« April 2006 | Main | June 2006 »
May 23, 2006
Companies engaging employees in reducing overwork
A great article recently in the Wall Street Journal called "Taking Back the Weekend: Companies Help Employees Cut Back on Overwork" detailed the efforts that some organizations are taking to work with employees in the ever-elusive pursuit of work-life balance (or work-life flexibility, depending on what camp you're in).
Some examples cited in the article include:
Cummins Inc.: At Cummins, based in Columbus, Ind., an annual survey of 6,700 employees in 2004 showed a drop in employee satisfaction with workloads, says Janet Dunn, Cummin's director of diversity development. So two Tennessee work teams met last year with WFD Consulting, Newton, Mass.-based consultants, to figure out how to jettison low-value tasks. Team members began meeting biweekly to identify and cut out redundant work, Ms. Dunn says. They reduced unplanned phone calls and the number of sales-history and analysis reports they had to generate for salespeople, by referring requests to online resources. Customer-help teams also organized to back each other up on service calls, to avoid any one employee's getting backed up with complex jobs. Such changes helped enable Mr. Williams, who works in a pricing unit, and more than 30 others to get more done during the workday, he says. Cummins plans to expand the pilot to other teams.
Alcan: At Alcan, based in Montreal, a 2005 survey of 55,000 employees revealed dissatisfaction with heavy workloads and long hours, says Steven Price, a human-resources director. In a series of steps, a half-dozen top executives got coaching on how to be better role models, partly by speaking up about their own challenges managing workload. Executives began encouraging employees "to push back and say, 'I'm not working on weekends as much,' " Mr. Price says. In Alcan's finance unit, employees were discouraged from working Sundays. The mandate was one of many improvements in processes that saved thousands of hours of work annually.
CarMax: CEO Austin Ligon begins some monthly meetings by asking, "What are we doing that is stupid, unnecessary or doesn't make sense?" The question draws a laugh and gets employees engaged in improving their workplace, he says. A Naperville, Ill., general manager, for example, created a new time-saving process for parking cars.
Boston Consulting Group: BCG logs consultants' total hours on a weekly "Red Zone Report"; any employee who works too long falls into the Red Zone, raising questions among managers, says Jeanie Duck, a senior vice president: "Are they working more than they should? Is it something they're choosing to do, or is it being forced on them?" In some cases, consultants get help prioritizing work. Also, managers who burn out their teams hurt their chances of promotion, Ms. Duck says.
IBM: After a 2004 survey of 42,000 employees revealed that four in 10 thought 15% of their job duties were unnecessary, IBM developed a Web-based tool for managers to use in routing out low-value work. The goal: to eke out "more time for customers and, as a byproduct, more time for our families and our personal life," says J.T. Childs, IBM's vice president, global diversity. Vincent Cozzolino, an IBM vice president in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., knew he had a problem because overtime costs were rising and people in his 600-employee unit had begun to "push back" when asked to do new projects. The intranet program surveyed employees about low-value work, asked why they did it, then presented managers with the data. When employees said on the survey, "'I'm doing it because Vinnie wants me to do it,' ... I'd have to ask myself, 'Do I really want this or don't I?' " Mr. Cozzolino says. He and his managers trimmed meeting requirements, bought new equipment to reduce time spent quality-checking computer parts, and consolidated two labs, saving hundreds of work hours, he says. IBM has expanded the program in the U.S. and six other countries.
Posted by Christopher at 2:44 PM
Comments
Post a comment
| TrackBackMay 22, 2006
Old computers harm office morale
I recently came across an interesting story that again reminded me of all the things organizations need to consider when trying to influence internal morale or engagement.
A poll conducted by Tickbox.net of more 2,700 European office workers from Britain, France and Germany found that workplace dissatisfaction increased significantly with the age of computer equipment.
British and French respondents said working on outdated computers was the most irritating aspect of office life. Almost 40 percent of the workers surveyed in the three countries were using computers at least three years old. Clerical and administrative workers often had the oldest equipment.
The survey said workers dealing with outdated equipment were 35 percent more likely to take six or more sick leave days a year compared with the average worker.
In France, where more workers use older computers, the likelihood jumped to 55 percent.
About two-thirds of those polled also complained of problems like eye fatigue, headaches, and repetitive strain injury (RSI). The number was highest in France.
Results also showed that women in all three countries were consistently more likely to be using outdated equipment.
In the UK, where more workers have up-to-date computers than in the other countries surveyed, the number of women using old equipment was double that of men.
Posted by Christopher at 10:16 AM
Comments
Post a comment
| TrackBackMay 15, 2006
Dogs and employee engagement
Here's one I haven't run across yet: the role of dogs in affecting levels of employee engagement. A survey done by dogster.com (OK, not exactly an unbiased source, but still) reported these findings:
-- 66 percent of dog owners said they would work longer hours if their dogs could be with them at work.
-- 49 percent said they'd switch jobs if they could take their dogs to work.
-- 32 percent said they'd take a pay cut to work with their dogs.
The results rather speak for themselves and are a reminder to us all of the wide range of factors that ultimately influence engagement. in fact, Dogster has even teamed up with SimplyHired to allow people to search for jobs at dog-friendly workplaces. Woof.
Posted by Christopher at 9:28 AM
Comments
Post a comment
| TrackBackThe drive of Southwest Airlines
Southwest, the largest domestic carrier in the U.S. and one that has created the category of low-fare airlines here, is often front-and-center in discussions of effective employee engagement and internal culture alignment, always with good reason. An interesting article in today's New York Times highlights the lives of 17 of the original employees who started the airline, many of whom are still slinging peanuts and tossing bags despite their multi-million dollar portofolios of SWA stock that have built up over time.
