Employee involvement is key to improving workplace culture. Your people play an important role in building your desired culture, and therefore should be given the opportunity to help develop it. Creating a positive business culture is not a top-down initiative. Every employee needs to feel involved, listened to, and emotionally engaged in the process.
In this blog we’ll be delving into the reasons why people need to feel involved in developing a business culture, the things an employee can tell you that a leader cannot, and share a quick and easy method to assess employee sentiment around your current culture.
Why feeling involved and included at work is so important
Alongside strong leadership, supportive management and integrity, listening to the employee voice is one of the four enablers of employee engagement. Asking your people to help develop the company culture is known to cultivate a strong sense of belonging and engagement. When leaders understand what employees are thinking and feeling, they can make more informed decisions about culture, strategy and implementation.
It’s not rocket science. If you had the choice between being told how to behave at work and being asked what behaviours you would like to see at work, which would you choose? Nobody enjoys being told what to do, much less how to behave!
Employees generally enjoy the feeling of being included and involved in matters which affect them. When this is present in workplace culture, it leads to enhanced productivity, improved morale and happiness, and higher rates of innovation. People also tend to feel a stronger sense of pride in their work and are more likely to recommend your organisation to others.
What can an employee tell you that a leader cannot?
Leaders know a lot about the current issues and challenges in your organisation, but they don’t know everything. Consulting the views of employees can provide a valuable temperature check of your current culture. It also reveals what’s happening in the places leaders can’t access, for example at delivery level and around the water cooler!
Employees can:
- Give a candid account of what life is like on the ground from those directly involved in delivering the tasks and actions requested by their leaders.
- Help you to pinpoint what’s working and not working.
- Reveal where attitudes to work are poor and employee satisfaction is low.
- Share how they think and feel about the way the organisation treats them as an individual.
- Give feedback on their line manager’s skills and behaviours, helping you to identify gaps to be filled.
- Tell you where leader and employee perceptions and opinions differ. Senior management might believe an engagement initiative to be a success, whereas employees might take a completely different view.
Listening strengthens the manager-employee relationship
Encouraging employees to share their knowledge, views and opinions helps to strengthen the relationship between teams and their leaders. Listening creates a bond of trust that allows everyone to feel involved in the future direction of the organisation. In the longer-term, employees tend to be more supportive of culture change when they know their views have been considered. There are also suggestions that employees who have been emotionally engaged with the process might find culture change less threatening and have stronger buy-in.
Listening is essential to create a collaborative workplace
Organisations that engage with, and listen to, their people tend to have higher rates of collaboration and teamwork. Normalising the habit of speaking up and sharing new ideas without fear of repercussion is a step towards creating a more collaborative work culture.
As trust develops, team members become more supportive of each other. They are likely to openly offer solutions to problems and embrace their peers’ success. This creates a positive team spirit and a motivating work environment. Mutual support also leads to a more resilient and responsive workforce that’s well equipped to manage change, including change of the cultural variety.
Collaboration leads to a host of other benefits and opportunities including learning and development, improved communication skills and reduced conflict through a respect and understanding of diverse perspectives.
The impact of a Cultural Values Assessment on company culture
A Cultural Values Assessment (CVA) is a powerful and incisive way to get right to the heart of your company’s culture. Useful as a catalyst to spark cultural change and as a method of continuously tracking cultural progress, this accessible, online questionnaire is quick to implement and complete.
The findings of your CVA can help leaders to understand their own impact and start making the mindset and behavioural shifts required forto achieve cultural change. We also highly recommend discussing the results with your teams to continue their involvement and ensure they understand the reasons behind future decisions.
Learn more about the benefits of a cultural values assessment.
Include your employees in creating the culture you desire
When it comes to developing and evolving business culture, it’s important to involve your employees to cultivate a strong sense of belonging and engagement. Employees have valuable thoughts and perspectives that leaders must not overlook. Listening to a range of views and keeping employees involved will put your organisation in the best position to shape your company culture.
Further reading
The value of building a people first workplace
Download our guide to transforming your company culture.