How engaged are your employees?

Ian Dodds Consulting has contributed to a book on employee engagement. The Extra Mile - How to Engage Your People to Win (David Macleod & Chris Brady, FT Prentice Hall) represents 4 years of research involving 33 million respondents. A key finding is that only 12% of employees are fully engaged. For all employers, this offers a huge performance improvement opportunity.

The book includes a contribution by Ian Dodds about how to harness diversity to engage everyone to win.

IDC's research has repeatedly shown in the Americas, Asia and Europe that people from non-traditional backgrounds in organisations often feel disengaged because their managers are not managing inclusively. They are unskilled in, or unprepared to put the effort into finding out what are the unique qualities that each of their team members brings to the workplace. Consequently, they don't give each of them the help and support they need to apply their unique qualities to the betterment of their work and business problem solving. Nor do they adequately help them develop their talents to advance their careers.

As it states in the book: "businesses which have managers who are skilled in harnessing diversity by fostering an inclusive work environment are likely to enjoy a competitive advantage through their ability to recruit and retain a diverse range of talent and the profitability this adds from more effective and innovative business problem solving and development."

This is an area that IDC has exceptional experience in and we are currently helping a global client develop its managers 'to harness deference' to obtain the business dividend this offers. This involves 10 teams of consultants and actor/facilitators working with managers and staff in the client's offices across Africa, Asia and the Americas.

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