The Employee Partnership

The demands on employees in modern business increase year on year as the pace of change accelerates.

Employees must get to grips with providing higher levels of service than the competition at a competitive cost per unit. These challenges create increasing pressure on individuals and managers. In this environment, a partnership approach to engaging employees is a necessary tool for business survival and essential for competitive success…

Impact of the current environment on the employee

The dramatic internal change currently being experienced in the Caribbean Telco sector is essential for economic survival, for all players in the industry. Each company must offer services to its local market which are priced attractively and which provide the connectivity demanded today to win against foreign competitors all too ready to intervene. In facing this environment, each company has its issues and its unique route for survival.

For incumbents, the route involves shaking up the workforce and encouraging them to engage with a new set of business imperatives that accept the ‘unfair’ competitive situation, embrace the customer and deliver a comprehensive level of service and profitably. Cost reduction becomes a constant mantra and managers need to learn how to ‘do more with less’

For new start-ups with adequate financial backing, the route is simpler and more focused on gaining a foothold, increasing customer numbers, and developing a brand. For the first few years, cost management is frequently a lesser issue that comes into the frame when the brand has been established, when backers have reached the bottom of their pockets, and the company has to operate within self generated resources.

If the start-up is undercapitalised and vulnerable, the task of developing a brand is much harder and cost management very necessary in addition to clever marketing strategies that exploit the perceived failings in the incumbent.

The pressure on employees in any of these scenarios ratchets up from one trading quarter to the next.

At the same time as these varied internal goals are driving employees to perform more effectively and deliver change, the customer base is buying and learning more about using technology. As customer knowledge increases, their expectations of service are rising while they expect to be able to use the technology they have come to need at a price per unit which ensures their overall costs are manageable. Inevitably, this means ever decreasing prices per unit, in line with those experienced by their relatives and friends in North America, the UK or Canada. Not unreasonably, they want to participate in the global explosion of low cost communication and integrate with their worldwide communities.

So, the range of pressures on employees is increasing. For the organisation to be successful, it must meet customer demands for appropriate technology, reasonable prices, uninterrupted service and marketing packages they understand and want. As a private company, it must also satisfy the new demands of shareholders who expect a profitable operation giving them a return on their investment. So, the organisation must learn to provide service excellence profitably.

Employees must understand and get to grips with the tasks, attitudes and actions that deliver the new quality of service and product range being demanded. These demands bring enormous challenge for employees who must gain new knowledge and skill and find so much changing around them. Frequently I encounter people who say they need some stability to enable them to be effective at work, when there is little to be found. This creates pressure which is energising to a point, beyond which it becomes stressful. Stressed employees spend a lot of their work time coping with unwelcome changes. This time is unproductive and can become an enormous hidden cost to the organisation. Of 100 employees, 10-15 % of their time is normally taken up with internal team management or job related discussions. If the organisational demands increase dramatically, the time used for management and personal discussions can increase to 60% and beyond. Output for 100 people then reduces to equal that of a team of approximately 65. In other words, 35% of employee costs could be carried as overhead, and output reduced to 65% of its potential.

This situation is difficult to remove altogether but can be mitigated by effective strategies for partnership and engagement.

To maximise the potential for employee performance and focus a bigger proportion of employees efforts towards the new priorities of the organisation employees need to be truly engaged

The engagement paradigm

Engagement is a state of personal involvement that results in an individual offering their discretionary effort to participate and solve problems of shared interest.

Partnership is an agreement of equals to deliver a shared outcome.

A partnership approach enables individuals to participate in the strategic activities of the organisation as well as resolving the day to day issues and problems.

In this environment, the ‘big picture’ is understood, with employees clear about the strategy and direction to be followed. They understand the dangers and opportunities on the horizon, and freely talk about them. People see the link between their own efforts, the stated goals of the company, and customer requirements. There is an urgency and energy in their work, with responsibility taken for personal action leading to a respect and understanding of the whole organisation. Functional boundaries are blended as people connect across departments to resolve issues successfully. Performance gaps are identified. Creativity is sparked, with people contributing ideas for improvement. Capacity fir future change develops as people develop the skills and relationships to tackle challenges together. Serving the customer and doing so profitably becomes the focus of real team effort. People engaged with the organisation and its goals are motivated to ‘go the extra mile’ in delivering the corporate strategy successfully

Engagement occurs when people feel a deep sense of belonging, being valued and respected and of doing something worthwhile and of value to the organisation and its customers.

Disengagement on the other hand, is a potentially damaging state that results in withdrawal, unwillingness, lack of confidence, silent resistance or cynicism and when viewed from a management perspective, a seeming inability to change and meet new targets.

The elements that give evidence that Partnership for Engagement exists are:

• Personal involvement
• Participation
• Problem solving
• Shared goals
• Equality
• Two way communication
• Accountability

Achieving a Partnership approach

Engagement can be generated through creating the conditions under which people flourish. By taking a partnership approach to employee management, the whole organisation can begin to refocus its relationship with its workforce. Many Caribbean organisations have already embarked on the process of defining and implementing human resource infrastructures that will ultimately enable engagement.

