Tweet

Imagine All the People

Written by: Stephen Goldberg

Article Overview: “Imagine all the people living life in peace” sang John Lennon in the 70’s and it’s still being played today. Well, imagine employees working everyday in harmony and peace and happily contributing to a healthy and highly profitable organization. Sounds like wishful idealistic thinking from the 70’s, right? But recent studies show that this is possible. The global consulting group Towers Perrin has published their annual global study of employee engagement, which shows just how motivated people are to perform at their best.

Imagine All the People

“Imagine all the people living life in peace” sang John Lennon in the 70’s and it’s still being played today. Well, imagine employees working everyday in harmony and peace and happily contributing to a healthy and highly profitable organization. Sounds like wishful idealistic thinking from the 70’s, right? But recent studies show that this is possible. The global consulting group Towers Perrin has published their annual global study of employee engagement, which shows just how motivated people are to perform at their best.

The study showed that for Canada only 23% of employees consider themselves fully engaged in their work. Now if you are a pessimist this may sound awful but on the other hand optimists will see opportunity to convert the remaining 76% to become engaged.

There is good reason to act on this opportunity because the study makes a correlation between high or low engagement and financial results. The organizations that had the highest percentage of employee engagement increased operating income by 19 per cent and earning per share by 28 per cent year to year.

Contrast that with the declines at the companies with the lowest percentage of engaged employees – 33 per cent in operating income and 11 per cent in earnings per share.

So what is required to act on this opportunity and have more of our employees become engaged and highly productive? Before coming up with solutions to problems it is recommended to begin by understanding the cause. According to Kevin Aselstine of Towers Perrin, “…only leadership can build engagement”.
What do leaders need to do to seize this opportunity to build an engaged workforce and improve financial results?

To answer this I will provide information from another study this time done by Gallup, who in the 90’s did a massive study to find out what contributed to the retention of top performers and to employee engagement. They narrowed the list down to 12 keys things that top leaders do well and often.

The 12 Workplace Issues That Matter (according to the employees surveyed):
1. I know what is expected of me at work.
2. I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right.
3. At work, I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day.
4. In the last seven days, I have received recognition or praise for doing good work.
5. My supervisor, or someone at work, seems to care about me as a person.
6. There is someone at work who encourages my development.
7. At work, my opinions seem to count.
8. The mission/purpose of my company makes me feel my job is important.
9. My associates (fellow employees) are committed to doing quality work.
10. I have a best friend at work.
11. In the last six months, someone at work has talked to me about my progress.
12. This last year, I have had opportunities at work to learn and grow.

Even though this study was done in the 90’s little has changed today and the list is more relevant than ever. Why? Because people’s needs have not changed.
Of course you need to begin by first building the right team and that means hiring and or promoting the right person for the job.

What is very interesting is that the above list does not cost any money. It only requires good leaders who are doing their job properly. If only 23% of the Canadian workforce are engaged the conclusion must be that leaders are not doing their jobs well or do not know how to do the things in the above list. This means that leadership development is a growing need that, if neglected, will cost companies huge amounts in lost opportunities.

Stephen Goldberg

Related Articles
  Imagine a Bigger Market and You'll See a Bigger Market
  A Great Life Starts in Your Imagination
  I’m Sending You on a Mission
  When Fear Holds You Back
  Psychological Tricks For Writing Sales Letters and Marketing Emails

Article Tags: 12 keys, correlation, declines, earning per share, earnings per share, employee engagement, gallup, global consulting group, global study, good reason, john lennon, massive study, operating income, optimists, pessimist, profitable organization, top performers, towers perrin, workforce, workplace issues



Related Forum Posts
Turbulent Olympics - It certainly looks like the Olympics are going to be turbulent this year. Will be interesting to see how things go as they get closer. Imagine, all this trouble and all they have done was carry the torch. Its just such a shame that the athletes are the ones that suffer. Chris
Best Pen - maybe - Fly Paper! interesting... I thought it would work on any surface - that would have been best. Imagine yourself in a cafe and you pull out the best writing surface available - a napkin. You're writing your ideas in ink but it's also captured on your pen! i could have only wished...
How do we market to 2 Billion people in China? - Internet had made the world a global village. How can we market our product to the 2 billion people in China? Imagine 1% of the population buying your product online. That is 20,000,000 multiply your product. If you sell your ebook for $5. This is $100,000,000. Please let us brainstorm on how we can market to this country. Your suggestion are welcome.
Re: Taking Your Online Business Offline? - Hi Alan, I was thinking that your URL could either use keywords such as the ones you suggested, or something like online-business-solutions etc, OR you could try to encapsulate the core service idea of getting existing businesses onto the Internet in a phrase such as "takeyourbusinessonline" etc. Imagine what you'd ask yourself if you had a small business and you wanted to go online with it but didn't know how to... Hope that helps. DH
Brilliant article - [quote:2fa7fifo]Imagine if you could always find what you needed in just 1 or 2 phone calls. If you are well networked, you probably can.[/quote:2fa7fifo] This point is so true. Over at my site I’m brining on a team of expert writers, whenever I have a question about an article I’m writing I fire of an email to them and within minutes I have an answer to my problem, something that could have taken me hours to research and learn elsewhere. I think one point that was missing, it’s a two way system. You have to be ready and willing to help others, otherwise know one will want to help you.


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Tweet

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

10 Ways to Handle Objections Effectively

How To Brand Your Home Business Online

How to Ask for a Flexible Work Arrangement

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.