5 Ways to Inspire Your Employees to Transform The Workplace Culture

McLean & Company found that a disengaged employee costs an organization approximately $3,400 for every $10,000 in annual salary.

A further study by CLC (Corporate Leadership Council) studied the engagement level of 50,000 employees globally and here’s what they found:

Engaged employees in a company causes profits to grow as much as 3X faster than their competitors.
Highly engaged employees are 87 percent less likely to leave the organization.

There is no question that inspired employees equal engaged employees and engaged employees can and do have the power to transform the workplace culture.

A key component of inspired employees is inspired leadership and here are 5 ways to inspire your employees to transform the workplace culture:

1. Create a culture where ‘everyone is a leader’ – research into the future of work points to revamped workplace cultures where there are teams of people working autonomously on projects. In a project based workplace work gets done faster and with more collaboration when teams feel that everyone in the group has a voice, has viable input and is valued as part of the team. This does not mean that everyone gets the ‘title’ of leader rather that everyone gets the learning, the training and the ability to apply fundamental leadership skills in their jobs.
2. Inspire your employees to ‘share’ – I often refer to Zappos and their focus on holocracy and recently I read an article that holocracy is being revisited because its primary focus is on technology not on people. For employees to be inspired enough to make a positive impact on the workplace culture they need to be treated as people and for their leaders to have a ‘shared leadership’ approach. Leaders who create an environment where sharing is rewarded naturally create inspired teams. Sharing includes the sharing of ideas, sharing of recognition, sharing of resources, sharing of data, sharing of power and energy.
3. Involve them in the vision – every person on the planet regardless of where they work wants to feel like he or she matters. As human beings we all want to feel that there is a reason to be here and that we all have something to contribute. In the past leaders and companies believed that employees should be just thankful to have a job. Now and in the future the power is shifting to the employee and it is the employer that has become thankful for its employees. Employees who get the vision of the company, who understand the impact that the company makes on people and who can make the link as to how he or she fits in with the big picture are truly inspired employees.
4. Ask them to be change leaders – if you want your employees to ‘be the transformers’ to transform the workplace then you have to overtly ask them to champion the changes that they and you want to see happen. Be ready for them to ask you for the growth opportunities, the training and the mentoring as part of being change leaders and be willing to give it to them. Millenials surveyed said that they would stay longer on a job if their leaders gave them ongoing challenges that helped them to grow and learn as much as they could in a short period of time.
5. Ask for your employees input AND listen AND implement – so many leaders miss golden opportunities to really inspire their employees by simply putting employee ideas into action. It reminds me of the Starbucks story on how the frappucino was created. An employee brought the idea to her store manager who agreed to a test and once the test was successful they took it to head office. A great example of transforming the business including profits through an inspired employee.

Inspired employees are the secret to competitive advantage – check out my infographic on inspired workplaces to find out more.