Employee Engagement & Quality Control

I happened to visit a car manufacturing facility a few days ago. I walked through the floors of the assembly line passing by grumpy workers. I could almost see the following written on their faces “I hate this job and this company – but I need the money, and that is the one and only reason I am doing this.”

Accompanying me on this walk was the quality guru of the factory, and he was telling me about all their global quality certifications and the processes the company followed to ensure the cars rolling out of their assembly lines are of world class quality. When I glanced at one of the workers who was going about his work – mounting the tires on a car, I felt I heard the following “I am going to do as bad a job as I can afford to, without any risk to my job – so you better put in place quality controls and measures and whatever else is needed to cover the company”. If only they were thinking, “I am going to do the best job I can, knowing I can always rely on the tools available to me and the quality control measures the company has put in place to ensure any unintentional errors I make are identified and corrected before the car moves to the next stage in the assembly line.”

What would it take for the company to move from the existing scenario to the new scenario I had described? “Higher Employee Engagement” is the silver bullet – but unfortunately, that is not something available off-the-shelf. A great reward and recognition program encompasses “Day-to-Day” recognition, informal recognition and formal recognition programs. This could prove to be a very cost effective solution in driving up employee engagement levels, especially for a large workforce doing repetitive jobs.

Bollywood and Employee Recognition

There was an article in the Economic Times not too long ago about how training managers in Indian corporates were incorporating clips from Bollywood movies into their training programs to make the programs more engaging and enjoyable - Shah Rukh’s speech to the team in “Chak De India" as an example of motivational speeches, Aamir’s comments in “3 Idiots" on how professors need to teach, or the power of team work and the impact on the team of an individual moving in a different direction in “Lagaan."

I recollect a scene from Munnabhai MBBS – where Sanjay Dutt or Munnabhai talks about the power of “Pyaar Ki Jappi” (“Hug of Love”) and demonstrates its power by hugging an old worker (a floor cleaner) and thanking him for cleaning the hospital floor for the last 30 years or so. Relating this to the contents of the CRP (Certified Recognition Professional) course, I had recently taken, I wondered about the positive impact “Day-to-Day” recognition could have on an organization. This old worker is clearly at the bottom of the corporate pyramid at the hospital and can be replaced easily with another worker, but the work he does is quite valuable in the true business sense – which patient would choose to get treated in a hospital which can’t even manage to keep its floors clean. If the worker’s manager or better still, one of the senior doctors, chats with him for a few seconds while passing him, tells him the work he does is very valuable to and explains why, I bet the floor will be sparkling clean for the next few weeks at least.

Employee Recognition in India

Ask any professionally run company in India if they have an employee recognition program in place and the answer will be “YES.” Dig a little deeper and more often than not, you will find that most programs are managed in an ad-hoc manner with very little thought process that has gone into it. It gets even worse if you start asking questions about ROI (Return on Investment), Recognition Strategy and Management Commitment to the program.

I personally believe that “Employee Recognition” can be a very powerful tool in the arsenal of business leaders and HR professionals to drive up employee engagement, which in turn, as has been proven over and over again, drives better business performance & customer satisfaction.

To compare this philosophy with Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, employers typically do a great job in taking care of the employee’s PHYSIOLOGICAL NEEDS (Compensation & Benefits) – Level 1, and SAFETY NEEDS (work-place, medical facilities, housing etc.) – Level 2. The individual’s SOCIAL NEEDS – Level 3, are fulfilled by becoming a part of a group of colleagues at work or by their strong family set-up outside of work. Post this, the fourth and the fifth needs (ESTEEM and SELF-ACTUALIZATION), tend to be clubbed in a majority of organizations i.e. the same employees who are valued and recognized are the ones who are promoted and grow up the corporate ladder. So employees tend to stay at level 3 (SOCIAL needs fulfilled) or move 2 steps ahead (SELF-ACTUALIZED). Are companies missing a trick in the book by not having a larger pool of employees at level 4 (ESTEEM needs fulfilled)? Logically, shouldn’t there be a larger number of employees with fulfilled esteem needs than those who are self actualized? Won’t employees be happier and more engaged if their chances of moving up the hierarchy of needs are higher?

A robust employee recognition program that is directly linked to the company’s vision, mission & values, and has the commitment of management, can effectively move a larger number of employees to level 4 (ESTEEM) and motivate a larger number of employees at level 3 to work harder, given that they now have a more realistic chance of moving to level 4.

The topics I hope to cover in this blog will centre around this philosophy and belief in the art & science of employee recognition as it applies to organizations in India and the surrounding regions. I will look forward to your participation.

Global Recognition

In the last 12 years, I have had the luxury of working in, and traveling to multiple countries, helping companies establish and manage their operations outside of their base locations. In this blog, I hope to share my practical insights in the area of Employee Recognition & Rewards, as it applies to various countries globally, starting with India – my current location. I have also initiated my research on identifying & documenting recognition practices in different countries in the field of Rewards & Recognition and hope to share my learnings as I go along.