27 Mar Empower People from Hire to Retire
Having the wrong person in any job is an expensive business problem given that most employers aren’t paying people to coast through their workday, play on their phones, and basically not do their jobs. That’s the difference between doing the bare minimum to get a paycheck and giving one’s best at work. According to Gallup, as many as 85% of employees are either not engaged or actively disengaged at work. No one wants to pay full price and not get full value – even from our employees.
When you have the wrong person in a role, there’s a very good chance they won’t stay in that role long. Turnover is expensive. According to the US Department of Labor, the average cost of a bad hiring decision can equal 30% of the first year’s compensation. It’s much higher for highly paid roles.
On the other hand, companies with high levels of employee engagement are more profitable, provide better customer service, and have fewer errors and workplace accidents. The difference? They hire the right people from the get-go and take care of them long term.
How do you know who is the “right person”? You have to create a human capital plan that supports your business plan. We start by using an objective job analysis tool to define the behavioral and cognitive requirements that will allow someone to be successful in the role. Then, you need to understand each person currently in a role as well as how to best coach and motivate them to higher performance. Understanding who the right person is helps with communication and performance by knowing how they will tackle their work, and more importantly, how they will pursue the organization’s goals. If you don’t know their strengths and are unable to align them to the job requirements, there will be a disconnect in performance.
There is also a business cost to mediocrity. Think about your best employees, the A players. Now think about your C-players. There’s a difference in output, production, sales, customer service ratings, or whatever metrics you’re measuring. For example, if you have 10 people on a team and only two or three are killing it and the rest are just okay, is that pushing your business forward? Or would you benefit from having people who behaviorally and cognitively tackle the work like those star performers?
The best way to achieve your business objectives is to align each employee’s natural motivating needs with the requirements of each job — beyond the resume. Education and experience are obvious. But for the business to truly create an engaged workforce, you have to understand individual motivating needs.
At Business Results, we work directly with clients ensuring they are able to quickly use the powerful combination of science, technology, and knowledge transfer to achieve their desired business results.
We teach our clients to use people data to define the ideal qualities that will help somebody perform at their very best in a role. We couple that with management training and leadership development so that post-hire managers and leaders know how to best communicate with, provide feedback to, communicate directions, and even give kudos based on each individual’s unique needs.
Knowing how to best manage each person on your team is a great step to improving engagement, productivity and profitability. Couple that management knowledge with a powerful tool such as CATIL, keeps your employees engaged, informed, and to empower them to do their best. You’ll have the system to hire, manage and keep your people engaged every day.