Promote your vision
Once you have made your hires and put them through their training paces, the job of engaging them is only beginning.
Employees need consistent communication from the levels above them in the organization. Middle managers need to interact with upper management, employees on the lower rungs need to be kept in the loop by their supervisors. Without that level of engagement, your culture will suffer, the trust factor between the management tiers of your company will begin to erode, and it could all end with your top performers seeking employment elsewhere.
For Warden, the concept of engagement boils down to one defining word: participation.
“Really, to make any kind of vision and leadership work, you have to allow participation in the process. If you don’t allow participation in the process, it’s hard for your people to get engaged,” he says.
Participation starts with giving employees a clear understanding of their role in the organization and how the jobs they perform on a daily basis help the organization realize its overall mission.
“They need to understand that their role in the process leads to the success of the organization,” Warden says. “If they’re not, you can talk all you want, but they won’t see a lot of the bigger picture. They’ll believe that they’re only the dishwasher or only in charge of the facility.”
If you give your employees and managers a concrete idea of how their piece fits the organizational puzzle, you can set the stage for meaningful dialogue throughout all levels of the organization. Employees will feel empowered to give feedback to management because they will, on some level, understand how management operates the business.
At The Rose Group, Warden and his team have taken the employee dialogue a step further, formalizing it by creating councils on which employees and managers from throughout the organization serve.
“We have a president’s council that is made up of people throughout the organization,” he says. “We discuss some very integral things that we do as a company, and the people who serve on the council bring some suggestions and ideas.
“As an example, we constructed a council that deals specifically with what goes on in the kitchens of our restaurants. They meet regularly and discuss better ways to do things. They came up with the idea of a kitchen certification program, which is a very rigorous evaluation program. We have a technology council, as well. And it’s all different levels of people, from hourly associates up to general managers.”
The people who serve on Warden’s councils become a sounding board for management, providing a ground-level perspective on new ideas and relaying input gleaned from interactions with customers.
“When your employees have input into that process, they feel engaged in the process and they become your advocates out in the field. Other people start passing their ideas along to them.”