It's a great reminder to me that 1) there ARE companies who do this right and 2) money isn't everything when it comes to keeping employees engaged -- it's more about a shared sense of mission and camaraderie, something that so many companies struggle to achieve.
Posted by Christopher at 7:06 AM
Comments
Post a comment
| TrackBackMay 12, 2006
Should IM be considered as an internal communications vehicle?
The short answer: yes.
Companies such as IBM, Sun Microsystems and Microsoft have embraced instant messaging as a tool for more streamlined communication and information sharing. IBM employees exchange around 2.5 million messages each day through the company's Lotus Sametime platform, virtually eliminating all voicemails, as David Marshak, the company's senior product manager for collaboration, told The New York Times.
While instant messaging is most commonly used in technology and communications organizations, the productivity gains it provides are possible in nearly every business where employees use the Internet.
Here are some ways instant messaging (IM) can help your company:
IM is conversational – With its back-and-forth nature, instant messaging lends itself easily to continuous dialogue. Additionally, IM does not require the formality often associated with e-mail.
IM is unobtrusive – Used properly, IM is a relatively silent tool that sits passively in the background of your computer while it’s not in use. It lends itself to multitasking such as communicating with colleagues during conference calls or answering a question while reading a document.
IM is informative – IM can be a valuable tool to monitor the work status of colleagues. The technology allows users to post messages while they're away or do not want to be disturbed, meaning that time isn't wasted trying to track down individuals.
IM is all grown up – At its inception, IM was used primarily for one-on-one and group text conversations. Today, most IM platforms allow for video and audio conversations, meetings, file transfers and streaming content. This can be helpful if you are looking to share a Web link or picture quickly.
IM is inexpensive – Most public IM hosts are free, so companies are only paying for the bandwidth they use. Companies who use IM can save money on conference calls, Webinars and international communications.
IM is…well...instant – When you need an answer now, IM can save precious seconds relative to e-mail. Ideal for brief exchanges, IM conversations often last seconds, meaning employees can work more efficiently without the worry of a cluttered e-mail inbox.
While IM can bring value to a workplace, it's not inherently any more useful than other communication tools such as e-mail, phone calls and blogs. Whether the technology is an asset or a liability is not dependant on the application, but rather how employees choose to use it. Similar to other tools, IM can be abused for personal use, used to leak sensitive information and serve as a portal for hackers and viruses. Many employee IMers integrate work-related and personal contacts under one user identity, increasing the potential for negative exposure.
Posted by Christopher at 5:09 PM
Comments
Chris,
We couldn't agree more that IM should be considered as important vehicle to add to the internal communication mix. According to Strategic Communication Management (v.10, issue 1, Jan 06) over half the US workforce uses instant messaging at work. The tricky part is working out how to harness this technology as part of formal corporate communication campaigns, rather than just as an informal device between small networks of colleages.
Posted by: Victoria Brown, Stromberg Consulting at May 16, 2006 3:27 PM
Post a comment
| TrackBackMay 3, 2006
Blogging in regulated industries
As we talk with companies about whether they should be blogging for reasons of internal or external relationship building, we often hit a brick wall when it comes to companies operating in regulated environments -- notably the pharmaceutical industry. A great post by Shel Holtz addresses this very issue. He has some good advice, which is that those companies should focus their blogging on the lifestyles associated with the products, rather than product attributes themselves (which would of course be subject to FDA regulation). We've seen a tendency in pharma for companies to reject blogging outright, which I feel is a knee-jerk reaction. As Shel's perspective shows, there are thoughtful ways to do it and still stay clear of regulators.
The bottom line for pharma, banking and other industries is this: people are already talking about you and your companies and you need to find a way to get in on the discussion, albeit in ways that work within the regulations. It can be done -- as Wells Fargo showed in their blog related to the 100th anniversary of the San Francisco earthquake.
Posted by Christopher at 5:03 PM
Comments
Post a comment
| TrackBackMay 2, 2006
Misplaced priorities: theft of office supplies
I alternated between amused and horrified at a recent Q&A in the New York Times on prevelance and reasons behind employee theft of office supplies. The article makes the point that theft of supplies is quite common and is sometimes driven by employees expressing a greater frustration at their lack of engagement and satisfaction. This point I agree with, but I take issue with the fact that this is a serious issue that companies need to be dealing with. I'd like to work for the company that has theft of paper and pens as its biggest problem.
Instead, what if the resources spent policing the supply cabinet were put toward improving supervisor competency related to communications and leadership? Or toward ensuring that employees understood their organization's business strategy and how they fit into it?
Posted by Christopher at 9:58 AM
Comments
And these are the companies that wonder why their employees are not loyal or lack trust in its leadership. Why would someone want to work in an organization that invests more time and money in a 10 cent pencil than in their employees.
Posted by: Jon at May 2, 2006 9:18 PM
A strict policy on office supplies does not indicate that a company thinks the theft of paper and pens is its biggest problem. I feel that a strict policy can and should indicate that the company is holding its employees to a high ethical standard. An employee that will not steal from his own company will be much less likely to cheat the company's clients. An entry-level employee that does not steal from the supply closet will be much less likely to use the company checkbook as his own personal account if he moves up to a position of greater responsibility.
I do agree with Chris that "policing" (or the policy itself) shouldn't be the primary method of deterring this kind of behavior. A satisfied employee that shares the company's vision, values and mindset and has an active role/stake in the company's performance won't be as likely to steal.
Posted by: Dave at May 4, 2006 6:22 PM