inquiries and the measurement of team performance.
Since then, engagement scores have almost recovered to 2003 levels, but still lag behind the global average. "One of my team put it that we were swimming along quite nicely in the middle of the pool and suddenly hit the bottom," says Mr McCafferty. "We managed to get half-way back up [by the 2005 employee survey] and we are now back on the surface."
Standard Life's use of employee surveys to measure engagement demonstrates the growing attention that companies are paying to the concept. Having an "engaged" workforce - a step beyond employee satisfaction or commitment - has been shown to improve the bottom line. Gallup's research, for example, has found a correlation between increased engagement and higher earnings per share. ISR, a rival employee research and consulting firm, found an average 19 per cent rise in operating income over 12 months for companies with a "highly engaged" workforce, compared with a fall of 33 per cent for companies with low engagement scores.
International surveys also show companies have their work cut out if they want to have a fully engaged workforce. Globally, 24 per cent of employees are "disengaged" and only 14 per cent are "highly engaged", according to one such survey by ???-Towers Perrin, the professional services firm.
Towers Perrin says that engagement is affected by significant change, whether positive or negative. Given the dramatic reshaping of the business environment from Asia to North America, "it is hardly surprising that so many employees exhibit a sense of dislocation and frustration at what they see as an ever-changing employment 'deal' with their employers".
Gauging employee opinion is, of course, only the first step. Acting on the findings is much harder. "There is a tendency with surveys to think: we've done that, and to put it to one side," says Sue Hayday, a research ???-fellow at the UK's Institute for Employment Studies. "Organisations like to have a figure for engagement so they can say they are better or worse than others. But just knowing the figure doesn't really help."
The numbers are particularly useful in identifying and addressing different levels of engagement within an organisation, she says.
For example, the institute's research in the National Health Service has found that engagement generally declines with age and length of service. But once employees hit 60, they suddenly become highly engaged - an intriguing finding given impending UK legislation to outlaw age ???-discrimination.
Ms Hayday says that employee engagement, unlike satisfaction or ???-commitment, involves a two-way relationship. "It's not just about the employee going the extra mile. The employer has to give something back."
This is echoed in Gallup's research into the subject, which has sought to identify the elements of engagement that team managers can influence.
Immediate supervisors and colleagues are crucial in determining an individual's engagement level, says Peter Flade, managing partner at Gallup in the UK. "Graduates might join a great company, but they tend to leave a lousy manager."
He says Gallup's 12 questions are also closely linked to productivity and staff retention.
For example, it has found the item about having a best friend at work to be the single biggest predictor of "shrinkage" - or theft - in the retail industry. "A high level of trust in the team dissuades people from leaving the warehouse door open," he says.
Standard Life has used its survey findings to pinpoint teams with better than average scores for engagement. It found staff turnover in these teams was about half that of poorly scoring teams, and absenteeism was 30 per cent lower. Team leaders were asked what they did and the information shared online.
"They are straightforward things," says Mr McCafferty. "These managers actively involve people in agreeing their individual targets. They differentiate clearly between 'must haves' and 'desirables'. Members of the team quickly flag when anything is unclear, regular checks are made on progress, and progress meetings take a variety of forms to suit team members and business needs."
Team leaders also play a more important part in internal communications than in the past, he says. As a mutual, the group used to take the approach of "management knows best", even to the extent of drawing up questions it thought employees would ask and providing the answers.
"Now we give people information and have a dialogue. In the past, it was parent-to-child communication. Now it's adult-to-adult."
