September 21, 2022
There are plenty of different reasons why your employees may no longer work with the same level of passion and enthusiasm as they once had. By knowing and understanding these reasons in a little more detail, you certainly put yourself in a stronger position to be able to retain your talent and keep them working for you over an extended period of time. While the reasons why employees disengage from work are various, there are some common trends and themes that can be drawn out across the board. Here are just a few of the main factors that could well lead to employee disengagement.
Perhaps the number one reason that you are likely to pick up on an employee engagement survey as to why members of staff are no longer as engaged as they once were comes down to a lack of recognition. If people feel like they are toiling away at a job but they are achieving nothing by doing so, this is more than likely going to eventually lead to a situation where they jump ship and simply look elsewhere to get the recognition that they are looking for. Ultimately, this is a problem that is a relatively cheap one to fix, but someone has to own and manage it - ensuring that everyone gets the kudos that they deserve for doing their job well.
The next common problem that many businesses find themselves up against is that there is simply no faith in the leadership and that the company is being led in the right direction. If this problem starts to proliferate, it can be very damaging to a business indeed. One way of getting around this is by engaging in clear communication at all times. This means constantly explaining the strategy and the reasons why certain decisions have been taken. While they may not always agree with what is going on, having this continual sense of purpose and direction, alongside celebrations of hitting targets and little wins can prove to be invaluable.
The work culture is something that becomes harder and harder to manage as a company grows larger. Therefore, you really need to stay on top of seeing how well you are doing and seeking out the different ways that you can improve it as and when possible. Again, this will come from having a good relationship with staff members so that they feel open to answering questions honestly. There are plenty of ways that you can seek to positively influence the work culture such as team building and providing incentives. You could always look to increase flexibility in a world in which more and more people are seeking out more of a hybrid model of working.
One of the other common issues that you may well find yourself up against involves unclear expectations. This often comes down to a failure in management. If employees don’t really know what is expected from them in their job role and how they can perform to achieve success, this is obviously going to be highly problematic from all sorts of different points of view. Therefore, there need to be clear meetings that happen on a regular basis where targets are laid out and there can be some sort of measurables to see whether people are moving in the right direction or not. Ultimately, the clearer the expectations, the better people are going to know whether their goals are aligning with what the company needs.
There has already been a look into a lack of recognition, but it is a slightly different kettle of fish when looking at feedback. Feedback can be delivered in the right way and the wrong way, but when it is the former, it is often appreciated as many people want to improve within their job role and feel like they are continually taking steps in the right direction. A big part of this comes down to achieving the type of open and honest culture that allows people to feel like they are really contributing to something bigger and they can speak their minds freely. However, if feedback is rarely - if ever - delivered, this often means that people are just going to coast along and do a basic job of work rather than ever feeling like they should go above and beyond.
This is another big one that can easily lead to disengagement. If people are not being rewarded in a way that they believe is fair and appropriate, this is quite obviously going to cause a situation in which they are going to simply disengage from the job role and perhaps even simply focus on doing the bare minimum at all times. Rewards come in numerous different forms, but obviously the bottom line salary is chief amongst them. However, in the modern world, even in a job in which the salary is good, people can still feel frustrated if they are not getting other rewards such as a good number of holidays and the flexibility to work where they want. There is no doubt that more and more people are looking at having a better work/life balance in the modern world, so putting a higher degree of focus on this can prove to be enormously useful for all sorts of different reasons.
As you can see from this list of reasons alone, there are plenty of factors that can cause people to disengage from the world of work. By understanding these in a higher level of detail, you help to create a situation where you are retaining your best and brightest staff members and they are more than likely to stick around to grow and build the business with you. However, having a high number of staff members that are totally disengaged from their job roles can have the exact opposite impact and can be enormously detrimental to what you are trying to achieve.
