Boosting Employee Engagement With Data

Employees don’t always wake up feeling at the top of their game. Sure, it feels nice to feel like you can conquer it all, but it is okay if there are days when your team is a bit slow or less creative.

We’re humans, after all, not robots that yield consistent output.

But the thing is, employees often bounce back from this slump. It may take hours, a whole shift, or several days, but regardless of the length, your team will usually find its footing again.

So, what happens when they never seem to perk up? When they’re just constantly underperforming at work?

You might have an unhappy and disengaged employee—if you let them be, their negative attitude towards work may rub off on the rest of the team.

Spotting the disengaged employee

Disengaged employees are not emotionally invested in or proud of their company. As a result, they lack enthusiasm and energy at work and are unhappy with their position or the business.

Simply put, they don’t want to be there and don’t mind expressing it. This affects more than just that worker’s output and productivity; a person’s attitude also affects people around them.

With these warning signs, you can easily spot declining employee engagement:

1. They’re mostly the center of the conflict

Is the team walking on eggshells when around a particular employee? Do they always seem to have a beef with somebody?

Disengaged employees are never famous for their patience.

They frequently show their disengagement by being openly angry and aggressive.

These workers will never be able to agree with anyone, and they will fight against any new initiatives or directives from their manager.

Their hostility can have serious adverse effects on team morale.

2. They spend time doing a lot of things that aren’t their job

It’s common to observe staff members having brief conversations when they pass one another or occasionally move around the office. Again, it’s a practical approach to fostering team spirit.

When this mingling and roving becomes extreme, issues develop.

Your employee may be disengaged if you can’t find them at their desk or anywhere relevant to their job description.

3. They are often late

Employees that are disengaged don’t arrive at work early.

Typically, a delay of up to 15 minutes is acceptable, especially if workers make a demonstrable effort to make up lost time.

However, it becomes more problematic if workers arrive at work much later than expected, leave at varying times, or take long lunch breaks.

4. They are frequently absent

Being absent is a graver offense than being late.

Employees who never show up for work or frequently take unscheduled sick days are sometimes overworked.

Additionally, they are disengaged if they frequently request days off while ignoring important deadlines and goals.

Sometimes workers are merely mentally unavailable. While at work, their thoughts are elsewhere. It would be okay if this occurred occasionally.

However, you might be dealing with a disengaged worker if you observe employees staring off into space frequently or need to leave many voicemails or messages before receiving a response.

5. They submit low-quality outputs

Your disengaged employee no longer yearns to be an employee of the month.

They may be just doing the bare minimum to avoid termination. A decline or stagnation in overall quality is a strong indicator of low employee engagement.

Why is employee engagement important?

Employee engagement is crucial because you don’t have happy and contented employees without it.

Happy employees are your best brand ambassadors; they are very much involved in their work and are willing to collaborate with their employers and coworkers.

Employees become more motivated and effective, going above and beyond what is required of them. Naturally, this impacts their mental health at work and may positively affect people around them, such as coworkers and clients.

All firms must prioritize employee engagement since having successful measures improves workplace cultures, lowers staff turnover, boosts productivity, fosters better working connections with clients, and positively impacts business earnings.

How can data help boost employee engagement?

Speaking of employee engagement strategies, can data help you craft a solid approach?

Yes, data-driven strategies prove successful in the long run.

Organizations worldwide invest billions of dollars each year in events and programs meant to raise morale and increase employee engagement.

These one-time or seasonal initiatives produce some impacts but are frequently transient and may disappear entirely a few weeks after the program’s end.

A thorough grasp of employee engagement and effective, continuing communication with your staff is essential for achieving long-lasting results.

Utilizing data and analytics to guide and assess the creation and implementation of your engagement plan is one impartial and reliable way to achieve this.

1. Measure how your employees are faring

Using data, management better understands what drives different employees, pinpoint how they operate at their most productive, and develop natural connections with each team member based on needs and engagement drivers.

HR can build ways to encourage employees to collaborate, especially if data can identify what aspect is insufficient or ineffective.

2. Craft data-driven engagement strategies

With analytics, your HR team can identify the skills and behaviors that will boost team productivity or efficiency throughout the company while also enhancing the working environment for staff members.

3. Help employees nurture their work-life balance

Even work-life balance is something HR can work on with the help of data. For example, you can identify employees working and collaborating outside regular work hours.

Working continuously after regular business hours could be a telltale sign of burnout; HR can use these insights to assist these employees in creating a better work-life balance.

4. Onboard efficiently and successfully

Effective onboarding shortens the time it takes new employees to become productive and lowers the proportion of workers who leave their jobs within the first three to six months.

On the other hand, a poor onboarding process can lead to expensive turnover and poor performance.

It takes time and effort to develop a good onboarding program. But when you evaluate your current process, the data you gather can help discover opportunities to enhance the new hire experience.

5. Be present for your employees

When employees feel that you value their hard work, they tend to be more engaged and satisfied.

However, your team might—and probably do—prefer to be acknowledged in different ways than you do. Data can help you determine how they want to be appreciated so you can close the gap and get the most out of your staff.

To summarize

Spending on incentive programs, organizational development, performance reviews, annual employee surveys, and a myriad of engagement initiatives without using data to inform the decisions objectively is likely to have little to no positive long-term effects for employees.

Business executives may decide what engagement programs to deploy, how to implement them effectively, and which groups would benefit from them most by leveraging data.

Such a strategy will assist businesses in gaining the insights they need to make better, data-driven decisions that will increase worker engagement, productivity, and success.

Help your HR team focus on crafting data-driven strategies with Hezum’s complete solutions.

Instead of taking the time to onboard, manage time-off requests, and track down pertinent documents needed by employees, leave it to Hezum. This way, your HR teams can focus their time and resources on more important matters—the employees.

Learn more about Hezum by visiting our website today.