...Answering to current dialogue
Employee loyalty is waning as "career experts" sell out for profit! An onslaught of bad advice has been distributed by paid job boards and employment listing media. Applicants and employees are actually instructed to "negotiate" for their best deal or "resign." Could this advice be motivated by a desire to increase attrition in companies when employment advertising is down? Could this advice be motivated by "experts" appealing to what individuals "want" to hear versus what they "need" to hear? In any event, good people are falling victim to bad advice, and employers need to be aware!
Managing People At Work well summarizes 3 key concepts to creating a "retention culture." 1. Support each team member's personal and professional goals. 2. Invest in training for the whole team. 3. Coach everyone, not just the ones "who need it."
Internal Marketing case studies have abounded these past years, especially in reaction to workforce attraction/retention and solidifying morale during a downsize. Techniques to handle employees as internal customers have manifested in teambuilding exercises, scenarios and assessments. Recent roundtables have also revealed that with "train the trainer" exercises, supervisors can educate and motivate their team members to treat them as internal customers as well.
Lean thinking/cellular manufacturing concepts have become increasingly popular topics with an emphasis on internal marketing. Studies consistently reveal that employee fear of job security is created by introducing this concept. "Lean" creates fear of job elimination. Proper employee education does successfully alleviate and replace the employee fear with "buy in" toward the increased company competitiveness, profit and valuable cross training provided. (In recent economy, this is clearly not the greatest concern of manufacturing employees, but a rebound and "ramp up" is certainly on the horizon).
"Human Capital" theories have received attention from the career minded! Our press articles and on site teambuilding exercises have encountered initially mixed reactions prior to acceptance. Some folks may never change, but definite success stories exist with those achievement-oriented team players!
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