Employee Engagement and Strategic Leadership The Manager’s Course

1. Employee Engagementand Strategic LeadershipThe Manager’s Course Mark Norman

2. Overall Objectives • Learn the mindset of Appreciation • Identify the key drivers of employee engagement • Understand the role of direct leaders in employee engagement • Practice the thinking and language of appreciative and engaging leaders • Develop the skill of clearly reading situations and choosing your approach and impact • Apply these to key interactions 4 2

3. Your Objectives What would you like to learn while you’re here?

4. Today’s Slides http://wp.me/P5izLC-gN

5. Intent vs IMPACT Most leaders and managers have good intent The best leaders have a positive impact

6. Role of the leader • Metaphor 1: Setting the table • Leaders set the table for high performance • Performers and team members bring their energy to the table Metaphor 2: Moving energy • Leaders create conditions in which human energy moves • How leadership enacts its role defines where human energy will go Observations and experiences

7. Small Group Discussion • Describe together the engaged employee 5

8. Engaged Employee

9. Small Group Discussion • Describe together the engaging leader

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11. Traditional focus / Current focus • Traditional (more reactive) • Manage discipline • Ensure compliance • Manage gaps in performance • Meet requirements • Resolve disputes • Just get the job done • Current focus (more proactive) • Manage energy • Create high trust and low negative conflict environments • Generate high commitment to clients • Ensure alignment with values • Deliver excellence 6

12. Definitions • Appreciative leaders • Leaders who are skilled at valuing organizations and their people • Engaged employees • Employees who are fully involved in their work and organization and take pride in both (investing discretionary effort and intending to stay) 7

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14. Levels of engagement (Gallup) • Engaged: • Loyal to the organization (ready to help out, takes initiative within reason) • Produces the required work • Not engaged • Stick to the job description • Feels no attachment to the organization • Actively disengaged • Spreads dissatisfaction • Walks the fine line

15. Source: Gallup

16. Source: Gallup

17. Source: Gallup

18. Aeon Hewitt Engagement Drivers

19. What can organizations do? • Design for engagement • Recruit for engagement • Ensure fair treatment • Ensure organizational alignment • Provide supports for success Actively build an effective and healthy culture 10

20. Questions to develop a culture of engagement Work on Mindset • Are we studying what’s working in our system? • Are we seeing opportunities for people to step up? • Are we learning from our teams? • Are we having significant conversations? • Are we involving people in significant decisions that affect their work? • Are we honoring their expertise? • Are we reshaping the “Prime Stories” that define us? Work on building alignment • Is the management team aligned on the culture that we need to develop? • Do we have a clear local purpose? • Do we have clear guiding principles? (articulated values) • Do we know our own decision making zone and are we working within it? • Do we know what we need roles to look like in the next 2-3 years? • Are we practicing what we preach?

21. How people contribute to engagement • Senior Leadership • Trust • Communication • Culture • Managers • Coaching • Relationships • Dialogue • Individual Contributors • Ownership • Clarity • Action 12

22. What Individuals Do? • Be clear on your values and goals • Take action • Own your engagement Ask yourself 6 questions Am I doing my best to… set clear goals for myself? make progress on those goals? be happy? make my work meaningful? build positive relationships? be fully engaged?

23. What Can Managers Do? • Take control of your engagement • Know and use the basic levers of engagement • Build relationships with your staff • Understand basic motivators and know how to work with your team’s dynamics

24. What Can Executives Do? • Commit or quit • Pay attention to the engagement of your direct reports • Set a clear direction • Build a culture that fuels engagement • Inspire commitment and trust • Talk about engagement with passion

25. Blessing White, Employee Engagement Research Update, 2013 13

26. Blessing White, Global Engagement Trends 2011 14

27. What can organizations do? • Design for engagement • Recruit for engagement • Ensure fair treatment • Ensure organizational alignment • Provide supports for success Actively build an effective and healthy culture 10

28. What is organizational culture? Affected by the focus of our conversations Illustrated by stories Lafferty What people feel they need to do in order to fit in People watch their immediate leader most closely

29. What embeds a culture (Schein) • How leaders allocate resources • How leaders allocate rewards and status • How leaders recruit, select, promote and terminate • What leaders pay attention to, measure and control on a regular basis • Organizational design and structure • Organizational systems and procedures • Rites and rituals of the organization • Stories about important events and people • Design and use of physical space, buildings and facades • Formal statements of vision, mission and values • Deliberate role modeling, teaching and coaching • How leaders react to critical incidents and organizational crises 5 1 6 2 7 3 8 4

30. URPURPOSE… orthumberland Paramedics provides industryleadinghealthcare. Weembracea positiveworkethic. We aspire toachieve the highest level of patient care by using a combination of leadership, critical thinking and teamwork in every challenge we face. URGUIDINGPRINCIPLES… EAREATOURBEST WHEN… • We work collaboratively toward our purpose… • We recognise and appreciate each others’ contribution to our purpose… • We strive to set the standard for professionalism • We support each other through the challenges of our work • We – as a family – create a positive and supportive environment in which we are valued… • We seamlessly work together with our public safety and healthcare partners… • We communicate openly and respectfully with one another… • We recognise the importance of a healthy work-life balance…

