The corporate culture has come a long way in the past few decades with the evolution of technology. The same has affected many fronts of business management and organizations are leveraging it to their advantage. Among these, human resources has been one of those fronts where the effect of technology can be clearly observed.
The prime objective of HR management is to pick out the good ones from the available talent pool and inspire them to give their best. For achieving the latter, organizations are now investing in various plans that add value to their employees and delivers instant gratification for their contributions.
These plans sum up as what we call “Employee Engagement Programs”.
Going by the general definition, “Employee engagement is the emotional connection which an employee feels towards his or her organization, that tends to influence their behaviors and level of effort in work-related activities.”
Upcycling Employee Engagement With Modern Technology
Traditional employee engagement methods mostly involved giving out accolades to the best performing employees on a monthly or yearly basis. At the most, managers would get up from their desk to give a pat on the back for a job well done. However, with the new generation of talents joining the workforce and their requirements which also includes the need for instant gratification, old methodologies of engagement no longer fit in.
This is where technology kicked in to aid organizations in keeping their workforce engaged and satisfied.
HR tech has truly revolutionized the way enterprises used to look out for talented individuals and keeping them aligned to the organizational goals. Among its many verticals, employee engagement software has played a vital role by assisting organizations to nurture an engaged workforce through proper planning and automation.
Further, since a majority of these platforms are based on SaaS principles, customizing, implementing, and sustaining flexible engagement schemes globally becomes quite handy.
Having such a platform enables employers to appreciate and reward the best performers in real-time irrespective of their location, deliver the best benefits and measure the effectiveness of the program with detailed analytics. Thereby, upscaling various modes of engaging employees digitally.
Let’s look at some of the ways through which you can digitally engage your employees.
6 Ways to Enhance Employee Engagement Digitally
1. Real-time Appreciation
With tech-savvy millennials and Gen Z’s flooding the workforce, the demand for instant appreciation is on the rise. These sects of employees are always connected to the internet and this helps them in achieving their targets faster. This restlessness also reflects when it comes to getting acknowledged for their work.
This new generation of employees takes recognition at work very seriously, sometimes even more than their paycheck. And if they don’t feel valued for their contributions they won’t mind switching workplaces.
However, to mitigate this from occurring and retain the best talents, organizations should start emphasizing real-time acknowledgment through a platform that’s both scalable and easy to use. Well, even if you don’t want to invest in such tools, you can still make use of workplace group chat or social media to praise your employees for their great deeds.
2. Help them to Upskill
Another great way that organizations often miss out on when thinking of ways to digitally engage employees lies in helping them reshape their existing skillset.
“Most of the employees joining the workforce in today’s date have a strong desire to learn and grow professionally”, as per the 2021 Workplace Learning Report by LinkedIn. But this desire of theirs often takes a hit due to various factors including ever-growing work-load, personal responsibilities, and more. This may look like their own issue but in the broader sense, it affects their performance at work.
Having said so, technology has made learning easy for all, and being a responsible employer you can leverage it to help your employees upskill. For this, you can tie up with various online course providers and facilitate your employees to learn whatever they want at their own convenience.
3. Host Virtual Team Building Activities
Team building activities are an important part of every employee engagement program. These activities allow you to bring your employees together and inspire them to achieve their goals in a collaborative manner.
Though organizing such activities is much easier when your employees are around. You can still host virtual team-building activities using various digital tools that support the concept of gamification and is accessible to all.
For your convenience, check out this list of virtual team-building activities that are suitable for organizations of all sizes to boost their digital employee engagement efforts.
4. Encourage Peer to Peer Recognition
The core of employee engagement lies in recognizing efforts at work whether it’s coming from a manager or a colleague of the employee. Here, the latter are the ones who witness the hard work of their teammates first hand, and earning their appreciation is one of the best things an employee can think of.
This mode of appreciation not only uplifts the employees’ morale but also strengthens the professional relationship amongst all that is much needed for a collaborative work environment.
Peer-to-peer recognition can be easily implemented via cloud-based employee rewards and recognition platform. Here, you can again take the advantage of available communication channels where everyone is present and encourage your employees to give shout-outs to their teammates whenever they unlock a new achievement.
5. Form a Virtual Community With All Employees
With work from home being the new norm, employees are hardly exposed to the office culture. The present setting might look like it’s a boom for the employees’ work-life balance but there are various associated issues that can’t be overlooked.
At the office, employees had the chance to interact with each other which created a lively environment and positively affected their level of engagement. However, in the remote work setting this thing takes a hit and often instills the feeling of isolation amongst the employees.
Here, the best way to avoid such a situation is to build a virtual community involving all your employees where everyone can stay connected 24×7. Encourage your employees to start a discussion or take part in one in the virtual community. Furthermore, you can choose to keep it an informal affair which would allow your employees to speak up their minds in a profound manner and maintain the team camaraderie.
6. Facilitate Them With Necessary Tools and Resources
Another important aspect of engaging your employees digitally is by facilitating them with all the necessary tools and resources required for their work. The present tech-savvy generation of employees desire to work with the best tools available and this directly affects their productivity.
Moreover, with the evolution of cloud-tech, such as cloud calling, accessing work is now much easier than ever before. An employee could be anywhere in the world and still, they are able to actively participate at work with their colleagues. Hence, as an organization, if you are looking forward to enhancing your employee engagement, you should definitely make it a point to provide access to the best tools and resources to your workforce.
Conclusion
Going with the present scenario, where work from home has become the new norm keeping employees engaged has become quite challenging for HR leaders. However, with constant support from the top leadership and proper utilization of the available software tools, organizations can truly engage their employees digitally.
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