2 minutes
They want to be leaders.
Talk with the leaders of just about any company, and you will hear a lot of talk about “employee engagement.” Employers are constantly trying to find new and better ways to create employee engagement. They want to know how to “motivate, inspire and engage” their employees. They want this, of course, because ultimately they want productive employees. But is that what employees want? Is their top desire to work for a company that inspires, motivates and engages them? Or is it something else?
I believe part of the problem is that employee engagement is framed from the perspective of the employer. That perspective says the employer is the leader that has to inspire and engage employee-followers. What if we switched that frame? Your employees want to be leaders, not followers. When your employees are leaders, they are more engaged than when they are following.
I heard the CEO of a large financial company give a lecture to a large audience of college students. He told them, “If you want to be leaders, you have to have followers.” I remember thinking that I couldn’t disagree more. How many of you, given a choice, would choose to be a follower rather than a leader? Employees don’t want you to inspire them. They want to inspire others. Employees don’t want to be engaged. Employees want to be engaging. Employees don’t want to be led, they want to lead.
Working Up to Being Leaders
Now I’m sure some of you are shaking your heads and saying, “These millennials just want to come in and start running everything. They don’t know anything yet. They haven’t paid their dues. They haven’t earned the right to lead.” Leading does not mean employees walk in and day three become managers, or month six become CEO. You can start with small leadership opportunities. For example, the manager at one credit union wanted to train her staff on how to handle problems with members. Originally, she planned to have a meeting and share ideas on specific situations and how to handle them. But she changed her mind.
She had the staff share their own stories of problems and, more importantly, had them share how they resolved the situations. The manager did share some of her own advice, but acknowledged some of the solutions the staff came up with were brilliant. The manager of a regional bank I know uses a very effective technique for addressing mistakes. When an employee makes a mistake, he asks that person to come up with three ideas on what he or she could do differently to avoid making that mistake again. The point is that employees need to be trained to take the lead, rather than to be followers who run to someone else to find a solution.
Spell It Out
In addition, you can spell out how employees can advance their careers and become leaders. Set out exactly what they need to do to get where they want to go. Research consistently shows employees want to know this information. You can help them by defining the leadership qualities they need to get there. Yes, you absolutely need management oversight and quality training. But bringing out the leader, rather than the follower, in each employee is key to fostering initiative and accountability, which are both essential to improving employee performance. And isn’t that what employee engagement is really all about?
Holly Buchanan is a popular writer and speaker. Author of Selling Financial Services to Women-What Men Need to Know and Even Women Will Be Surprised to Learn, she works with the financial industry on delivering what today's customers and employees really want.
