Leadership Tip of the Month:
Finding that key talent is just the beginning; retaining them is the hard part.  Keeping them challenged and motivated as well making them feel like that they are appreciated are critical components to engaging employees.

Employee Engagement is a hot topic as the shortage of high performing talent increases.  A May study from McKinsey & Co. found that by 2018, the U.S. will face a shortage of 1.5 million managers who can use data to shape business decisions. And the shortage gets even larger for non management employees, especially knowledge workers in the areas of healthcare, technology, and accounting.

Another study in June 2011 from Mercer, the global HR consulting firm, found that nearly  one third (32 percent) of American workers are considering leaving their organization, which is a 40 percent increase since 2005. So not only is there a shortage but there is also a higher risk of losing the talent you already have on your team.
So what should you be doing to nurture and increase employee engagement on your team? Here are a few tips to get you started:

1. Before hiring ask yourself “does the candidate fit culturally with the organization?” In other words, does the potential employee have the same set of values the company lives every day?  More often than not employees fail in the short term because they don’t “fit” the culture of the organization, not because they don’t have the skills.

Read more on the Executive Velocity website.

Author: Beth Armknecht Miller, President and Executive Coach, Executive Velocity Inc