Do you work in a productive, inspiring workplace?
Or is your organization’s culture primarily frustrating and dull?
Tiny HR’s 2015 Engagement and Culture Report revealed that only 31 percent of employees feel strongly valued at work. While that is better than the 21% in the 2014 report, there’s obviously still much work to do. How sad that nearly 70% of employees do not feel strongly valued!
Respondents were also asked, “Would you leave your current job if another company offered a 10% raise?” 25% said yes. That’s a lot of employees who are not satisfied with their current job situation.
The report also asked what got in the way of productivity. About 35% felt that their co-workers lack follow through, which then affects overall productivity. This trend makes me think that leaders are not holding every team member accountable. This type of unfairness is dangerous and erodes trust.
Tiny HR also found that employee happiness directly correlated with the work environment and organizational culture. Building a purposeful, positive, productive culture is vital.
Leaders can strengthen the health of their culture by making values carry the same weight (or more) than performance. Exercises such as creating an organizational constitution can help you ensure that everyone treats others with respect, dignity, and trust.
I have seen this approach work! I have watched customer service and engagement go up, as well as results and profits (within 18 months, and by 35-40 percent!)
When you implement an organizational constitution, you give clarity to your team, department or company. They begin to know their servant purpose, their reason for being beyond “making money” or “selling widgets.” Making money or selling widgets is not intrinsically motivating for most people. Results and profits are important, but you want to tie those aims into something of greater significance and meaning. Serving others, especially in specifically defined ways, creates personal meaning.
To craft your team’s servant purpose, consider these questions:
- What does our team do?
- For whom do we do it?
- To what end? How does what we do improve our customers’ quality of life?
After answering these questions, you can begin to craft a meaningful servant purpose statement and shift the thinking of your team toward that purpose.
Service means many things. It may mean making a profit so that employees can earn a $300 grant to their favorite charity each year . . . Or volunteer as a team to help a cause . . . Or have paid time off to offer their expertise as a volunteer for a favorite non-profit.
So you can see, the goal of making a profit is not diminished by crafting a servant purpose. However, results and profits are not the end all. When your team’s purposes focus on service to others, work becomes more than a job. It becomes a place where they feel a fit in working with others to improve other’s quality of life.
Make boosting your culture to one of significant service a priority. You will see all sorts of positive results.
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