If I May Make a Suggestion

Two warnings up front:

1. I've read about 6 hours of information on employee suggestions. (Source list below.)
2. I am suggesting you invite employee suggestions to generate more employee engagement.

I see two reasons for giving your people the chance to suggest any/all of the following:

• Improvements in their work environment.
• Productivity enhancements.
• Shifts/revisions in team function.
• Communication ideas.
• Hiring practices.
• Retention tactics and strategies.
• Customer service suggestions.
• Employee engagement, morale, opinion improvements.
• More.
• Still more.
• Even more.

The first reason for employee suggestions: your organization will improve. You will accomplish greater success in specific ways and so, in general. Employee are closest to the situations that warrant improvement. Suggestions are about improvements. It follows that things will get better.

The second reason: employee engagement will increase. This occurs in two ways, as well. First, your people engage in looking for suggestible improvements. Second, they engage in proving their suggestions (and improvements) valid.

How do you make an employee suggestion system work? Some suggestions:

1. Make the suggestion system valid and vital to your organization's culture. Elevate your suggestion system's importance. Recognize its importance orally and in print. Celebrate its contributors and their contributions. People believe in change once it's part of their language.
2. Make the suggestion process simple to complete. Involve employees--those who will carry out the suggestion process--in determining the best series of steps, requirements, and procedures. You want people to want to make suggestions. People do what doesn't frustrate them.
3. Make suggestion submission noteworthy. Celebrate the simple act of offering a suggestion by reinforcing the fact that a quantity of suggestions are necessary to produce the true quality suggestions. People enjoy being appreciated.

[Notice the hyperlink phrases above. Click on any of them to e-mail me your request for more information about an Employee Suggestion System That Works.]

Sources
Answers.com: Employee Suggestion Programs
Heathfield, Susan:  Harness the Power of an Employee Suggestion Program: Beyond the Suggestion Box 
Klein, Sarah:  Do You Have What It Takes to Manage Your Toughest, and often Your Best, Employees?
Toolpack:  Using Customer, Supplier and Employee Suggestions

Comments

[David Zinger]

Tim;
You have some good "suggestions." I appreciate both your perspective and the topic you write about. I will take a look at some more, the post on does engagement really have meaning caught my eye.
Take care, carry on caring, and remain engaged,
David