Does your organization have a high attrition rate?
Are you facing challenges with respect to leadership-team or manager-employee relationships?
Do you believe that people don’t leave organizations, they leave their immediate managers, leaders and decision-makers?
If yes, you’re not far afield! It is true that most employees leave organizations because of poor managerial relationships. A recent report published in the DDI's Frontline Leader Project focused on identifying the emotions, relationships and behavioural patterns of frontline managers.
The research is based on a survey that collected data from more than a thousand team leaders, managers, senior leaders, and individual contributors of various organizations. The published report points out experiences of anxiety, frustration, and rewarding moments for employees. "The research makes a clear case that we should stop using the term 'soft skills' to describe what are really critical leadership skills," said Stephanie Neal, director of DDI's Center for Analytics and Behavioural Research (CABER).
How managers think, articulate and express their emotions and how they make their teams feel are the strongest drivers and methods of talent retention. It is their personal conduct at workplace and their interactions with their teams that will determine the motivation level of their teams. This leadership research and findings give us insider information about how front-line leaders of an organization can support in bridging organizational gaps of loss of talent by being an emotionally intelligent leader.
Perhaps, by investing in your managers you can empower them to shift from being mere bosses to TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERS, who have the intelligence to connect, engage and inspire!
The big question to ask here is – is it just bosses who create a toxic environment at workplace that compels employees to leave the organization? No, bosses are a subset or an entity of the organization. If talent retention is an organization-wide challenge, there is a possibility that your employees have to put up with a toxic culture on a routine basis. So, it’s not just the bosses but a cultural concern that must be addressed.
Why is employee retention important?
In today’s time, building a loyal, growth-driven and committed workforce is a vital factor for organizational success. Leaders who crack the code of building a positive and empowering work-culture, also crack the code to sustainable and exponential growth.
Success of the organization is dependent of individual contributors who are a part of bigger teams. When these teams work cohesively towards a common vision, goal and objective, success is guaranteed.
No wonder why large organizations are also focusing on re-vamping their work-culture that facilitates genuine leader-manager-team connection, not just on a transactional level, but also on a personal and emotional level.
What are the signs to look for in a low emotionally intelligent employee/ manager/ leader?
- They always feel the need to be ‘right’ and are unwilling to listen to others
- They are ignorant to other’s feelings and express themselves in harsh words
- They behave insensitively like passing remarks after a tragic event
- They are ‘blamers’ who are ready to shift responsibility when things don’t go right
- They express denial when given constructive feedback
- They have ‘emotional outbursts’ in times of stress
- They struggle with building long-term genuine relationships
- The have a tendency to focus on the problem, not the solution
Any organization that promotes a culture that is supportive, understanding and makes each employee feel valued is able to retain its talent. As Sir Richard Branson says, ‘Train people well enough so they can leave. Treat them well enough so they don’t want to.”
Which means that a positive company culture is the key to maximise your employee’s potential, and score well on the relatability scale (which is the extent/ measure of how employees understand, collaborate, respect and enjoy working with each other).
The important fact to notice here is that organizations with a high relatability scale are trusted by their clients to be more effective, efficient, understanding, collaboration, competent and credible. How you treat your employees is a reflection of the relationship you will share with your external stakeholders such as clients and vendors.
In simple terms, your team’s, your manager’s and your company’s ‘Emotional Intelligence’ is a key factor in driving a sustainable success. We may agree that the company culture building is a natural progression but to let it unfold itself is like gambling with your organization’s future.
Auraa Image Management & Consulting can help you build a strong, well-intended and positive work culture while you focus on achieving your business goals. We can do this by closely working with your teams, managers and leaders through our customised interventions. Our trainers and coaches are experts in empowering individuals and organizations by working on their emotional intelligence quotient.
We include several assessments, tools, exercises, role-plays, demos to ensure that each of our intervention is enhances awareness, are highly effective and easy to comprehend & practice to bring about a significant transformation.
Here are a few ways you can start being emotionally intelligent with:
1. Build your self-awareness
- Understand your emotions, feelings, triggers and motivating factors
- Identify your strengths and weaknesses
How to do this – The best way to begin your journey of self-awareness is by journaling your daily habits, situation and your reactions to them. In about 15 days, you will start to notice a pattern of your emotional expressions, triggers and motivators. This will help you understand yourself better, and give you clarity to develop a roadmap to regulate and manage your behaviour.
2. Build your social-awareness
- Understand and manage other’s emotions
- Be open to understand other’s perspectives
How to do this – Practice empathy, put yourself in other’s shoes and be willing and open to understand what they are feelings, why do they feel this way and how can you comfort/ support them. In business situations, if as a senior leader, you have to give a critical feedback to your team member, ensure that you manage their emotions, use kind words and be assertive. While giving a critical feedback, also ensure that you manage your tone, avoid blaming and focus on giving a roadmap for improvement and growth.
Your self-awareness and social-awareness is vital to build an emotionally intelligent workplace.
Give yourself a chance to build, co-create and work at a place whose culture you can be proud of.