Employee involvement is essential. And screens can be very helpful in getting it right.
We recentlydiscussed the importance of employee engagement with our customers, Avon. Employee engagement is criticalbut extremely difficult for the world’s largest beauty manufacturer. Finding the right solution to create an impactful experience was therefore critical.
But, what exactly is employee engagement, and why is it so critical?
What exactly is employee engagement?
Employee engagement is not an easy task. Neither is its definition; there are over 50 of them. However, engaged workers exhibit three psychological states, according to the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD):
Vigor
Dedication
Absorption
Vigor: Refers to your employees’ resilience and the amount of energy they put into their work even when things are difficult.
Dedication: Dedicated employees push harder and for more by demonstrating enthusiasm and pride in their work.
Absorption: When you are completely immersed in your work, your output is more likely to be
impactful.
The significance of corporate culture
Creating a company culture of vigorous, dedicated, and absorbed employees, on the other hand, can be extremely difficult. Nonetheless, it is an essential component of creating a modern connected workplace.
However, having engaged employees in the first place is critical; strong employee engagement helps fuel a positive, ambitious, and inclusive company culture. And having a strong company culture filled with engaged employees not only sets you apart in the eyes of employees, candidates, and customers, but it can also have a massive impact on business results.
The effect of employee engagement on business outcomes
According to HR Grapevine, Gallup, and Hubspot articles, engaged employees are happier and healthier, which leads to higher employee retention and productivity. Those who aren’t, on the other hand, are 60% more likely to make mistakes.
However, understanding the demographics of that pool of employees – both engaged and non-engaged – is also important to consider.
Millennials are the most numerous generation in the labor force today. And, like any new generation, they bring with them different perceptions and expectations. This group has stated that they feel engaged at work when they strongly agree that the company’s mission or purpose makes them feel that their job is important. Furthermore, 69 percent of employees said they would work harder if they felt properly recognized and appreciated.
Businesses with engaged employees outperform those without by 202 percent, according to one study.
A 10 percent rise in customer ratings, as well as a 20 percent gain in revenue, are also perks of the deal for them. Again, employee involvement is crucial to the success of any organization.
There are several things to consider while discussing
internal communications
Internal communications teams are responsible for a large part of shaping company culture, but their efforts are not being felt; 74 percent of employees believe they are losing out on crucial information at work, but just 46 percent will open and read an internal communications email. This could be due to the fact that 56 percent of us say that we have email overload.
But what about those who don’t have a desk?
Before even considering how to improve internal communications, it’s important to understand
who makes up the staff.
Email isn’t the most effective method of communication for those 2.7 billion workers, who make uproughly 80 percent of the active workforce and work primarily in education and health care or
retail or hospitality or manufacturing or logistics etc. Email communication isn’t the most effective method of communication for those deskless workers, who aren’t provided with company devices and must instead rely on unofficial communication methods such as WhatsApp.
A hybrid working pattern is becoming increasingly popular in the post COVID environment, which
adds to the complexity of communications. It’s only when we’re working in these complex surroundings that we see the value of displays. In house communications with the use of digital signage.
Customers tell us that word-of mouth in meetings and peer-to-peer alerts still accounts for a big amount of internal communications. Then there are the actual noticeboards, whiteboards, and scraps of paper that quickly become inconsistent and out-of-date, making them difficult to manage and maintain.
Some type of screen is already all around us. In reality, they’re usually either empty, scarcely used or playing cable news.
Offices and work places with blank screens, therefore, represent enormous untapped potential.
A look at the psychology of digital signs
Simply put, screens enhance important information in the background.
An SMS or an email can be acknowledged instantly, but viewing relevant and timely content on a screen taps into unconscious cognition.
The subconscious mind has the ability to handle up to 20,000 bits of information at once,
accounting for around 95 percent of all of our cognition, according to researchers.
As a result, digital signage is a potent communication tool.
Knowing that our visual and aural senses are more sensitive to subliminal environmental stimuli,
continuous audiovisual awareness leads to better memor.
In what way can you maximize your screen potential?
It all comes down to where you are in our’maturity’ model; we tend to classify our customers as adept, sophisticated, and strategic users of digital signage, depending on their experience.
With the help of your screens, you’re amplifying some content. For example, staff announcements or localized weather information. You can now start targeting specific groups and being more selective about who sees what – rather than everyone seeing the same thing – as you get closer to an experienced user.
We’d love for all of our clients to be strategic users who are evaluating the impact of their material based on their own objectives and KPIs, but that’s not the case for most of our customers. This information is then used to modify and improve the content strategy.
Using digital signage strategically requires a lot of work. Knowing what to show, when and where can be a challenge if you want your material to be dynamic.
The strategic user will require several versions for different audiences and different times of the
day. When working with a smaller team, you may need to rely more on technology and automate some tasks to reduce administrative stress.
It was for this reason that we built the Dsfeed framework
It is not a “do it yourself” feature of CMS , but rather a sophisticated approach to aid you in understanding the underlying “why” behind how you use your screens – and being a strategic user.
Together, I believe we can create something frictionless and inclusive for all employees. As a result, corporate headquarters and local offices can curate information in a way that makes sense. We’re talking about a content strategy that we can customize to your organization’s needs.
It is possible to measure the impact of your screens, as well as demonstrate the ROI of adopting digital signage in order to develop the future connected workplace of your modernized office.
And yet in the end, it has nothing to do with a screen at all. It’s about getting people to take constructive action in the actual world. And that’s what employee engagement is all about: a sense of belonging and purpose.
You’re interested in learning more about DSFEED, right?
The Bookreen Professional Services team is available to discuss how they can help you optimize your screen potential. Request a demo and they’ll show you how DSFeed can take you from proficient to strategic.