I know… it’s Wednesday and I am on time… Considering it’s 6.49 a.m. as I’m writing this, I think I’m actually early.

Anyways….

Here In South Carolina

I’m here in S.C. conducting 10 focus groups with employees of one of my clients. As a follow-up to their second Workforce Engagement Assessment, we are getting more specific information on the issues brought up in the survey.

Finding the Balance

As you know, the group with the highest engagement in the Employee Hold’em 2008 National Workforce Engagement Benchmark are Senior Executives, where 81% are Fully Engaged. No duh.

The group withe second highest engagement are employees taking care of both a child under 18 currently living in the household and an adult loved one, with nearly 2/3 being Fully Engaged (64%). My friends at World at Work (the Total Rewards folks and the publisher of my first three books, more on that later in the blog) are very interested in those results. Big “oh”!

I’m been talking to friends, associates and clients about this issue, trying to put a little “meat on the bones”. I’ve also been thinking a lot about the situation my own family faced three years ago when my mom was dying and the responsibility of the welfare of my father fell on me and my brother. It wasn’t a job either my brother or I applied for, honestly I don’t think either one of us had the skills, experiences or competencies required to deal with my mom in hospice for nearly three weeks and the need to get my dad into full time nursing care.

When I got the call from my father that mom was rushed to the hospital I was in Las Vegas, having fun with my friends over Super Bowl weekend. I flew immediately home and when I landed in Indianapolis I called my boss at his house (it was a Saturday) and told him what I knew of the situation. I told Dave that I didn’t know when I would be back to work or what my schedule was going to be, but I assured him that I would still get my work done.

As I look back over those three horrific weeks when mom was in hospice and the three months my brother and I worked like mad to get my dad “situated”, I have tried to figure out if I had achieved the kind of work-life balance that we all talk about. The quick answer is “no”. I didn’t find the balance, but I did find the answer. I took care of my family, and my work be damned.

That may be the reason behind the increased engagement of these sandwich generation folks. In their own mind, they have achieved “balance”. Not the “a state of equilibrium or equipoise; equal distribution of weight, amount, etc” as Dictionary.com defines it, but the “mental steadiness or emotional stability; habit of calm behavior, judgment, etc.” that is listed as their third definition.

My brother and I knew what needed to be done. We tried to have the mental steadiness and the calm behavior and judgement to make the right decisions, and looking back we did a pretty darned good job, inexperienced as we were.

We’ll see if this line of thought bears fruit as I continue my research.

Fun and Games

As we have seen in the last two national benchmark studies conducted by my organization (Employee Hold’em) participation in a company sponsored social event is critical to the engagement of the employees to their organization. Taking employees to a local minor league baseball game, having “beach day” on a Friday where employees wear shorts and go “beachy”, having a pitch-in lunch or even going to the local watering hole can significantly improve the relationship employees have with their peers and colleagues.

Employees who participated in an event were 50% more engaged than employees who didn’t (or who were given no opportunity).

Fun and games can be great engagement and commitment tools.. Try ‘em, you’ll like ‘em.

One, Two, Three

Yes, three books now.

I can’t stand myself, I’m having so much fun.

Our first book, Workforce Engagement, Strategies to Recruit, Retrain, Reward & Retain Talent will have a second edition, as we are updating the book with our current thinking on the subject and the new 2008 National Benchmark data mentioned above.  So, talking about the second edition of my first book just sounds so cool…

Our second book, Employee Engagement Fundamentals, A Guide for Managers and Supervisors will be out at the beginning of August, and will be paired up with the re-release of book #2.

Our third book will be on the basics of Rewards & Recognition, a topic that I wrote extensively about in both books, and on an article coming up in the July issue of Human Resource Executive.  My take on the “recognition” part of R&R is a little bit different than most HR folks.

No duh!

Have a great day!