Cultural Empathy Comes After Digital Engagement

 With Gallup surveys consistently reporting that 70% of us do not feel engaged at work, you have to wonder what is missing.

Bosses do their best to motivate and develop their people, but the simple fact is that they never have enough time or resources to do it as much as they would like.

Employees themselves are equally busy. They might absorb the workplace culture because of their interactions with the people around them, but unless there is a different strategy in place, there is no consistency in the adoption of an employer’s values.

When an employee “feels” their culture, their loyalty is cemented.

With employee retention climbing to the top of the HR agenda, ensuring this cultural empathy is at the heart of every HR communications agenda.

Companies need to engage their people digitally as well as in person.

But what exactly does this mean?

Digital engagement is not a weekly motivatory email from the boss. This is uni-directional (they do not expect replies), so actually, there is no engagement here at all. In fact, anything that comes from an individual and does not welcome feedback (because they are busy) cannot be classed as engagement.

True engagement requires a “back and forth” of sharing opinions.

You are made to think, and you are prompted to reply.

Only a digital “app” can accomplish this to maximum effect. The content is still managed by the HR leaders and line managers within a company, but because there is one degree of separation from them, people do not feel that they are taking up their time when they engage with the app.

It is an interesting psychological observation that for certain interactions, people are happier conversing with a digital manager rather than a real manager.

These conversations also tend to be more honest.

The Employee App allows organizations to initiate these conversations - employees engage with them whenever they want to (rather than having their work interrupted by an over-zealous boss).

Our clients have found that when thought-provoking content is “pushed” to their people on a regular basis via the app, it creates an echo chamber effect. People are taking the messages on board, refining their behaviours and influencing each other in the process. This virtuous circle is enhanced further by the continuous feedback loop that the app promotes.

When people are actively involved in moulding the company culture in such a way, they cannot help but feel that little bit more empowered to change the “feeling” of their workplace.

Far too many workplace cultures feel like an oil tanker that is impossible to manoeuvre.

With digital engagement, every interaction counts and every individual has a genuine and continuous opportunity to enable change.

People feel empathy towards their culture when they are taking part in forming it. 

Culture and Engagement 

We have partnered with an organisation who offer simple action-based programs that transform disengaged employees into fully engaged leaders.  

Our partner has developed 9 bespoke programs varying in length from 5 hours to 12 months long to tackle culture and engagement challenges. Weather you want to increase the engagement within a particular functional area of the business or get your senior management and leaderships singing from the same hymn sheet there's a course for you. 

For more information regarding our partners programs please get in touch today for more information.

Digital Engagement 

Looking for a way to increase engagement from top to bottom via digital technology? Take a look at our employee app. 

Employee Apps are enabling businesses to:

• Communicate with all of their workforce no matter where they are
• Share business stories, visions, missions and values
• Digitalise the company newsletter, publish in real time as news happens 
• Replace the old Intranet that many employees don't have access to
• Retain employees longer as they feel part of the bigger picture