Employee Engagement: The Secret to Bridging the Gap in Your Workforce

The pandemic has certainly affected us all in various ways, yet all industries have felt the pressure of one reoccurring theme: employee engagement. Research shows that it is correlated to not only productivity but profitability. So, what is employee engagement and what are the challenges faced when trying to achieve it?

Engagement Vs. Satisfaction

Employee engagement is defined as the extent to which employees feel passionate about their jobs, are committed to the organization, and put discretionary effort into their work. It's not to be confused with employee satisfaction, a measurement of tolerance of much workload will be accepted for the rate of compensation. Think of it this way: a person can be satisfied with a job and consequently he/she shows up daily, but still may not be connected to or engaged with the work he/she is doing. This may lead to to lack of motivation to go above and beyond. We'll mention why that's important now.

Why It Matters

Organizations with highly engaged employees have shown operating margins three times higher than those of companies with the lowest levels of engagement as well as 22 percent greater productivity. What effect will this ultimately have on your organization? The most common benefit of employee engagement is better production or going "above and beyond". An engaged employee will tend to do more than the minimum requirement of them, working more diligently to problem solve and serve customers. This leads many managers and leaders to ask themselves, "Where else does it make sense for employee engagement to become advantageous to the organization?" Regarding receptivity and employee feedback, you'll find there is more insight to gain from an engaged workforce. Consequently, this helps you to learn more about your business as well as cultivate growth and success.

Drive Employee Engagement with HCM Technology

Gartner, Inc. found that 88% of businesses all over the world mandated or encouraged all employees to to work from home at the start of the pandemic. With the remote workforce seeing no decline, most organizations are creating contingency plans for employees as restrictions are still changing and future regulations are unclear. What an evaluation of this approach will uncover is: while you maintain the ability to work on existing initiatives and projects — you lose the valuable connections that your human capital share when they can collaborate in person. How can you drive employee engagement in a world that requires us to socially distance and virtually connect? Communication, transparency, and experience are the building blocks for a great HCM platform and workforce.

Communication

• Allow managers and employees to connect in real-time. Using HCM technology should an employee need to request time off, administrators receive prompt notification-- each user can perform the actions instantaneously and can respond to them at their convenience using a variety of mobile devices. Forget having to track each other down and execute documentation. Let the work flow seamlessly through the cloud based system.

Transparency

• A great HCM solution can break down the silos of the employee and administrative experience. With TruPay's Inspire HCM—payroll, HR, and time management are all accessed and managed with one single sign-on. Real time data collection makes it possible to show every user all they want to know when they want to know it. An employee could view their accrual balances and benefits eligibility the same as an administrator—aligning all parts of your organization

Experience

• To optimize engagement, whether it be with an organization, a web page or a video game—it's all about the experience. With HCM technology, give your organization a hands-on experience that collects the data and turns it into insight. It's easy for employees at all levels to view their data at glance, from any location using any compatible mobile device. Tasks are simplified at every level within the organization, reducing time spent and increasing efficiency. 

We can conclude that employee engagement is something that most companies desire to increase, yet it can be difficult to know where to start assessing engagement levels and the barriers to optimizing it. A study can be done by Gallup revealed that about 34% of employees are engaged, which leaves much room for improvement. What if you were able to increase engagement by 5%—can you imagine what this would do for company culture, morale, and your bottom line? Our team will continue to help organizations drive employee engagement in the modern workforce through HCM technology and solutions.

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