However, sometimes, evidence can emerge of the contrary -
even if you might have to be well on the ball to spot it. After all, a quarter
of workers say they have lied or bent the truth in engagement surveys.
Another eye-opening
statistic reported by CIO [1] is
that, in a survey of full-time 400 employees working at major organisations, 69%
are "open to other opportunities or already seeking their next jobs."
Sadly, they would probably never admit so to you, so watch out for these
potential warning signs...
Use one-on-one
interviews, not an engagement survey
As we have already seen, engagement surveys could tell you
surprisingly little about your workers' investment in your company. Indeed, not
everyone might be willing to admit to responding misleadingly to such surveys,
so it can't be easy to detect the true scope of the deception.
However, you could still make a start by entirely forgoing
those ineffective surveys and instead arranging one-on-one interviews with your
workers. When allowed to provide feedback anonymously and conversationally,
many workers will be more candid and honest with their input.
Get to know your
employees well
How well do you know them already? Probably not as much as
you think. According to one survey, 57% of workers believe that their leaders
are "detached from the workforce". If you aren't yourself engaged in
your workers, their own engagement could quickly fall.
For this reason, it can pay for you to better acquaint
yourself with your recruits on a personal - but still professional - level.
Through doing this, you could make your staff feel more comfortable with you -
and, hence, more willing to indicate issues that could have otherwise led them
to quit.
Solicit ideas from
staff members
You could have a pleasantly large number of opportunities to
do this. Those chances could arise, for example, during a brainstorm session or
when you are updating people about what's happening in the company - and want
ideas on where the company could go next.
If you find that certain employees are largely mute when you
are trying to gather ideas, it could be a sign that the workers in question
don't believe you would take on their thoughts anyway or they
don't intend to stay with your firm for too much longer, says Insights For Professionals [2].
Keep an eye on
employees' social media accounts
Do you follow your workers on social media? If so, seeing an
employee take to Facebook or Twitter to complain about your company could
initially tempt you to take disciplinary action against that badmouthing
worker. However, could they genuinely have a point?
Keep this possibility in mind by asking the employee about
the issue. If they have a well-justified grievance, this could be down to an
issue that permeates the company culture. Thankfully, if that problem is
widespread stress, you could tackle it with employee
wellbeing solutions from LifeWorks [3] and so prevent it from further
snowballing.