Your Employees WANT to be Challenged: Survey

By Allan Pulga 

If you assume your workers are lazy and require extra initiative to perform at the level you demand, odds are you are mistaken. In fact, it’s likely your employees are working harder than you think, to exceed your expectations. 

The majority of employees today desire to be fully engaged in the workplace and set high standards for themselves according to a study conducted by the Towers Perrin management consulting firm, as reported by Virgina Galt of The Globe and Mail. 

The study, released Oct. 22, surveyed nearly 90,000 workers worldwide and found that 84 percent of respondents enjoy challenging work, 83 percent look for opportunities to develop new skills and 58 percent “tend to invest time and effort beyond what is required,” said Towers Perrin. 

However, the majority also feel they are not getting the organizational support they need to perform to full potential. “Employees want to invest more of themselves to help their employers, but employers don’t understand their employee base well enough to create a work experience and culture that will elicit full engagement… Employers need to understand their employees as well as they understand their customers,” Towers Perrin said. 

Make your workers feel valued 

Galt reports the survey found that only 6 percent of Canadian respondents believe senior management “treats employees as if they the most important part of the organization,” and only 23 percent describe themselves as being fully engaged at work, according to the firm. 

The survey says 32 percent of Canadian employees are partly to fully disengaged, which should be a major concern to managers and employers. 

Engaged employees make you more money 

Obviously, engaged employees are much less likely to quit than their disenchanted colleagues, and ultimately contribute to greater profits for their employer, explained Kevin Aselstine, managing principal at Towers Perrin in Toronto, to Galt. 

Towers Perrin found that companies with the highest percentage of engaged employees collectively increased operating income 19 percent year-to-year. Meanwhile, companies with the lowest percentage of engaged employees showed year-to-year drop in operating income of 33 percent. 

How to engage your employees? 

1. Show them you care

Let your employees know you care about how they feel, about their progress on the job, and about recognizing their accomplishments. 

Towers Perrin identified a belief that senior management “is sincerely interested in employee well-being” as the No. 1 driver of worker engagement worldwide. 

2. Feedback, communication and honesty

“Senior leaders get low marks in particular on communication and transparency,” said Towers Perrin in its report. 

“Only 38 percent feel senior management communicates openly and honestly and only 44 percent agree senior management tries to be visible and accessible,” the firm reported. Rather than feeling they are considered as their employer’s most important assets, “more than 50 percent feel that senior management ‘treats us as just another part of the organization to be managed,’ or as if we don’t matter.” 

3. Understand your employees’ needs

The survey findings indicate that senior managers have it within their power to drive engagement up by getting a better handle on the support their employees need and want, reported Galt in conclusion.