The groups you claim membership in shape your life. Families, classes, sports leagues, and, of course, employers are just a few examples. When you consider the groups you enjoyed most, what made them that way? Chances are that, among other factors, they made you feel heard and accepted. You knew your involvement and voice actually mattered.
In the workplace, this feeling of employee involvement is critical to building an engaged team. Let’s explore what employee involvement entails and how your company can start involving team members across the organization.
What is employee involvement?
Employee involvement means allowing team members to meaningfully participate in all aspects of the business. It requires establishing anonymous channels where team members can share their input — and then acting on that feedback to demonstrate that you value employee voice. By building avenues of communication that give your employees a real voice in key organizational decisions, you create a culture of involvement, which brings out the best team members at every level of your company.
What about employee participation and employee empowerment?
Employee involvement has a strong correlation with both employee participation and empowerment. Employee participation is most commonly defined as employees collaborating with each other, while empowerment involves giving employees the resources, responsibilities, and support needed to succeed and grow. An empowered team knows what they have the ability to accomplish, and this confidence ensures success in almost all parts of your organization. Sustainable, authentic employee empowerment requires additional elements beyond employee involvement, but prioritizing involvement is a key part of empowering your team.
The benefits of employee involvement
Increased employee empowerment and participation are both positive outcomes, but there are numerous other ways that improved employee involvement can benefit your organization. When your employees have a voice, they have the ability to share ideas, concerns, and their unique perspectives — and they know what their feedback will influence future decisions at work. This influence is key: seeing their ideas translated into meaningful changes and other actions is a major driver of engagement. Ninety percent of workers stating they are more likely to remain at an employer that accepts and acts on feedback.
Employee involvement can also boost innovation and productivity in several ways. Your team may have suggestions that will improve workflows or offer cost savings, and you will never discover those unless you ask. Involved employees in an enjoyable work environment can innovate more freely, knowing that their ideas and concepts will be heard and welcomed. In addition, when your team feels appreciated, confident, and engaged, it’s that much easier for them to feel truly invested in their work, staying motivated and productive.
Finally, when your team is directly involved in decisions and policy changes that impact their job, they know your organization values them. And this could make all the difference between retaining key talent and seeing them walk out the door.
How to make employee involvement part of your organizational culture
If you’re ready to experience the benefits offered by a strong culture of employee involvement, it’s time to take action. Here are three best practices for fostering employee involvement.
Supporting employee voice
The process of connecting meaningful feedback from each member of your team is much easier with the right tools. Look for an employee engagement platform that includes pulse surveys — quick, easy-to-answer surveys administered on a frequent basis — and an always-on, AI-powered HR chatbot. With a steady flow of real-time, actionable employee feedback, your organization will have the insights it needs to address key issues and demonstrate its commitment to supporting employee voice.
Enabling employee recognition
Over 80% of employees say they don’t feel recognized or rewarded. If you want to ensure your team is part of the 20% that do, build an employee recognition program that’s customized for your employees and their unique needs. Make developing an effective recognition program easy with an employee recognition platform that supports social, monetary, and peer-to-peer recognition.
Carefully crafting communication
Information sharing in the form of internal communications is critical to employee involvement. Is your organization practicing the three key aspects of information sharing: consistent, transparent, and balanced communication? If not, HR should prioritize training team members at all levels on effective communication practices, from executives to staff.
Unlock the way to employee involvement
Every organization should take steps to get their employees involved with all aspects of their business, from the perks they offer to the projects they take on. Jump start involvement with an employee engagement solution like Achievers Listen that captures employee voice and makes it easy to act on feedback. Achievers Listen even integrates with Achievers Recognize, an employee recognition solution that gives your team the ability to show appreciation in real time and award points employees can redeem for rewards they actually want.
