Engaging Employees ?a Good Idea Too

Engaging Employees ?a Good Idea Too

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We have talked a lot on the pages of this magazine about how vital it is to really engage your customers today. The days of simply selling product are long over as consumers are now looking for a true retail experience. OK—we’re sure you get that, so we won’t belabor the point here.

There is however a link on that "engagement chain" that doesn’t always get the attention it deserves. If you’re really on board with this customer engagement thing, you should also ask yourself this question—all the time: Are my employees engaged in their jobs?

A recent article in Business Week that examined just how engaged people are in the workplace today, turned to a recent Gallup poll that revealed approximately 30 percent of the corporate workforce today is truly engaged in its work.

Why does this matter to you? The story went on to point out some recent findings from Best Buy that I think really drive home how important it is to check the pulse of your workforce…frequently.

At one of the chain’s stores, executives evaluated employee engagement and discovered the store was, as the story put it, middling at best. After polling the employees for solutions, the management implemented some "institutional" changes, like a "team close," so all team members felt jointly responsible for the nightly store closing, and not just an unlucky few.

As a result of executives actually listening to employees and making what they termed "some bold decisions," employee engagement improved and the store substantially lowered employee turnover and increased profits. These changes were then scaled across the 1,200-store chain. For every one-tenth-of-a-point increase in employee engagement, the chain claims each Best Buy store increased profits by $100,000 a year.

If over two-thirds of your employees are tuned out to what you’re trying to do, what effect is that having on your efforts to engage your customers? I think it’s fair to assume that unengaged employees don’t create engaged customers—and that’s probably a best-case scenario. Retailers trying to improve the customer experience without figuring out how to engage the 70 percent of their workforce that is going through the motions are doomed to failure.

On the customer level this engagement thing is a big deal and it’s becoming a very expected part of the retail equation for many people. Employees that really buy into your version of it will make it and those that don’t, simply put, will break it.

Michael McEnaney

Editor-in-Chief/Publisher

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