PART 1: Employee Engagement: Strategies for Small Business Success — INTRODUCTION

1. Introduction

Employee engagement is crucial for any thriving company but carries even more weight in small businesses where each team member's contribution directly impacts the company's success. Defined as the level of emotional investment and commitment employees feel towards their company, engagement profoundly influences both their productivity and overall company performance. In smaller enterprises, the benefits of high engagement include more robust productivity, stronger collaboration, and higher employee retention rates. However, small businesses also face distinct challenges in fostering this environment. Limited resources can make it challenging to match the salaries and benefits offered by larger companies. Opportunities for advancement may be fewer, potentially stifling the career aspirations of ambitious employees. Additionally, the necessity for employees to wear multiple hats can lead to role confusion and eventual burnout if not managed effectively.

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Contact Information:

Jeff Saari, Workplace Culture Solution:

Email: 1VISIONARY@GMAIL.COM

Phone: 603-762-4866

Your Pain Points

In a session this morning my client told me that the reason he has become more effective in his leadership is because he had a 'humbling' experience last year.  This manager almost didn't make it in his organization as his behavior over time had become toxic.  He first came to me after this humbling experience and he and I have done some really great, challenging and fun work together.  The humbling experience was getting 360 feedback in the organization which was largely critical, as well as being put on the chopping block if he didn't turn around.  I like his story so much because it illustrates that 1. we can turn around, and 2. we need to know what our blind spots or pain points are in order to grow.  

Just as in the body pain points need to be identified and then released through manipulation, heat, rolling on rollers, etc., our psychological/emotional world need the same.  With coaching this manager was able to roll out the kinks in his emotional reactions and intellectual disturbances by learning skills and looking at what he wanted to create.  Instead of solely focusing on what isn't working, we started to use appreciation, relationship building, skill building and team building to create a better leadership and team experience.  I have seen many pain points that leaders either know or get to know when I am on their watch.  

I have documented many such pain points/blind spots that I believe as leaders (or anyone) gets more intimate with, they can become less and sometimes obliterated.  Here is a non-exhaustive list.  See if any fit for you, deep inside.  See if you can identify one or two or (heavens-no) all of them and say them out loud: 

• Getting through to a defensive manager/managee
• Fear of conflict
• Figuring out capacity
• How to say no
• Letting go of control and let others help
• Too much in the weeds
• Holding others accountable; pleasing others
• Work/life balance
• Vague projects/procrastination
• Speaking up/self-advocacy
• Unaware of impact on others
• Trusting your gut
• Lack of systems
• Delivery too brash
• Lonely at the top
• Dealing with change
• Inspiring a vision
• Managing friends
• Managing other’s employees
• Lack of org chart clarity
• Turnover
• No leadership training
• Assessing when to fire someone
• Co-managing an employee
• Getting people committed
• Getting annual reviews done

Can you see yourself in any of these?  Are there others?  I would love to hear about your pain points.  As you self-identify (or have others identify them for you!) you can look at how you want to address it/them.  I can think of nothing better to do than to become a better manager and thus person. 

Positive and Negative Thinking

There are many people out there that think positive thinking is the holy grail.  There's nothing wrong with that per se, but we can't live up to the ideal of not thinking negatively can we?  We all have negative thoughts, judgments, and feelings from time to time; some more than others.  And then we have positive times.  Hopefully you have more of the former, but this isn't the main event.  My mentor Robert Fritz once told us some years ago in a workshop that what actually matters is what you want to create.  The creator wants to create the creation just because it wants to be created.  I think there is a place for negativity and I am sometimes stricken by its hold.  There is great power in negativity because it is showing you that something is awry with what you are trying to create.  It helps us, or can help us, focus back on what it is we want and then keep the actions going to get it.  We never know if the creation will pan out or will be good or received well by others, but that is again not the main event.  Creating for creating's sake is the name of the game.  So the next time you are betwixt with a negative (or positive) mindset, don't overload it with some pithy ideal from The Secret, acknowledge your dismay and turn its eye onto what it's telling you to bring into existence.  So talk to your challenging co-worker, clean out that office clutter, get to the gym.  Not because you have to, but because you want to. 

Wellness of the Whole — Inputs and Outputs

I have been thinking lately about a 'well' life.  For some reason inputs and outputs, or debits and credits, or payables and receivables come up for me.  With my clients sometimes we are talking about such things like happiness, balance, well-being.  I think most of us professionals are striving for the good life, where you have a lot of good things going on:  money in the bank, a fit body, learning, nice things, pleasurable experiences, sound relationships, solid community involvement, etc.  There are so many avenues to pursue that it can become sheer overwhelment at times trying to understand if we are reaching the balance/well-being or not.  

Inputs and outputs can be shown in a myriad of ways.  Eating 'right' is one avenue to explore.  What are you putting into your body on a daily basis?  Is what you think is healthy actually healthy?  Do you tend to have patterns of stressful eating?  Are you pursuing understanding how food becomes mood?  For instance, alcohol is a depressant.  Now I'm not averse to a drink here and there.  But when you see how drinking affects your energy, mood, body even the next day, this is a case of inputs and outputs.  You have to pay into the system.  If you are eating lots of inflammatory foods and have ailments of certain kinds, you are taking a hit from the inputs you are putting in.  It's basic science.  

