The management merry-go-round: An employee perspective on restructuring
I was talking once to a railway worker who described his life in one of the UK’s railway franchises: Every so often a new franchise owner would bring in a new set of excited managers to play with the railway set, but the railway set itself never fundamentally changed. This guy had been doing the same job for forty years since the days of British Rail, and the rotation of management every few years was just a part of life. A second example:... [Read More...]
Programme communications: The loose cannon
Every change/comms manager we’ve shown this picture to seems to roll over laughing … it’s obviously hit a bit of a nerve! We are currently in the process of creating a new pre-packaged Visual Dialogue “session-in-a-box” to help programme teams discuss and resolve common issues. This picture is one of several we’ve created to help get people talking. They draw on our own experiences of difficult situations... [Read More...]
Employee engagement: Getting on board the runaway train
This is a vote of sympathy for all of the beleaguered change managers out there working with unsympathetic programme managers! Tweet This Post Read More →
Public Service Event: Engaging the Human Resource
Employee engagement: Something you do with your employees, not to them We were invited to attend the Public Service Event “Engaging the Human Resource” yesterday. For me the highlight of the day was an inspiring story from Clive Bradley about his trip to the Gambian hospital of Bangtang, which he used brilliantly to illustrate the point that engagement isn’t something you do to your employees, but rather something that you do with them. We... [Read More...]
CMI Employee Engagement event: Communication Matters!
It’s widely acknowledged that an important driver of engagement is having the sort of culture where employees’ views are sought out, listened to and make a difference, and where they speak out and challenge when appropriate. Effective communication is clearly crucial if this is to happen. Last week, we went to an event entitled, ‘Employee Engagement: Communication Matters’ which was jointly held by AIM Research, the CMI and the Institute... [Read More...]
PR Week Engaging Internal Comms 2010
New ‘Story of Engagement’ picture unveiled at the PR Week Internal Comms conference Last week saw us taking a new Big Picture to the PR Week Engaging Internal Communications conference at the Grange City Hotel in Tower Hill. The new picture is a cityscape depicting what happens when organisations don’t pay attention to the 4 key drivers of employee engagement. According to the MacLeod report on engagement, these are: • Strategic... [Read More...]
What are the characteristics of an engaged employee?
Seeing yourself as a part of your organisation is a key characteristic of an engaged employee “What are the characteristics of an engaged employee?” is a question they’re asking over at David Zinger’s ‘The Employee Engagement Network’ There are many different ways to characterise an engaged employee but one stands out for me – seeing yourself as part of the organisation rather than apart from it. In my experience,... [Read More...]
CRF Employee Engagement Conference 2010
I went to a great conference last week on employee engagement organised by the Corporate Research Forum. There were several good speakers, covering a range of interesting themes and plenty of time to explore them with participants around the table. This was something I greatly enjoyed as it was good to be at a conference on engagement and actually feel engaged! One particular table exercise was to discuss “what HR can do to create employee engagement?” A... [Read More...]
Yearning for connection
The desire to connect with others, or get them to understand you can often lead to a desire to engage. One of the biggest unspokens can be the fear to articulate our need for others, because we may feel weak or vulnerable. Tweet This Post Read More →
The Fantasy Of Control
Many people in organisations think that their leaders and senior management are obsessed with the idea that they can fix things with even more hard data – and that this gives rise to the fantasy of being in control. The real problems that need fixing are often left hidden under the table; unacknowledged and undealt with – a taboo subject. For a lot of people the stuff hidden under the table is what really matters. If you’re looking for... [Read More...]
Shall I stick my head above the parapet?
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What is engagement?
Engagement is Connection … The Department of Business, Innovation and Skills has just published a new report by David MacLeod and Nita Clarke on employee engagement. We wholeheartedly recommend this report – it makes some great points and is filled with useful case studies. It’s very hard to get to the end and still avoid the conclusion that having an engaged workforce really does improve bottom line results. But what actually is engagement? ... [Read More...]
The time cost of poor communication
What I learned about communication from commuting into London every day … Two things I hate: Train delays and boring Powerpoint presentations. They both waste time, and not in an unrelated way, as I want to show. The metaphor of time as a scarce resource is a well integrated part of the Western worldview – we don’t just talk about how we waste time, but how we save time, spend time, how time runs out, how some time can be set aside, how... [Read More...]
Meaning Inc. Book Review
Meaning Inc: What does it all mean? Meaning Inc came out about a year ago now, and is basically a manifesto from business psychology consultancy YSC. Although its stated author is YSC’s CEO Gurnek Bains, judging from the Acknowledgements it was very much a collaborative effort. The models and case studies (not to mention cover recommendations) are evidently drawn from client history. This isn’t problematic, although the content does sometimes... [Read More...]
