vital

Nurses play a critical role in healthcare and the well-being of patients. For them to perform optimally, it is essential that they feel engaged and valued in their workplace.

Employee engagement is more than just job satisfaction; it drives increased productivity, better patient outcomes, and a more positive work environment. Investing in nurses’ engagement will not only benefit them, but the hospital as a whole.

Showing appreciation and commitment to nurses by fostering an environment that values their contributions, supports their growth, and recognizes their efforts is potentially one of the best ways to decrease patients’ mortality rates.

intermittent reinforcement

One of the many reasons social media is addictive is “intermittent reinforcement.” This refers to the infinite scroll or the way endless items reappear when you reach the bottom, creating a feeling of no end in sight.

People can sometimes experience the same sensation in their job. Without a clearly defined endpoint for a task or project, achieving a sense of completion and fulfillment can be difficult.

Social media addiction can be emotionally draining, as can work that feels never-ending.

employability

Labor market regulators and public employment services (PES) can help people become more employable by promoting soft-skills. Here are six ways they can do this:

  1. Incorporate soft-skills training into education and workforce development programs. PES can team up with educational institutions and training providers to ensure students and job seekers know how to communicate, work with others, and solve problems.
  2. Encourage employers to put a value on and prioritize soft-skills when hiring and promoting. PES can explain to employers how important soft-skills are and remind them to look at them along with technical skills when recruiting and promoting.
  3. Develop and promote industry-specific soft-skills standards. PES can work with industry associations and employers to create and advertise soft-skills standards specific to different industries. This can help job seekers and employees understand the soft-skills in demand in their chosen field. Or vice versa, they can help people choose a specific field, taking the required hard-skills into account, based on their soft-skills.
  4. Give incentives to employers who train their employees in soft-skills. PES can incentivize employers who invest in training their employees in soft-skills. This encourages them to help employees develop their soft-skills and become more employable.
  5. Create and advertise certifications for soft-skills. PES can create and advertise certification programs for soft-skills. This can help job seekers show their abilities and help employers find people with matching soft-skills.
  6. Use a two-sided model to assess people and jobs for soft-skills. PES can evaluate people and the jobs they’re offering regarding the soft-skills required. Preferably, a scientifically sound model.

primary job

Human resources professionals’ primary job is to create career development perspectives and opportunities. Recently, I heard Howard Schultz, longtime CEO of Starbucks, say this. Below, I’ll try to create insight into how this could be achieved, through 10 pointers, taking into account the potential pitfalls.

  1. Offer training and development programs, such as workshops, classes, and mentoring.
  2. Create clear career progression paths within the company.
  3. Encourage employees to take on additional responsibilities and stretch assignments.
  4. Provide opportunities for employees to work on cross-functional teams or projects.
  5. Offer tuition reimbursement or other educational assistance.
  6. Facilitate networking opportunities with other professionals in the company or industry.
  7. Offer leadership development programs.
  8. Provide regular feedback and coaching.
  9. Encourage employees to set career development goals and track progress.
  10. Be open to flexible work arrangements and remote working opportunities.

All these initiatives rely on insight and a clear understanding of the employee’s skills — both hard and soft — and professional expectations. Without this, you’re flying blind.

Many companies believe they’re performing well on people analytics, but in reality, many valuable insights are still missing.

half gone

Nearly 48% of white-collar workers in Belgium are open to a new job within the next six months, a reflection of the growing dissatisfaction with their current job and its related responsibilities. This lack of engagement and commitment to their current job can have a detrimental effect on productivity, as many employees may be subconsciously scaling back on their responsibilities or even mentally dropping out.

This readiness on the part of employees to move on can be a major concern for employers, as it not only means reduced productivity but also creates uncertainty, as it can be hard to tell which employees are interested in leaving and which aren’t. Having nearly half of your employees wanting to leave is serious, without question.

Not knowing which half is even more dramatic.

analytics journey

Five things that make or break a data-driven analytics journey.

Companies that want to work in a more data-driven way should consider these five things before embarking on their journey. Whether it’d be marketing, hr, finance, or sales… The foundation has to be solid. To measure is to know; hence not knowing exactly what you are measuring doesn’t propel a company forward on its journey, au contraire.

Imagine a company that wants to identify so-called high potentials. What it means to be a high-potential could be drastically different in Europe as opposed to Asia or America. That’s why an unambiguous, shared language is required, so definitions are clear.

Ideally, a baseline is established. Without one deciding if trends are positive or negative becomes more of a guessing game. Also, data should be measured continuously. A one-off measurement can never represent the context and nuance that it needs.

If a company can only rely on analysts to reveal insights, there is a chance a lot of other valuable insights remain uncovered. The data should be accessible to the right people and presented in a comprehensible format.

Apples and apples or apples and oranges? Without the ability to compare, the data remains isolated. Comparisons in time or benchmarking with industry standards help with orienting where the company is.

Garbage in, garbage out. The adage doesn’t surprise anyone. Yet, dubious data input happens relatively often in analytics journies. These five pillars revolve around laying the right foundations, and quality is an absolute must.

Those five pillars once again; shared language, baseline & continuous measurement, comparing, and quality.

why not two

Companies hire people to do one job. Why not two? Or Three?

I’m not saying people should perform in two or three jobs simultaneously. I’m saying that companies should visualize a trajectory that features progression and evolution between different (internal) jobs.

Doing so requires insight into learning paths. Regarding both hard – and soft skills.

Definitely worthwhile looking into. The degree to which companies can convince people to choose for them as an employer correlates heavily with the degree to which companies can provide a career perspective.

ruin your brand

Bad news travels far swiftly. Almost three-quarters (72%) of job seekers say they share negative experiences with companies where they apply online.

Offering a bad experience to potential candidates is, by and large a surefire way to drive your employer brand into the ground.

What’s worse, some initiatives are so simple to implement. So simple, in fact, that it’d be a shame not to do it.

React. A simple message to acknowledge that the candidacy has been received successfully goes a long way. If at all possible, including the typical response time in that message makes a huge difference.

Image ordering online, checking out without any indication whatsoever regarding delivery. How many customers would purchase again with that same company, or leave an enthusiastic review?

one rule

There is one crucial rule Elon Musk forgot about or deliberately chose to disregard.

Recently, some news outlets reported that Musk told Twitter employees they should expect 80-hour workweeks, no more free food, and some other arguably hostile announcements.

Whether it’s personal – or professional relationships, seduction generally works better than coercion.

Maybe, by exemplary leadership alongside creating a culture so good, that people don’t mind working double shifts, employees would automatically choose to go the extra mile.

Maybe, similar to the trend we’re seeing in Silicon Valley at the moment, it’s a (rather harsh) way of letting people go. Threatening them with a bad time could cause employees to pack up and go.

invisible

The notorious double q, “quiet quitting,” isn’t a new phenomenon. What has, however, changed drastically recently is its visibility.

Almost three centuries ago, workers on assembly lines would have people hovering over them while the latter watched the workers and their productivity levels.

Today, Corona has accelerated and increased working-from-home initiatives. Making employees’ productivity, or lack thereof, much less visible.

At the risk of introducing a communistic undertone, Lenin once said, “Trust, but verify.” Without proper initiatives to check in with employees, the risk of them sliding into quiet quitting mode is substantial.

Those initiatives should be tailor-made and personalized. Small talk just won’t cut it. Apply a (scientifically sound) model to measure employee engagement to get ahead of the dreaded double q.