In the emotional or mental world it's not so easy to assess.  Thich Nhat Hahn, Zen Master says that watching media and reading tabloids, etc. can create an unruly mind, or agitation.  This can be very subtle but again, taking in negativity can lead to the output of negativity or negative states of mind and feeling.  

For wellness to occur, I believe we need to assess the various areas of our lives to see what is working and what is not working.  A good coach or friend can help you sift through this quagmire.  Putting the various pieces of your life out on display, even if it is just on a sheet of paper you can begin to see how you are doing and what is off kilter.  Of course I am presupposing that you want to create a life of balance and well-being, mindfulness and health. I talk to clients everyday about some things that are out of balance.  I love these candid talks.  Nobody really wants stress and I believe it can be controlled by controlling the inputs into the system.  Take care of what you read, what you ingest, what you choose to focus on, etc. and you will see an enlightening turnaround I'm sure of it!  

Taking Calculated Risks

Recently I was able to do something that I have never done before:  speak to 1200 people over 2 days up on the big stage.  I was asked to speak to the incoming new students about managing anxiety at Keene State College.  The experience and collaboration with the student affairs folks was truly amazing, totally went off without a hitch and was well received.  

Some of my clients are dealing with pushing the edge, riding the wave, creating something new, taking risks.  For me it was a calculated risk because even though I have never done a Ted style talk on the big stage, I have done hundreds of hours with groups of smaller sizes.  So when the college asked me to do this it felt right, and my work heretofore was leading me into this arena of public/motivational speaking.  It just felt right.

I had a session last evening with someone who is looking at morphing her role in her company. She is feeling hemmed in by her current role and wants to approach her boss about a new position that she is creating (in her mind) based on a real need in the organization.  This could be a risk to put out there to her boss because the answer might be no.  Also, if others find out they might think she isn't committed to her current department and role.  And her major fear is that her boss might say no and use this to push her out the door.  So in coaching her, we got into the vision of the new role, which excited her.  Then we talked about all of these potential landmines and explored how to mitigate them should they arise.  And we talked about the choice of staying unhappy in a current role or seeking to go towards the positive energy she is feeling.

After my talks were through I had several students come up to me and ask me questions, some have me high fives and some were sobbing or crying.  People are dealing with anxiety and depression all over the place and I struck a cord.  I shared some of my own past pain up there on the stage and it connected them to me.  After all I am a human being too not immune to the slings and arrows of time.  

After taking this calculated risk I want more.  I had a filmmaker film the whole thing and he is going to make a full length movie out of it and give me whatever video clips for marketing I want.  I will pander this to other colleges and businesses to get more speaking gigs.  I love being on the stage, connecting with a large audience, and being as real as possible.  I never would have known this if I would have played it safe.

The Economy of Emotions

I have been hearing lately in many places this notion of the economy of motion, that is making each movement as efficient as possible.  So if you are weight lifting for instance, or running, you don't want to waste energy in inefficient body movements.  Not only do you not get the benefit of the gains you want, you can get injured as well.  So I was thinking about how this may apply to the emotional world.

In a recent blog I mentioned how an adverse feeling like embarrassment can lead us to take actions like acquiescence, avoidance, going small.  However, when I ask people, these are not usually the actions they really want to take, so to me this is an inefficient way to deal with the strong negative emotions.  One woman in a recent workshop blurted out that is just seems so natural to purvey these ineffective actions.

Why would we do the opposite of what we want?  Very curious indeed.  Answer?  Because we usually don't know any better or don't know a better way.  But there is always a better way in anything.  My Kung Fu instructor just told me that after 40+ years of practicing he just learned something new from his master.  Very cool.  

So the better and more efficient way  is this:  When you feel gripped by a strong emotion, stop.  Take a deep breath or two, take a walk, sleep on it, talk to a friend about it, go work out, eat some protein, take a break.  Sometimes taking what a client called a 'calculated pause' you can get a new perspective on something that is triggering you in the moment.  Let us not react to situations, but calm down and enlist our rational minds on the challenges we face.  Then we can choose what we want to do instead of react with an action that doesn't support what we want.  Of course strong emotions are there for a good reason, but you won't know what the reason is until you inspect it.

Why does embarrassment come up for instance?  Let's say you are doing a presentation and you start fumbling your words.  You then get in your head and worry what others are thinking of you and you think you should be able to do better.  These are thoughts in your head that let embarrassment creep in.  Of course this happens at the speed of light and just seems to happen.  The our body catches up with the feeling and we get red and sweaty in the palms and then look to get out of the situation as fast as possible.  BUT, reality is that you were fumbling the words a little bit, that's it.  We then ascribe all of these worries, fears, and obligations on it to be something different.  By reacting to the embarrassment we don't usually get what we want.  SO...we need to calm down in the face of embarrassment and re-calibrate.  Take some deep breaths and focus on what you want to pull off.  If you can't pull it off maybe you need more practice and next time will go more smoothly.  

The economy of emotion is to calm down under duress and focus on the outcome you want.  If you fall prey to the emotions and purvey a negative action, learn about it so you have less chance to do it next time.  One of my students from the college told me after 3 months in my class that she doesn't get embarrassed anymore, and she had a heavy case of it.  She is in the driver's seat, not the other way around.  This is the most efficient and stable place to be.