The Time of Engagement

Rarely have I seen employee engagement and time discussed together. Unless it's been, "Where am I to find the time for employee engagement?!"

The assumption, I guess, is we want employees engaged all the time.

I offer you this "timely consideration" concerning employee engagement. Time is a factor in our lives--especially our work--well, all the time. How time's ever-presence impacts our people's desire, ability and success concerning engagement is worth some thought.

First, consider the value of our employees' engagement time. When we think about the time they are engaged, are we thinking of the quantity of time, the quantity of time, or both?

You can predict my question:

Would you rather an employee be half-engaged all the time (quantity) or fully engaged (quality) half the time?

And I can predict your answer:

I want the employee 100% engaged, 100% of the time. I want the full quantity of maximum quality.

A laudable goal. I suggest the most productive way to move to that 100%-100% desire is quantity first, then quality. You see, I believe the only place quality happens before quantity is in the dictionary.

Reaching a critical mass (quantity) and then refining to the desired level of excellence (quality) is logically the more effective approach.

It looks like this:

1. Set your Engagement-How-Much-of-the-Time objective. This quantity objective is the critical mass of engaged time you seek. For example, your objective might be engagement 75% of employee time. The average time of engagement per employee, then, would be 6 hours of every 8 hour day.
2. Design and implement a CORE plan (Communication-Opportunities-Resources-Engagement, and all four components are equally significant).
3. Repeat #2 with subsequent CORE strategies until you reach your objective.
4. When objective is met, shift focus from quantity of time employees are engaged to quality of that engagement time.
5. Now construct subsequent plans (using CORE) that target niches of your employee base.(Quality is more specific, more focused than quantity.)
6. Build more specific engagement by your managers to improve the engagement among their people.

It takes a quantity of your (and your managers') time. It is work that requires quality effort.

And, it pays off. And so, it's worth it.

Comments

[Andrew Meyer]

Tim,

I enjoy your writing so much because it makes me think about things I really need to spend more time thinking about.

Is there maybe one item which could be considered prior to your list of six items? Maybe number 0.5?

0.5 Define what engagement means. When you want people to engage, make sure they know what productive engagement means and how they can tell if they've successfully engaged in and completed something meaningful.

I say this because I believe many times good people aren't told and have no way to know. They have very little guidance about what should be done and no way of telling if it's done correctly.

For example, you could have the best surgeon in the world, but if she doesn't know what's wrong with you and nobody tells her, it's not likely to turn out well. No matter how fully engaged she is. In fact, the more engaged and eager she is, the bloodier it's likely to get.

My half thought,

Andy
http://alignmentinquiries.blogspot.com/

[Tim Wright]

Andy

Certainly a good thought. And I admit to being guilty of the been-thinking-about-it-so-long-I-take-it-for-granted flaw.

I/O/W I assume the communication of "what is engagement, what does engagement mean for you, and what are some sure signs you are/aren't engaged" takes place constantly. Or should.

And, equally foolishly, I assume this is a known fact by managers universally.

Thanks for your more than a half-thought.

Tim