Frank Mercado, Director of Business Development at the Center for Energy Sustainability & Economics, explains in his article Advancing the Discourse on Talent Engagement how engagement is a key factor that brings the organisation to the ‘next level’.  He argues that “For over 30 years now, powerful executives, pundits and practitioners have been digging for the ‘elixir' of workforce engagement. Simply because engaged employees perform better: perhaps by working harder, longer and/or smarter”.   Further into the article, he then defines engagement as “the soul of the company which 'excites' and 'energizes' people to work. It's all about meaningful work, not the career glamour. It's the mission that drives bottom line results.”

It is evident, then, that employee engagement is key to the organisation.  Disengaged employees will find the job tedious, and will battle every day with even the simple task of going to work, much less working while there.  This in turn will bring a downward spiral in their productivity, the meeting of objectives and their time as productive employees, that will end up with the employee leaving the organisation or becoming a liability.  According to Mercado, “just 30 percent of American workers are engaged at work costing companies $450 billion to $550 billion per year in lost productivity. (That includes the price of absenteeism, workplace accidents and increased health care costs.)”

To avoid the inevitable consequences of lack of engagement, organisations have invested millions over the years in different ways to help minimise or eliminate them.  In the past decade, training and development has become a key factor to determine whether employees stay in or leave their current job.  According to a study conducted by the Dale Carnegie Training Center, 40% of employees leave the job within the year due to poor training.  Furthermore, on previous article, The Real ROI of Learning and Development, we discuss the findings of Maia Josebachvili, explained in her article How to understand the ROI of investing in People, where she exposes the positive consequences of investing in proper people practices, such as an L&D programme in the organisation.  A solid L&D programme has proved to be a key element in motivating employees, which in turn brings up their levels of engagement, ensuring that their input and their time as productive employees in your organisation increases.  

Giving your employees the benefit of training and developing themselves within the organisation will ensure that they are engaged and motivated to do their job to the best of their ability.  By doing this, you’re making them loyal employees who will try to grow with the organisation as much as they possibly can.  Thus, they will constantly be on the lookout for new ways of improving their skills and acquire new ones at every given opportunity.  Furthermore, because your employees are constantly learning new skills and perfecting the ones they already have, they will also find new and better ways to do their job, and to improve the different processes in the organisation.

‍The moral of the story is simple: poorly trained employees will result in a lack of productivity, high employee churn and additional spending in hiring, recruiting and onboarding. This is why investing in learning will ensure that your employees are efficient, engaged and proactive.  

Find out exactly how this translates into better company culture, process and increased productivity within your organization in the following two articles. (coming soon)