Employee experience is essential in today’s work environment. The way we experience work impacts our personal growth, our motivation and how we serve the world. Simply put, employee experience impacts everything!
It's more important than ever before to understand what motivates our workforce. How do they experience their work environment? What are their skills, opportunities and passions?
As their leader, how do you help people thrive?
It takes four leadership strategies to create an experience and environment where people can flourish. Let's talk about each one in detail.
1. Building Trust
Building trust requires vulnerability and courage as the leader. It takes vulnerability to share with others about a time you didn’t get it right and what you learned from it.
When we open up, it shows it's okay for our employees to open up to us. This is how we create trust.
Be transparent about your opportunities to grow and how you are working on them. Humility can go a long way in leading others.
Building trust also requires being genuinely curious about who we lead. What makes them excited? What would make them leave the company? Why do they stay? What part of their work is fulfilling? What frustrates them? How do they learn best?
When we dig deeper and ask questions, we will learn how to best support our people.
2. Listening
Listening is a simple concept but often difficult to master. Constant distractions can create an environment where it’s easy to “half-listen” as a leader.
We stare at the emails coming in on our computer or phone screens and mutter an “okay” or “yeah” when someone stops to talk to us. How are you eroding trust in this moment? Can you truly listen now or is there a better time to talk?
Address the situation and avoid distractions during those moments. Or plan another time to talk if you can’t give someone your undivided attention.
When your employees truly feel heard, they are more likely to approach you again in the future when they need your help. Listening builds equity in the relationship over time.
3. Modeling Growth: It Starts With the Leader
To help people flourish, we need to focus on our own growth as leaders, too.
Ask yourself these questions:
- Are you setting your own goals?
- Do you model personal growth and learning?
- Do you believe in why and who your company serves?
- What are you reading or learning about right now?
- How can you share those “nuggets” of knowledge with your people to help them?
- What is important to you?
- What are your priorities?
- Are you following through?
Our people need to see us living these values so they know what it looks like and they can model it.
4. Providing Clarity
For our employees to flourish, we need to be clear with them. As Brené Brown says, “Clear is kind. Unclear is unkind.”
Do you wait for a yearly performance review to let your employees know how they are doing and what they need to work on?
Clarity on the following things is important all year long:
- Are they meeting expectations?
- What is their blind spot?
- How are they using their strengths?
- How do you see them progressing?
- What work still needs to be done?
As the leader, are you clear on your own vision for the team and do you clearly communicate it? Clarity defines success.
Be clear with your employees about what success looks like and how you can help them grow. This requires providing honest feedback — feedback that may not be easy to give or for the receiver to hear.
This is the greatest gift you can give someone who truly wants to grow.
Final Thoughts
Helping people flourish is the greatest responsibility and gift as a leader.
The ultimate employee experience is one in which people feel supported to become a better version of themselves. This takes intentional and focused leadership that requires building trust, truly listening, modeling growth and providing clarity.
At RevLocal, we invest in our employees in a variety of ways to help them flourish! Digital marketing isn't always easy, but we work together by building trust, listening, providing clarity and leading them toward success. Learn more about our careers and culture here.
Don't forget to check out our previous leadership series blog here!