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Using Commitment and Ownership to Enhance Engagement

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One of the many links I followed on Twitter today took me to a very interesting piece by Terrence Seamon. The article is called “Engagement: A New Lens on Performance Review”. What I like about it is a) it’s a short and simple read and b) it ties engagement, productivity and performance together neatly. Here’s a brief extract and you can click here for the article on Terrence’s blog. Good work.

If a business leader hears about employee engagement and sees the potential in it to raise his organization’s productivity and profitability, how would he link it to his annual performance management process?

Commitment – Essentially, employee engagement comes down to commitment: How committed is the employee to the organization? Let’s cut to the quick on this and say: Employee commitment is directly related to the degree of commitment they feel from the organization. So, if you want high performance from employees, demonstrate your commitment to them. This can take a variety of forms. In the context of performance review, one thing you can do is “turn the tables” and ask the employee for feedback. Ask: How are we doing? What can we do to provide you with better support this year? What are your goals that we can help you with?

Ownership – Some employees are already highly engaged. If you could “pop the lid” on their psyches and peer inside, what would you see? One of the things you’d notice is that they have the attitude of an owner. They take ownership of the things they do. They don’t need much supervision. And they don’t need your feedback either in most cases. In fact, they are their own toughest critics most of the time.

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Editor's Welcome

 

Hello! And welcome back as we enter 2012, with a busy year ahead of us all. With talk of double-dip recessions, a possible partial or even full break-up of the Eurozone and unemployment rates set to hit nearly 9%, topics such as organisational streamlining, staff resilience and talent management are likely to be on many an HR professional's lips over the next 12 months.
 
But to lighten the gloom here in the UK, we also have the Queen's Diamond Jubilee and its attendant public holidays to look forward to at the start of June. Followed by two weeks of Olympic Games from 27 July to 12 August and the Paralympics from 29 August to 9 September, each generating their own excitement, but also issues to work through for hard-pressed HR departments trying to sort out the multifarious staffing issues in advance.
 
So with an interesting but challenging year to come, HRZone promises to be with you, supporting you all the way and providing our usual insightful blend of news, analysis, community blogs and expert comment to help you sort the wheat from the chaff. As ever, we love to hear from you too so feel free to either post your words of wisdom to our blog section yourself or, in the case of longer, more in-depth ‘expert voice’ articles, drop me a line with any ideas to cath.everett@siftmedia.co.uk.....
 
Cath Everett
HRZone Editor 
 
 
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