Employee Engagement Research Supports Increased ROI in Key Industries
In case you haven’t noticed, there is a lot of fluffy, happy feel-good information out there about employee engagement. Companies have sprouted up, jumping on the employee engagement band wagon, presumably to benefit your company’s bottom line. This trend points towards a very important question if you are at all interested in the whole movement: is there research that supports what engaged employees do for your financial well-being, not just employee well-being? This article will look at research statistics from three major areas of business: healthcare, manufacturing, and sales.
Employee Engagement in Healthcare
Increases in a tough arena
Research supports the theory that increased employee engagement can increase a company’s ROI, according to a study reported in the Journal of Healthcare Management. Research conducted in the healthcare industry, an area known to have increasing challenges gaining and sustaining a competitive advantage, states that employees in highly participative work climates provided 14 percent better customer service, committed 26 percent fewer clinical errors, demonstrated 79 percent lower burnout, and felt 61 percent lower likelihood of leaving the organization than employees in more authoritarian work climates. The study goes on to indicate that not only can increasing employee engagement in the workplace improve profits, overall patient care and effectiveness of the organization are likely to improve as well. A win-win for both consumer and company.
Although fighting the healthcare turnover rate can seem daunting, one study points to how employees who are engaged are less likely to want to leave their current position; another outlines that increased employee engagement can reduce turnover in the organization by 54 percent. Conversely, workers who feel disenfranchised decrease their commitment to the organization by 78 percent. Moreover, the cost of turnover of one employee is 6-9 months salary of that employee, according to the Society for Human Resource Management. Good reasons to try to sustain a culture of keeping the employees currently on the payroll.
Increasing Employee Engagement in Manufacturing
Lower defects in workmanship, fewer safety incidents
If the healthcare industry presents challenges gaining a competitive advantage, the manufacturing sector would gain leaps and bounds by lowering product defects. But can employee engagement statistics aid in this manufacturing nightmare? Gallup states yes, in its 2016 Q12® Meta Analysis. All together, the Gallup research shows favorable figures in three key manufacturing areas: 41 percent lower absenteeism, 58 percent fewer safety incidents, and 40 percent fewer quality defects. Happy workers are 12 percent more productive, while unhappy workers are 10 percent less productive than average, a 22 percent total spread of productivity! Workers who believe they are not treated well decrease their work effort by 48 percent, and their quality of work by 38 percent.
Sales and Employee Engagement Results
High correlation between happy employees and happy customers
In the high customer service industry of sales, statistics again support the benefits your company can receive from making employee engagement a priority. When your brain is at positive, rather than neutral or negative, you are 31 percent more productive, and 37 percent better at sales. Correlation between customer satisfaction and company culture is so strong that the difference in
revenue between salespeople in strong and weak company cultures was 30 percent. An overwhelming 25 percent of workers admitted to taking their frustrations out on customers when they felt on the receiving end of poor treatment at work, demonstrating the truth that what comes around goes around. What is the truth about your company culture?
No matter what aspect of business you are involved in-- healthcare, manufacturing, or sales and customer service-- the research supports that highly engaged employees will increase your company’s effectiveness and ultimately, bottom line.
