How Does Contributing to Company Culture Affect Employee Engagement?

How Does Contributing to Company Culture Affect Employee Engagement?

In the quest to foster a thriving workplace, we've gathered insights from seven human resource professionals on how they've shaped a positive company culture. Highlighting contributions ranging from launching a 'Keep Your Promises' program to fostering an open idea exchange, our CHRO and CEO respondents share specific strategies that have significantly boosted employee engagement.

• Launched “Keep Your Promises” Program
• Innovated 360-Degree Recruitment Process
• Empowered Peer-to-Peer Recognition
• Implemented Flexible Work Initiatives
• Practiced Consultative Decision-Making
• Established Informal Listening Sessions
• Fostered Open Idea Exchange

Launched “Keep Your Promises” Program

We launched a “Keep Your Promises” program that ensured our talent brand matched the organization's work-life realities. Too often, companies promise or have a reputation for a particular culture but fail to live up to those standards. Our EVP audit allowed us to thoughtfully select, promote, and deliver specific experiences. Being true to our word not only increased new-hire retention and engagement but also re-energized tenured employees.

Innovated 360-Degree Recruitment Process

At Deepler, I introduced a 360-degree recruitment interview process to enhance our hiring strategy and improve employee retention. This innovative approach allows candidates to interact with clients, resellers, and various employees before they formally apply for a position. By providing a comprehensive view of our company culture, values, and daily operations, candidates can make more informed decisions about their fit with the organization.

The results of this initiative have been remarkable. We've seen a 38% increase in above-average applicants, indicating that more high-quality candidates are drawn to our transparent and inclusive recruitment process. This improvement in applicant quality has also translated into higher retention rates, as new hires are better aligned with our company culture and expectations from the outset.

It ensures that both the company and the candidates are making well-informed decisions, leading to a more harmonious and productive workforce. By fostering open communication and providing a realistic preview of the workplace, we are not only attracting top talent but also retaining them longer, which is crucial in today's competitive job market.

Empowered Peer-to-Peer Recognition

We focus on peer-to-peer recognition because it helps every single employee be recognized for the work they are doing. By empowering employees to celebrate one another, we see people being recognized an average of 4.7 times each month—that could never happen from a CEO or manager because they don't have the bandwidth to see or recognize everything happening. When everyone feels “seen,” employee engagement goes way up!

Implemented Flexible Work Initiatives

We wanted to encourage a good work-life balance for our employees, so we implemented several flexible working initiatives such as working from home, flextime, and four-day workweeks to fit our staff's different needs and preferences.

And we found this was especially helpful for employees responsible for childcare and eldercare responsibilities and led to less stress for our employees in these situations, helping improve overall morale. We also saw additional benefits of staff taking advantage of the flexibility to pursue individual interests or further their education in different areas, which again helped fuel their personal motivation to succeed in their work.

So we saw our employee engagement scores go up, with employees telling us that they felt more productive, more loyal to our company, and better about where they work. These changes helped foster a more resilient workforce as our turnover rates declined dramatically.

Practiced Consultative Decision-Making

Consultative decision-making increases collaboration, teamwork, transparency, and improves inclusivity. In my previous assignments as CHRO, I have ensured that most decisions with ramifications on employees are taken by obtaining inputs from various stakeholders and employees, cutting across the levels, geographies, genders, and functions across the organization.

Town halls, focused group discussions, anonymous as well as open survey results, etc., provided diverse views to be selected based on alignment to organizational values, utility, and ROI.

Even in the case of Rewards & Recognition outcomes, multiple seniors from disparate functions/departments take a collective decision on winners, weighing objective parameters to bring fairness to the process and help create leaders who are recognized by the larger ecosystem and not mere stars in silos.

Established Informal Listening Sessions

Having worked in human resources for a while, I took on the task of encouraging a positive corporate culture by giving staff members more opportunities to express their thoughts. I realized that many workers' disengagement stemmed from their perception of not having their opinions heard.

One doable step I took was to set up frequent, informal listening sessions where staff members from various departments and levels could express their opinions directly to management. Once, a new hire made a small adjustment to our project management software that made it far more useful for the entire staff.

The impact on the staff's engagement was immediate. Knowing their efforts might result in real improvements gave people a sense of empowerment. Along with fostering an innovative and always-improving culture, this open communication increased trust between management and staff.

Fostered Open Idea Exchange

My main goal was to establish an environment where staff members could freely discuss ideas and projects with the group. This method lets everyone, at any level, present their ideas and get comments. Encouragement of pride and ownership, as well as original thought, was the aim.

A junior developer, for example, once recommended enhancing our client feedback procedure. Simple yet effective, the concept increased consumer satisfaction noticeably. Seeing their efforts have a real impact gave staff members a sense of worth and appreciation.

This project greatly increased employee involvement. In this atmosphere of celebration of innovation, every voice had value. Higher involvement in business activities and a clear improvement in general morale were indicators of greater engagement. This strategy has largely fostered a cooperative and upbeat corporate culture.