Guest Post By Tim Fitzpatrick

“To win in the marketplace you must first win in the workplace.” –Doug Conant

Employee Engagement and Success

Employee engagement is critically important to the success of any business.  I’ll go into why in just a minute, but let’s first define what it is.

Employee engagement is the level to which employees feel excited about their jobs, are committed to the organization and how much effort they elect to put into their work.  It is different than employee satisfaction which indicates how happy or content employees are.

Now that we’ve got that out of the way, why should you care about employee engagement? Here are 5 excellent reasons why:

• Better engagement leads to better productivity
  Engaged employees believe the work they are doing is important and makes a difference.  They work harder because of this.  With strong engagement your company can accomplish more with less people.
• Less employee turnover
  Even for small companies annual employee turnover costs tens of thousands of dollars every year. For larger companies it’s in the millions.  When employees are happy and content they have less incentive to look elsewhere and tend to avoid “the grass is greener” type thinking.
• More positive energy
  Negative energy and complaining run through an organization like cancer.  Similarly, positive energy is contagious and will create a work environment that is motivating, exciting, and dynamic.
• Leads to higher employee satisfaction
  Employees who are engaged are more satisfied and happy than those who aren’t.
• Attracts the best candidates to your company
  When you’ve got engaged and satisfied employees they tell people how great it is to work for your company.  That’s an environment that great people want to be a part of… birds of a feather flock together!

Here’s the bottom line: strong employee engagement will drive revenue growth and decrease costs for your company.

At the core of employee engagement is communication.  It’s the main driver in making employees feel engaged.  You might be familiar with some of the more popular engagement tools & techniques below:

• Surveys
• Recognition programs
• Wellness programs
• Transparency
• Professional & career development
• Volunteering
• Events & activities

How can you increase employee engagement quickly?  By using the power of mobile.

More workers are accessing business applications through their mobile devices and it’s pretty obvious most people prefer to use their mobile devices to access and consume information.

Why not take advantage of this and create an employee engagement mobile app for your company?

What’s an employee engagement mobile app?  Think of it as an app where employees can go to access important company news and information.  Remember, communication is at the core of employee engagement and a mobile app will open up the lines of communication within your company.

Many companies are starting to realize how powerful an employee engagement mobile app can be.  Why are they so powerful?  Because you can bring together a number of your employee engagement tools and techniques (like the ones listed above) into a simple, easy to use platform that is at your employees finger tips anytime, anywhere.

Here are a few of the features your company can provide with a mobile app that will help solidify your employee engagement efforts.

• Surveys
  Surveys have long been used as a tool to gather valuable information about how employees feel and areas for improvement.  You can incorporate those surveys in your mobile app making is incredibly easy for employees to find and complete them.
• Forms
  You can easily incorporate your most important forms into your app, making it easier and quicker for employees to complete forms.
• Company News
  An app can be an easy place to access important company news.  I’m sure you are sending this out via other channels, but an app gives your employees a single place to access this information with the click of a button.  The more you are willing to share, the more transparent the company will be perceived by employees.
• Employee Recognition
  Employee recognition can be a huge driver of engagement.  Your app can be a place to recognize the special achievements of your staff.
• Events Calendar
  If you want your employees to participate in company events, you need to make it easy for them to know about them.  Your app can be a place to quickly see upcoming events with all the details and quickly add it to their calendar.
• Videos
  Do you have training videos?  How about corporate news videos?  Your app can be a great place to give employees access to this content so they can consume it when it’s most convenient for them.
• FAQ’s
  Post your frequently asked questions from employees with the answers they need right in your app.
• Employee Directory
  How about an employee directory right at your fingertips?  This makes it super easy for employees to reach out and connect with the folks they need to.
• Just In Time Messaging
  Reach your entire company or a specific group right on their phones with important reminders, news and events.  The messages will show up as notifications on the employee’s phone.  These messages are delivered almost instantly with no junk mail folder to worry about.

The features above are certainly not an exhaustive list, but they are a great place to start.  Your employees are mobile.  Shouldn’t your engagement tools be too?

Did you find this helpful?  Feel free to comment or share.

About the Author

Tim Fitzpatrick is the President & Founder of Rialto Mobile.  At Rialto Mobile, we specialize in helping businesses drive engagement with customers and employees using the power of mobile applications. If you’d like to learn more about what we do visit us at www.RialtoMobile.com.

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