Fix the damn roads
Eating the elephant one bite at a time can improve your company and employee engagement (satisfaction)
I just had another tire fixed because of a pothole on Michigan roads. For those of you that live here, you know the drill.
This is not a shot at current Governor of Michigan, it’s what all politicians are elected to do. Fix today’s problems. This was her specific campaign slogan - “fix the damn roads”. When politicians take those problems away, meaning that they fix them, the liberty of time to work on those future big problems is earned.
In a world with an attention span shorter than a sitcom, you need to fix these small problems.
Say what you’ll do, and do what you say!
Your organization has issues today. All organizations do., It is impossible to hide from them. Before you put grandiose plans together for the future, prove to your team you can fix something that matters to them.
Do you think you have earned your team’s trust? If your vision is so clear, fix the damn roads so it’s at least a smoother ride to the promised land.
Visioning
Why does visioning for the future always have to be so far down the road? In Gallup Polls over the years, employee engagement has been below 35% for decades. The actively-disengaged - “those who have miserable work experiences and spread their unhappiness to their colleagues” is around 13%. That is a whole lot of people actively trying to dismantle your company! How do you re-engage? Try to fix the damn roads!
With the labor force as tight as it is today, you need to work with what you have. Some say that catering to these unhappy individuals ignores the rest that are actively engaged. The fact of the matter is; the problems of the discontent are the same problems as the content, some just scream louder than others. Potholes aren’t a problem if you don’t drive much, but they are still a problem for everyone.
Eat that elephant one bite at a time
Knocking out small problems. Put in fixes that may cost a little bit of money. Invest time by actively listening to your team. Dig deep and find out their issues and either fix them, or empower the team to fix it. Yeah, you have it by now … Fix the Damn Roads!
You have heard the statistics before. Employee satisfaction and/or engagement cost companies billions annually. If your customer service reps are not smiling at customers, it costs you future business. Get them smiling! You’ll earn some time to put in the big plans for the future. Remember, you need engaged employees to help you turn that ship around!
At the Kole Performance Group we can help you identify those potholes and provide methods to either patch or completely resurface them.