Infrastructures for developing engagement include:

• Defining management competencies
• Agreeing management principles
• Defining expectations of leadership and management performance
• Instilling leadership principles and skill building
• Encouraging a coaching and developmental approach to staff relationships
• Identifying clear goals and objectives within the individual’s sphere of influence
• Providing clear management information on individual result areas
• Conducting regular (monthly) performance review meetings
• Conducting annual appraisals
• Reviewing career development
• Enabling problem solving groups
• Implementing genuine two way communication

For engagement to be the outcome, each element of the human resource infrastructure must integrate to reinforce the whole. Partnership for Engagement can therefore be designed, constructed and managed as a system.

If considered in this way, one can see how the culture may be changed from one state to another. By creating and describing all aspects of a new human resource system, and making these explicit, it is a short step to communicating these new mechanisms to the workforce. Once they become discussible, and firmly put on the management agenda, successful implementation of a new cultural format becomes more likely. The key is in providing both a detailed picture of the new mechanisms, and a clear framework of activities to change from the old to the new.

Timing the changes

A constant feature of organisational life is the implementation of change, either through introducing new technologies, reorganising the delivery process, or updating employee terms and conditions. And a common feature of change implementation is poor treatment of the people concerned.

I don’t believe any manager embarks on a people change situation intending to treat people badly, but this outcome nevertheless seems so frequently to occur, despite their best efforts.

Why should this be? The reasons often amount to lack of communications and activity planning from the people’s perspective, or insecurity and inexperience, or lack of thinking time through stress and overwork.

A significant change implementation is an ideal time to begin the process of developing a culture of engagement and employee partnership. It puts a marker in the corporate calendar and gives an opportunity to try new things, some of which can be radical and new and provide a welcome breath of fresh air.

Engaging through implementing change

So what are the points on which employees decide or feel enabled to engage more productively with your organisations, and which can establish a culture of positive respect? Axelrod in his book ‘Terms of Engagement’ describes a new approach to managing change, involving the whole organisation in the process, overcoming resistance and generating more energy for positive improvement.

Wide circles of involvement vs a few important people ‘in the know’. Being consulted or informed in a timely manner about relevant changes is the first point on which people know if they and their opinion are valued. Conversely, if only a few ‘important’ people know, then it must be only they who are valued, and a good reason for me to withdraw my goodwill. Inclusion is a fundamental and powerful human need.

Open connections vs closed hierarchy. With problems and ideas to investigate and resolve quickly, cross functional and multi level groups offer the best opportunity for rapid exposure of the issues, and sharing of knowledge, views and learning. This isn’t easy to achieve since the usual approach when things are going wrong is to retreat into the hierarchy, keep quiet about the problems and protect your back. In this scenario, admitting failure is a risky business and the success of the hierarchy shows it being valued and reinforced when in fact it is actually impairing the development of an engaged culture.

Communities for action vs institutionalised command and control. Enabling formal and informal communities to develop for problem solving creates a freedom where people feel they have permission to act outside of the hierarchy compared to waiting to be told how the problem will be solved.

Embracing democratic principles vs controlled dictatorship. This is the most difficult part of the paradigm to implement since it requires managers at all levels to create an environment of open two way communication, of valuing the individual and their contribution, and encouraging their team to behave similarly.

These concepts sound like commonsense, and we have all experienced situations where we have seen them in action. The challenge in the ICT sector is to enable their development while the external environment continues to change so dramatically and while the organisation itself is in a state of permanent crisis or flux. With executives and managers pressed for quick results, the desire to act now and plan later is seductive.

Frequently, the employee perspective is excluded from the apparently more pressing and urgent issues of new technology or new product and service introduction. Building in the time for managers and employees to prepare and plan can circumvent later operational and people issues and problems, restore employee faith in the organisation and its management, and develop a culture of energy and engagement. This, in turn, delivers the customer and organisational goals more effectively.

To implement this state, a number of priorities must be in evidence from all perspectives. These include:

Establish the rules, and be very clear and explicit in communicating them at every opportunity, even down to the detail of new procedures for everyday tasks. These do not have to be dictated as they can be clarified by managers and their teams, as part of the process of communication, inclusion and involvement. But the fact that they must change should not be in doubt, with no room left for the old culture.

Ensure infrastructures are in place to support involvement, problem solving and action. Nothing strangles enterprise and enthusiasm faster than a slow and tortuous decision making process. In that scenario, significant energy has to be diverted to getting decisions through and energy for focusing on innovation and improvement is significantly reduced. Infrastructures for cross functional teamworking can be designed and tested to help manage the decision making process, and to help answer the question ‘How do we make this happen?’

Reward successes. This ‘catches people doing something right’ and reinforces the new. It identifies the new heroes and heroines and determines the new cultural ‘stories’. It also identifies early wins that can reinforce the new culture and help people to feel optimistic about the future.

Apply sanctions to exhibitions of old behaviour, particularly those high profile cases. People will be looking to see how this behaviour is treated and how serious you are in reducing it. If it means removal of a few serious old guard resistors, then so be it. Do remember that resistance can be legitimate, and can demonstrate engagement and energy for improvement and change. You will need to judge the motivation behind resistance before deciding whether sanctions are the right response. If used inappropriately, trust can be lost.

Summary

The employee partnership can be developed and systematised to generate a culture of engagement. This must develop if the organisation is to become the flexible fast-moving entity that customers are expecting and needing and that the competition is promising. Customers won’t wait and increasingly will refuse to give you time to respond and change. They will merely churn to the competitor. Engagement is now a necessity for business survival and a very effective tool for competitive success.