Three Low Cost Ways to Connect with Your Staff and Improve Productivity

Morale is low.

Staff aren’t performing as well as they should.

Supervisors are upset.

And they want YOU to solve the problem.

The Problem

As leaders in your organization, people look to you to create a supportive culture where staff can thrive, and when morale drops and staff are no longer meeting expectations, they want you to step in and fix the problem.

I’ve found that there are three reasons your staff aren’t meeting expectations:

• Knowledge

• Skills

• Desire

Do your staff know what they need to do? Do they know how to do those things? Are they motivated to do those things?

If you want to improve employee engagement and productivity, this is a great place to start.

The Solution

Ask.

Ask your employees. Find out if they are having a gap in knowledge, skills, or desire, so you can create a solution that speaks to that need.

Emily Taylor, principal of teenyBIG, dedicates her work to helping organizations hear from key audiences, including their staff. I reached out to Emily to hear her perspective on the best strategies for connecting with your stakeholders. She offers:

Did you know that brands are viewed more favorably by 77% of consumers if they proactively invite and accept customer feedback? The same is true of your staff. When going into these opportunities to listen, be sure to both understand the challenge you are trying to uncover information for and leave some open space to hear things you may not have expected. Often we assume we know what our challenge might be but as we listen a different cause is revealed. Depending on your staff, culture, and the depth of personal feedback you are looking for, it can take time for people to open up but it is worth the effort to build trust and open up roadblocks.

So how do you do that?

Here are three low-cost ways to connect with your staff and discover the root cause of the performance issues.

• Surveys: Surveys are useful if you need broad feedback on less complex issues. You can use tools like SurveyMonkey or Google Forms to collect feedback from staff. Ask closed questions on a scale and open questions to gather additional responses.

• Interviews: Interviews are useful if the issue is more complex, and you need to have a conversation to identify the root issues. Schedule one-on-one conversations, phone calls, Zoom meetings, or coffee chats to hear from staff individually. Prepare your questions ahead of time, focusing mostly on open-ended questions.

• Focus Groups: Focus groups are useful for complex issues as well, but they only work if everyone will feel comfortable discussing the issue in a group setting. Find a great facilitator in your organization or hire one to facilitate these small group conversations with your staff.

Key Takeaways

List the questions you need answered, and identify the best method to collect those answers directly from your staff.