31. Building Blocks Involved • Rebuild a credible senior leadership presence • Build the cohesiveness of the management team • Develop a common philosophy of leadership • Develop a track record of values based and purpose centered leadership • Change the narrative held by management • Seek and enact opportunities for significant staff involvement • Transform the relationship with the union executive • Create contribution processes that involve all instead of maintaining the staff/management divide

32. Focus of Managers 1 1. Connect people to purpose 2 • 2. Manage outcomes and performance 4 3. Clarify and model values 3 4. Move out of the front line decision making zone

33. High Trust Culture (Paul Zak) 106% 40% 50% 13% 29% 76% 74% More engagement Less stress More energy at work Less burnout Fewer sick days More satisfaction with life Higher productivity Trust Oxytocin

34. How leaders manage for trust Recognize excellence Induce “challenge stress” Give people discretion on how they do their jobs Enable job crafting Share information broadly Facilitate whole person growth Intentionally Build relationships See: Trust Factor: The Science of Creating High Performance Companies, Amacom 2017, Paul Zak

35. PM • Mindsets • Control • Learning • Appreciative • Drivers of engagement • Talk of engaging leaders

36. Appreciative Mindset Levers for Engagement Skilled Local Leaders Working through significant conversations Employee Engagement Fully Involved Positive connection to organization Willing to go the extra mile 15

37. Mindsets 18

39. Appreciation: Valuing and Honouring • To Appreciate: • To fully understand • To value and honour • To increase in worth • AI has one goal: • Discover the root cause of success • Since what we focus on becomes our reality. • Not the glass half empty but why the glass is half full. 18

40. Traditional - Appreciative • Managers = Problem solvers • Organizations full of problems • Look for what needs to be fixed • Deficit thinking • Focus on what’s wrong to do less of it • Managers = Learners • Organizations are solutions • Something works • Learn from what works and do more of it 19

41. Appreciative Thinking • To create change: • Focus on what’s right and do more of it. • Twice as effective as the traditional “focus on what’s wrong and do less of it.” • Asking questions of an organization or group influences them. • Change begins with the first question! • Ask a positive one • E.g. “What’s the problem?” becomes ”What do we want more of?” 19

42. Appreciative Thinking • When we ask positive questions • We evoke positive emotions (interest, joy, anticipation, hope) • We carry forward best of the past • And the positive energy required to move to the future

43. Motivation Acceptances • Drive to feel right • Motivation is internal • We chose how we direct our own energy • We can only manage ourselves, we can’t control others 22

44. These go beyond basic survival and safety needs Taken care of by any good employer through decent salary and due diligence around workplace safety The basic need of every human being is to be appreciated. Wm. James Key Human Needs 22

45. People look to their immediate environment - their managers or supervisors, their peers - for answers to three vital questions: Do I Matter (am I valuable, am I making a difference)? Am I Competent (can I learn, is my competence recognized)? Can I influence this situation (have a say. Make significant decisions)? Throughout our lives the answers to these questions shape our self-worth. Fundamental Motivation: Three Fundamental Questions 22

46. Workplace answers to these questions include: Do I Matter (am I valuable)? I am treated with respect and care by my boss, co-workers. My work makes a difference to my unit, boss, organization. I am regularly recognized (thanked) for my efforts. Am I Competent (or can I learn)? Someone regularly talks to me about how I’m doing. I am clear about how I could learn more and develop in the future. Someone is encouraging my development. Can I influence this situation (have a say)? I and my colleagues, co-workers, are involved in decisions that affect us. I am listened to. My opinions count. Appreciation in Action

47. Everyone puts their “selves” on the line at work. When people get positive answers to these questions they are energized to achieve more Become more cooperative Become more engaged with their work and organization When they consistently get negative answers to these questions they have to defend themselves against these threats to their sense of self worth… Basic Needs and Engagement

48. Every Conversation Counts 23 48 • Each conversation has a real effect on energy use in our workplace. • Provides people with a choice to work with us (Positively Oriented Outward Behaviour) - creative and collaborative • Or around us – Self-Preserving Behaviour (Fly Under the Radar) or Against us (In Your Face) • A choice to be enthusiastic or indifferent - engaged or disengaged

49. Employee Engagement Commonly measured by the strength of individual’s answers to a series of questions that describe factors which research demonstrates are related to measures of productivity. • Engagement: The more 5’s in a unit, the higher the: • Productivity, • Employee retention, • Customer satisfaction and loyalty, • Profitability • Buckingham and research since then has found that the relationship with local manager shapes engagement

50. Four Key Business Outcomes 27