How to Measure Employee Engagement With a Stay Interview

Here is an article written by Frank Kalman for Talent Management magazine. To check out all the resources and sign up for a free subscription to the TM and/or Chief Learning Officer magazines published by MedfiaTec, please click here.

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Stay interviews are essentially informal conversations between managers and their direct reports — not to mention one of the most valuable measures of employee engagement out there.

When it comes to measuring employee engagement, there’s an oft-overlooked method — one that isn’t traditionally woven into the formal HR process — that some engagement specialists say might be the most effective of all: the stay interview.

Unlike the exit interview, where HR managers gain insights into employee sentiment just before they walk out the door, and the performance review, where managers assess employees’ performance for the year, the stay interview asks the question most managers yearn to ask their top talent: What could we do to make you stay?

“The ultimate goal of the stay interview is to stay in someone’s head and make sure we retain them,” said Kevin Kruse, author of WE: How to Increase Performance and Profits Through Full Engagement.

The stay interview is perhaps a manager’s most honest grip on engagement, according to Kruse. It’s a one-on-one meeting with a front-line manager and a direct report to gain insight on that employee’s perspective on the organization’s key engagement drivers, and to learn which of those drivers need fixing to retain top talent.

Kruse said stay interviews work best when they happen at least once or twice a year.

The stay interview is also not typically owned by the HR manager. If a manager feels that his or her relationship with an employee is particularly trustworthy, the stay interview might be more effective outside of the office — say at a coffee shop or over lunch, Kruse said.

A successful stay interview, however, isn’t as simple as just asking the question: “What could we do to make you stay?” HR managers need to train leaders to ask questions that help drive understanding on employee feelings about the key areas of engagement — company culture, communication, growth and recognition.

“It’s less about, ‘Are you going to leave?’ and more about, ‘How are you feeling about the things that would make them [want to] jump on Monster.com,’” Kruse said.

Managers should exercise caution in how stay interview questions are framed. For example, when asking employees about their feelings about communication, it would be best to refrain from asking blunt questions such as: “Do you think communication is going well here?”

Instead, managers can engage employees in a more open approach: “Is there enough two-way communication going on at [insert company name here]?” Kruse said.

It’s also important for managers to separate the stay interview from discussions about employee performance, said Dick Finnegan, the author of The Power of Stay Interviews for Engagement and Retention and the CEO of C-Suite Analytics, an engagement and retention firm.

“It’s [a meeting] about how is the job working from your perspective [the employee] and not my perspective as a manager,” Finnegan said.

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To read the complete article, please click here.

Frank Kalman is an associate editor of Talent Management magazine. He can be reached at fkalman@talentmgt.com.

Can the Exit Interview Be An Engagement Tool?

Here is an excerpt from an article written by Frank Kalman for Talent Management magazine. To check out all the resources and sign up for a free subscription to the TM and/or Chief Learning Officer magazines published by MedfiaTec, please click here.

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Using exit interviews to measure employee engagement may not be the norm, but there are times it can help gauge employee sentiments.

Organizations employ a variety of methods to measure and track employee engagement, but probably none as surprising as this: In a recent survey by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) and Globoforce, an employee-recognition-services firm, 65 percent of firms reported using exit interviews as one of the ways they measure engagement.

“It’s like closing the barn after the horse is already out,” said Kevin Kruse, author of We: How to Increase Performance and Profits Through Full Engagement, in reaction to the finding.

“It’s after the fact, and engagement is something that happens when they’re employed,” added Jim Harter, chief scientist of workplace management and well-being at performance management firm Gallup.

Even Derek Irvine, vice president of client strategy and consulting with Globoforce, was taken aback by exit interviews’ prominence as part of the engagement measurement process.

The bottom line, all three said, is that the exit interview is not the best place to have a comprehensive engagement conversation with an employee. Some even questioned the validity of an exit interview altogether.

Yet the three did agree, after some thought, that if an exit interview is going to be used to track engagement, there are some instances where the data could be used to help firms add value.

Harter said the exit interview might become a principal engagement measurement tool if a firm is experiencing a rash of employee defections. “If you’re bleeding, you’ve got to get the stitches out and fix it if you’ve got a deep cut,” he said.

In this case, the exit interview becomes especially important, since HR managers need to figure out what to change in the short term to boost retention and get a gauge on engagement.

“Maybe they’ve lost some of their best performers,” Harter said. “[The exit interview] is more of a short-term fix from my perspective: ‘Let’s understand what we need to do differently right now.’”

Exit interviews can also bring forth surprising candor on engagement-related subjects from departing employees, Kruse said.

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To read the complete article, please click here.

Frank Kalman is an associate editor of Talent Management magazine. He can be reached at fkalman@talentmgt.com.

Engagement: “Soft Stuff With Hard Results”

Mike Prokopeak

Here is an article written by Mike Prokopeak for Talent Management magazine’s “Talent Management Perspectives” series. To check out all the resources and sign up for a free subscription to the Talent Management and Chief Learning Officer magazines published by MedfiaTec, please click here.

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Work-life balance is a myth. Even if employers develop job-sharing options or flexible work schedules and workers place strict boundaries around their jobs, work will find a way home with them, argue the authors of a new book on employee engagement.

“You can’t box up the emotions from work,” said Kevin Kruse, co-author with Kenexa CEO Rudy Karsan of We: How to Increase Performance and Profits Through Full Engagement. “That’s still going to spill over into the home domain.”

The idea that the answer is to simply structure work differently to create balance is inadequate, Kruse said; instead, managers should focus on developing deeper employee engagement. Engaged employees are healthier, more productive and contribute to higher profits and performance. It’s different from job satisfaction in that way.

“You can be satisfied at work but still not be fully engaged,” Kruse said. “If you’re satisfied, you might not give that 100 percent effort; you might return that headhunter’s call.”

Companies that pursue that elusive work-life balance may be headed down the wrong path. Instead, they should focus on effective day-to-day management that connects on a personal level with employees.

“When you realize the impact that you have as a leader, it’s very dramatic,” Kruse said. “From [workers'] cardiovascular health to the quality of their marriage to the behavior patterns of their children, you have an impact even though you’re not a doctor; you’re not a marriage counselor; you’re not an elementary school teacher.”

Effectively engaging employees goes beyond conducting annual surveys, holding annual recognition meetings and structuring job roles differently. It requires practicing great leadership every day. That’s where many engagement efforts fall flat. Despite the best intentions, many leaders and managers fail to see the big picture.

“We look at the to-do list and the reports that need to be taken care of and the fires that need to be put out, and most of us default to managing tasks instead of leading people,” Kruse said.

Kruse said there are three ways to build engagement:

• Growth: Provide learning and career development opportunities.
• Recognition: Show appreciation for the work being done.
• Trust: Build a shared vision for the future.

When business is growing, engagement often takes care of itself without specific leadership activities to foster it. Employees will see growth opportunities ahead and receive recognition through increased pay. It’s a different story when the economy is sluggish.

“In this environment, you activate this growth mechanism by personal growth,” Kruse said. “You want to make sure that you’re having honest conversations with your team members about their expectations for advancement and growth and be realistic and honest with them about whether or not that matches up with the reality of the company or not.”

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Mike Prokopeak is editorial director for Talent Management magazine.