We are upGagement and we’re here to help save you time, money, and resources by providing you with the best ways to grow and maintain the culture of your company. We know people, and we free you up to focus on your core business by handing you an aligned Talent Strategy.
We are re-vamping our content initiatives starting this month, and we are so happy that you can join us for what promises to be the next exciting chapter in our own company’s growth.
To kick it all off, we are tackling a big subject that is on the tip of everyone’s tongue lately. We’re sure you’ve heard about it. Some are calling it The Great Resignation.
The Harvard Business Journal writes that according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 4 million Americans quit their jobs in July 2021. Resignations peaked in April and have remained abnormally high for the last several months, with a record-breaking 10.9 million open jobs at the end of July. (1)
They’re calling it, “The Great Resignation,” and for good reason. You hear about it most in the hospitality industry, but the IT and Healthcare Industries have been hit hard as well. (2)
Is unemployment and government aid a piece of this puzzle? Sure it is. But, as many have pointed out, there is a deeper, more human element at play here as well.
Many workers are simply finding that life is more important than work (when they’re not feeling “connected” at work). (3) People who were in jobs that required many more than 40 hours a week or obligations to miss family holidays in favor of work got a new lease on life while at home with their families during Quarantine. Many of these former Work Horses found something that they had never experienced before – a sense of personal freedom and autonomy.
So what can we do about this? How do we as employers mitigate turnover in our companies during the greatest en-mass national turnover in our country’s history?
The answer is this:
We REFRAME The Problem.
We learn to look at this situation as an opportunity rather than an obstacle.
With such a vast number of jobs open and so few workers available and willing to fill them, now is the perfect opportunity to work on creating a company culture that attracts and retains people rather than giving them an excuse to look for the next best thing.
How do you keep people?
You engage people. Lucky for us, people are so much more than the sum of their parts. At Woodhill Solutions, we simplify your process to find the right people, keep them with you, and continue to grow their talents and skills to ensure they are an asset to your company as they grow into their careers.
Why is this the right strategy?
This strategy saves you time and money in the long run. Keeping your workforce engaged, challenged, and fulfilled ensures that they will not just stay, but grow the company by contributing their own resources and ideas.
We’re all about breaking it down into practical, accomplishable chunks here. So here are the Top 3 Things You Can Do to Engage Your Workforce on a Deeper Level:
1. LEARN WHAT MAKES THEM TICK
We come at every workplace problem with the same basic (yet ESSENTIAL) strategy, because it works. If you know how the people in your company work, you can figure out how to utilize their talents to your best advantage. We do this by offering a talent optimization platform called The Predictive Index to help you assess your people, and support their growth and engagement with insights into what motivates/energizes them in their work.
Which brings us to our second point…
2. ASSESS THIER GOALS
How does what your employees are doing now help them fulfill their future goals? Be honest about this one – if you sugar coat the answer, you’re missing the point. Are your employee’s tasks fulfilling for them? Do their contributions and their rewards help them further the parts of their lives that they are trying to develop outside of the workplace? Are they creating careers for themselves by working for you, or is this just another dead-end job? How are they growing by being with you? If you can’t answer these questions, we can help you. But you also might want to consider incorporating our next point…
3. FULLY EMBODY YOUR CULTURE AND VALUES
Want your employees to be loyal? Great. Be loyal to them.
Want your employees to work diligently and not let the small stuff slip through the cracks? Model that behavior.
Want them to be inspired? Want them to want to come to work every day? Then make sure that you are feeding your own creativity and taking care of yourself, and that you are coming into work every day inspired and ready to take on the day.
Know your company’s cultural values. Be them. Model them. Walk the walk and talk the talk, and your workforce will follow you.
That’s all for today. Please reach out to us via the contact form on this site if you have any questions, or even just ideas or absurd notions. We are always happy to hear from you.
We are so happy you joined us, and be sure to check out our social media feeds on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram for more education and information and look for another blog next month!
References:
(2) https://hbr.org/2021/09/who-is-driving-the-great-resignation
(4) https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/interactive/2021/1-in-500-covid-deaths/