Employee Involvement

By Susan M. Heathfield

Jobs Vacancy, Job vacancies, Employment Jobs

Definition:

Employee involvement is creating an environment in which people have an impact on decisions and actions that affect their jobs.

Employee involvement is not the goal nor is it a tool, as practiced in many organizations. Rather, it is a management and leadership philosophy about how people are most enabled to contribute to continuous improvement and the ongoing success of their work organization.

My bias, from working with people for 40+ years, is to involve people as much as possible in all aspects of work decisions and planning. This involvement increases ownership and commitment, retains your best employees, and fosters an environment in which people choose to be motivated and contributing.

How to involve employees in decisionmaking and continuous improvement activities is the strategic aspect of involvement and can include such methods as suggestion systems, manufacturing cells, work teams, continuous improvement meetings, Kaizen (continuous improvement) events, corrective action processes, and periodic discussions with the supervisor.

Intrinsic to most employee involvement processes is training in team effectiveness, communication, and problem solving; the development of reward and recognition systems; and frequently, the sharing of gains made through employee involvement efforts.

Employee Involvement Model

For people and organizations who desire a model to apply, the best I have discovered was developed from work by Tannenbaum and Schmidt (1958) and Sadler (1970). They provide a continuum for leadership and involvement that includes an increasing role for employees and a decreasing role for supervisors in the decision process. The continuum includes this progression.

• Tell: the supervisor makes the decision and announces it to staff. The supervisor provides complete direction.



• Sell: the supervisor makes the decision and then attempts to gain commitment from staff by "selling" the positive aspects of the decision.



• Consult: the supervisor invites input into a decision while retaining authority to make the final decision herself.



• Join: the supervisor invites employees to make the decision with the supervisor. The supervisor considers her voice equal in the decision process.

To round out the model, I add the following.

• Delegate: the supervisor turns the decision over to another party.

In Danger of Getting Fired or Laid Off?

By Susan M. Heathfield,

Jobs Vacancy, Job vacancies, Employment Jobs

Employment termination - no matter the cause - is scary, disorienting, and disruptive to habitual patterns. Getting fired is never fun; layoffs are equally disheartening. In either scenario, your feelings of self worth and self esteem are dealt a blow. Just when you most need a positive outlook to help you find your next opportunity, you feel dizzy as if your whole world is spinning out of control. Don’t despair. Better? This is how to prepare yourself for your next layoff or employment termination – before the fateful meeting.

Signs of Impending Employment Termination

Signs of an impending employment termination are obvious in retrospect. If your employment is terminated for performance reasons, you will generally have had a performance improvement plan. Or, minimally, performance improvement discussion meetings with your supervisor will have escalated. Your manager may also have involved Human Resources staff in these discussions.

The employee handbook generally lists the circumstances and infractions under which progressive discipline, up to and including employment termination, are meted out. You will want to become familiar with these guidelines.

If you believe your manager is building a case that will result in employment termination, you may want to speak to an attorney while you still have time to affect your employment. In other cases employment termination is the right answer. You may be underperforming or ill suited to the role you are expected to perform.

Layoffs are also often obvious in retrospect. Many companies will communicate an increasingly dire financial forecast; other companies leave employees in the dark about their financial situation. Signs that a layoff might occur include some or all of these.

Managers ask employees to implement cost saving measures. Both hiring and spending are frozen. Employees who leave are not replaced. Sales are down or the sales projection is dismal. Closed door meetings o

Leadership and Management Success Tips

By Susan M. Heathfield

Jobs Vacancy, Job vacancies, Employment Jobs

These tips about how to communicate during change will help you make your change communication effective and successful.

• Provide answers to questions only if you know the answer. Leaders destroy their credibility when they provide incorrect information or appear to stumble or back-peddle, when providing an answer. It is much better to say you don’t know, and that you will try to find out.



• Leaders need to listen, just listen. Avoid defensiveness, excuse-making, and answers that are too quickly given. Act with thoughtfulness. The power of real listening cannot be over emphasized. Real listening is one of your most critical components in change communication.



• Make leaders and change sponsors available, daily when possible, to mingle with others in the workplace.



• Communication should be proactive. If the rumor mill is already in action, the organization has waited too long to communicate.