How Technology is Changing Engagement at Work

Organizations today understand the true importance of employee engagement. Increasingly, this is becoming a vital cog in any employee satisfaction and retention strategy. We discuss five ways in which technology can help in improving employee engagement.

Why Engagement Matters

There’s no denying the fact: employee engagement is a serious game-changer for businesses, regardless of size or scale. In a highly complex market, fraught with rising attrition rates, retaining employees is critical. Add to that a young, vibrant millennial workforce who are hungry for various facilities, benefits, and means of engagement, above and beyond only compensation. This is why improving employee engagement is integral to a company’s culture, as well as its long-term profitability.

In its simplest form, high engagement means your workforce is inspired to perform assigned tasks to the best of their ability, are constantly motivated and enthused and feel a sense of ownership/accountability for the project.

Also read: 4 Employee Engagement Trends that Will Rule 2019

Now, improving employee engagement is a complex terrain. Given its apparent intangible state, companies often flounder when it comes to defining concrete strategies. This is where technology can help – by offering pragmatic add-ons, real-time solutions, and carefully planned engagement methodologies, HR teams can make a genuine difference. Let’s look at five ways in which technology can breathe new life into your employee engagement gameplan.

5 Ways Technology Can Help in Improving Employee Engagement

Collaboration is key

Research reveals that when employees are allowed to freely collaborate and work in coordination with each other, there is a significant uptick in productivity. In fact, flexibility and virtual work in today’s time is a must-have for any organization.

There are a plethora of collaboration and flexibility tools (from intranets to the highly popular Slack and Slack alternatives) which can help employers give their workforce the opportunity to talk to each other, share ideas, and collaborate more closely than ever before – no matter where they are located. “A modern digital workplace solution can be customized to accurately reflect an organization’s workforce and its changing work experience. It can integrate all of the technologies that employees leverage to support cross-platform collaboration,” said Will Saville who is Co-Founder of intranet provider, Unily.

Gamification makes training fun and meaningful

When it comes to training, often employees find monotonous workflows and practices exhausting, choosing to stay away from learning paths that could otherwise be extremely helpful. Gamification, with its focus on interactivity, a sense of ease, and an innovative way of sharing learning and development, can both transform training sessions as well as improve employee engagement.

To explore exactly how workplace gamification can aid in improving employee engagement, please read: Tackling Disengagement with Workplace Gamification.

It’s okay to allow personal tools – as long as compliance is maintained

This is the smartphone generation. At home and at work, employees are constantly logged into multiple devices, from smartphones to laptops and desktops. This is why letting employees work, collaborate, and communicate across multiple devices, is always a smart move. All that a company needs to do, is ensure that employees adhere to a stringent level of compliance and are made to understand the importance of security and the threat of cybercrimes.

Also read: Implementing the BYOD Model: 7 Do’s and Don’ts to Remember

Recognition and acknowledgment are welcome, any day and every day

“A great way to encourage employee engagement and motivating employees to do better and improve is to recognize and reward their efforts and their work in the company,” said Myron Monet, Marketing Manager for technical talent provider, Mobilunity. Beyond the annual review, appraisals, or quarterly sitdowns, peer recognition and ‘spot’ recognition are extremely important for boosting morale and building motivation. This will help in improving employee engagement, even as employers instill a sense of ownership and positivity among team members.

Again, there are several tools out there which can help regularize recognition and offer new and innovative ways to reward exceptional performance from an employee.

Let employees gather new ideas on the go

Today, mobile learning is an accepted form of intelligent delivery in the L&D function. Given how employees spend a major chunk of their time on their smartphones, rich and bite-sized content is always a better alternative, instead of text-heavy and complex materials. What’s more, with new technologies like microlearning, MOOC, and data analytics, employees can actually be empowered to pick up relevant skillsets, improving employee engagement. By gathering advanced learning insights through data analytics, L&D teams can finetune modules as per individual needs. Needless to say, all of this goes a long way in strengthening and improving employee engagement.

Also read:

Top 8 Best Practices for Employee Cross-Training

In Conclusion

These are the five most popular ways in which technology can help in improving employee engagement. At its very core, engagement should give your workers a sense of freedom – freedom from being chained to a desk, greater flexibility, and the ability to unflinchingly share the most disruptive ideas and maximize their potential.

How are you using technology and cutting-edge software in a bid to improve employee engagement? Share your thoughts on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter pages