Your Job is Not to Engage Them
Corporations spend a lot of energy on employee engagement as if there is some magic formula of training, open door policies, and standardized performance evaluations that if the leader does all of them in perfect harmony they’ll have a symphony of engagement.
It’s not the leader’s job to engage workers. It’s the workers’ job to come to work ready to do their best. The problem is employees may not know how to be their best or what ‘best’ looks like. It’s the leader’s job to issue the call to greatness and help employees be great.
To do this a leader has to help employees bypass their ego and the emotional churn of needing to be right and start focusing on facts not assumptions.
Free lunch, a pool table in the break room and flex hours are not the answer to poor engagement. Setting clear goals is a start but can backfire and lead to entitlement without accountability. “What would great look like?” is a way to involve employees in solutions to their workplace drama, in setting their goals and in the method of evaluation of their performance.
Recently, I was in South Africa learning a lot about its culture and people. There surely isn’t a lot of money to spend on training and development there where the major industry is tourism. Yet, the people are happy and want others to feel happy here. At any level, I see that as greatness.
If you are ready to have a purposeful career and not an accidental one here is a link to my FREE actionable career - Career and Life Planning Tool. If you don't know where you'll be at the end of the year you are already there.
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Your coach,
Mary Lee
P.S. Feel free to forward this email to someone who could benefit from it. We are all walking down the same road in life looking for a hand to hold. Sometimes we must be the hand that reaches out. www.MaryLeeGannon.com
Mary Lee Gannon, ACC, CAE is an executive coach and 19-year corporate CEO who helps leaders have more effective careers, happier lives and better relationships. Request a free consultation call.
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