你的员工敬业吗？
你
在工作中有好朋友吗？如果从来没人问过你这个问题，当它出现在公司的一份雇员调查中的时候，你可能会觉得这是个奇怪的问题。你或许会纳闷，为什么他们想知道这个？这关他们什么事？
寿险公司标准人寿(Standard Life)发现，这个问题与它“关系重大”。这家公司在一次痛苦的改组之后，实现了股份化，并于上月在伦敦证交所(London Stock Exchange)上市。
两年前，一项定期调查显示，该公司经历了一次“员工敬业度”的巨大滑坡。这一调查旨在确定员工是否认为自己是公司的一部分、理解其目标，并愿意和能够尽全力实现这些目标。
信任受损影响敬业度
盖洛普(Gallup)负责这一包含12个问题的调查，这是它在一家公司中所见到过的幅度最大的滑坡。最低分出现在雇员对公司所倡导价值的理解，以及公司对他们的期望等问题上。标准人寿的人力资源总监斯蒂芬?麦卡弗蒂(Stephen McCafferty)表示，这一结果表明，大量的裁员，以及集团决定放弃长期以来实行的相互制(mutual)，都对员工的信任度构成了巨大的破坏。
“雇员们说：‘我们无法确定自己是否还能信赖这家公司。我们曾以为这是一项稳定的业务――我们不明白为什么情况变了。’”他表示，“这些分数让我们大大地愣住了。这有点令人震惊，但从某种程度上讲，这是件好事。”
在这些可怕的结果中，也存在较为积极的东西：对于“我在工作中有一个好朋友”这一问题的回答没有受到太大影响。尽管长期在此供职的同事离开了，对公司也丧失了信心，但团队之间和个人之间的关系仍比较好。
“因此这个问题对于公司而言关系重大――它对于在非常困难的时期维持一定水平的敬业度作用巨大，”麦卡弗蒂表示，“当你重建员工对公司的信心时，你是在一个良好的基础上开始的。”
分析哪些方面分数最低的过程发挥了作用，帮助该保险公司明白了最迫切需要采取的行动。其结果是，高级经理人改变了他们制定策略的方式，在确定方案前请员工参与。公司对业绩评估过程进行了重审，让员工个人目标更为清晰，同时全面改革了对客户质询的处理以及团队业绩的考核。
自那以后，该公司敬业度的分值已大致回升到2003年的水平，但仍落后于全球平均水平。“我们团队中有人这样形容：我们一直在游泳池中间游得很好，但突然之间却沉底了，”麦卡弗蒂表示，“（从2005年的雇员调查来看）我们努力上升了一半，如今我们重新浮出了水面。”
超越员工满意度
标准人寿利用雇员调查衡量敬业度的经历表明，公司对敬业度的概念越来越关注。事实表明，拥有一支“敬业的”员工队伍――这是超越员工满意度或忠诚度的一步――能提高企业的利润水平。例如，盖洛普的研究便发现，在敬业度提高和每股收益增加之间存在着联动关系。另一家同业的员工调查和咨询公司ISR发现，拥有“高度敬业的”员工队伍的公司，12个月的营运收入平均上升19%，而在“敬业度”方面分数较低的公司，则平均下降33%。
其它国际调查还表明，如果公司想要拥有非常敬业的员工队伍，它们得好好谋划一下。专业服务公司韬睿咨询(Towers Perrin)进行的一次此类调查显示，全球范围内，24%的雇员“不敬业”，只有14%的人“高度敬业”。
韬睿咨询表示，重大变化会对员工敬业度产生正面或负面的影响。鉴于从亚洲到北美，商业环境都在发生显著转变，“在员工眼中，他们与雇主的雇佣‘交易’不断变化，因此，如此众多的雇员出现混乱和受挫的感觉也就不足为奇了。”
当然，调查员工的想法只是第一步。针对调查结果采取行动则要困难得多。“调查中往往存在这样一种倾向：我们已经完成了任务，可以丢开不管了。”英国职业研究所(Institute for Employment Studies)研究员苏?海迪(Sue Hayday)表示，“各单位都喜欢拥有一份敬业度数据，这样它们就可以说出自己比其它单位强，或是不如其它单位。但光知道这个数字并没有实际帮助。”
她表示，这些数据在识别和处理组织内部不同敬业程度方面尤其有帮助。
例如，该机构对英国国民健康服务体系(National Health Service)的研究发现，敬业度通常会随着年龄和服务年限的上升而下降。但雇员一到了60岁，会突然变得高度敬业――考虑到英国即将立法禁止年龄歧视，这是一个有趣的发现。
海迪表示，员工敬业度和满意度或忠诚度不一样，它涉及一种双向关系。“这不仅仅是雇员额外付出的问题，雇主必须也有所回报。”
盖洛普对该问题的研究也提到了这一点，该公司的研究希望找出团队管理者能够影响到的敬业因素。
盖洛普英国主管合伙人彼得?弗拉德(Peter Flade)表示，直接主管和同事对个人敬业程度的影响至关重要。“毕业生可能会加入一家出色的公司，但他们往往会离开一位惹人生厌的经理。”
他表示，盖洛普的12个问题，同样与生产力和留住员工密切相关。
例如，研究发现，员工在工作中有一个好朋友，会成为零售业对“损耗”（或“失窃”）最显著的预报。他表示：“团队中较高的信任度，会提醒人们不要让仓库大门敞开。”
平等沟通是关键
利用其调查结果，标准人寿挑出了敬业度分数高于平均值的团队。它发现，这些团队的员工流动率，约为得分较低团队的一半，缺勤率也低30%。他们询问了团队领导者的做法，并通过网络共享这些信息。
“这都是些简单明了的事情，”麦卡弗蒂表示，“这些管理者认同团队成员的个人目标，积极影响他们。他们明确了“要求”和“希望”之间的差异。当情况不确定时，团队成员会很快发出讯号，定期检查进度，同时采取多种形式的进度会议，以适应团队成员和业务的需要。
他表示，在内部交流中，团队领导人也扮演了比从前更为重要的角色。在以前，作为一个相互制保险企业，标准人寿采取的是“管理层最清楚”的方式，甚至会草拟出它认为员工会提出的问题，并提供相应的答案。
“现在，我们为员工提供信息，并进行对话。过去，是一种父母对子女式的沟通，现在则是成人之间的平等交流。”
