Dialing It In

In our industry, it is easy to get excited about the future of IP communications and technological innovation. The IP community is healthy and growing faster than most businesses. It is easy as owners and managers to get caught up in the challenges and opportunities, thereby overlooking addressable personnel issues. As we have grown sales and marketing at Broadvox, I find that I have not asked my team’s opinion of their jobs, my performance or the company in general for over a year. The last time we engaged in such an activity, we did it as a group as I wanted an open and “safe" discussion. Most liked the approach but some wanted the anonymity of a survey. Our current size and dispersal across the country make it very difficult to have a face-to-face discussion and I find it is difficult to get people engaged using an audio conference bridge. As I researched various tools I found one developed by Gallup in the late '70s that is considered good for measuring employee engagement.

Gallup developed 12 questions to ask employees to determine if they were properly engaged with the company. Determining the level of engagement for your organization is critical, according to Gallup.

“In world-class organizations, the ratio of engaged to actively disengaged employees is 9.57:1. In average organizations, the ratio of engaged to actively disengaged employees is 1.83:1 ... . Beyond the significant differences engaged workgroups show in productivity, profitability, safety incidents, and absenteeism versus disengaged workgroups, we have proven that engaged organizations have 3.9 times the earnings per share (EPS) growth rate compared to organizations with lower engagement in their same industry."

Here are the 12 Questions:

1. Do you know what is expected of you at work?
2. Do you have the materials and equipment to do your work right?
3. At work, do you have the opportunity to do what you do best every day?
4. In the last seven days, have you received recognition or praise for doing good work?
5. Does your supervisor, or someone at work, seem to care about you as a person?
6. Is there someone at work who encourages your development?
7. At work, do your opinions seem to count?
8. Does the mission/purpose of your company make you feel your job is important?
9. Are your associates (fellow employees) committed to doing quality work?
10. Do you have a best friend at work?
11. In the last six months, has someone at work talked to you about your progress?
12. In the last year, have you had opportunities to learn and grow?

Obviously, Gallup offers a service around these questions and the manner for analyzing the results of the questionnaire is proprietary. My purpose today is to remind you of an obligation to continuously measure and improve your workforce and company. Whether you choose to use the questions or services of Gallup is up to you. Just be motivated to do something. Building a top-notch organization requires an ongoing effort and an understanding of the positives and negatives, with the goal being to increase the positives and reduce the negatives.

Engaged employees never dial it in.

See you on Monday. I am thinking of baking this weekend.

David Byrd is vice president of marketing and sales for Broadvox , and is responsible for marketing and channel sales programs to SMBs, enterprises and carriers as well as defining the product offering. Prior to joining Broadvox, David was the vice president of Channels and Alliances for Eftia and Telcordia. As director of eBusiness Development with i2 Technologies, he developed major partnerships with many of the leaders in Internet eCommerce and supply chain management. As CEO of Planet Hollywood Online he was a pioneer in using early Internet technologies to build a branded entertainment and eCommerce website company partnered with Planet Hollywood. Having over 20 years of telecom sales and marketing experience, he has held executive positions with Hewlett-Packard, Sprint and Ericsson.