Piloting the Employee Engagement Ship of the Business

Dr. Roderic "Rod" Hewlett is a sought after expert on leadership and business. With a focus on infusing businesses with the skills required to succeed in today’s global market, Rod brings tremendous leadership skills, effective communication and dynamic management concepts that have been widely accepted, across the globe. Rod’s wide breadth of experience includes executive level and global management roles, and he currently serves as Vice President of Planning and Product Development at Bellevue University.

"As HR professionals, we're given the opportunity to pilot the ship of our businesses, providing (at times) under-the-radar guidance and leadership to employees and management at every level," says Dr. Rod Hewlett. "Human resource professionals play a significant role in creating an empowered and engaged workforce that will drive business and successfully fulfill customer needs. Though this is not a foreign concept to most, I still hear of HR departments who fail to recognize the benefits of strong employee engagement. These departments remain stuck in the routine of performing the minimum requirements, such as basic recruitment instead of talent placement and development, or merely acting as a first-day point of contact rather than establishing an initial orientation and education program with ongoing follow-up. The problem is that this bare bones HR approach can be mistaken for a well-oiled machine, yet businesses can't quite put a finger on why they're experiencing communication gaps, employee turnover and resource misuse. Technically, these HR professionals aren't doing their jobs incorrectly. They're just not doing enough to set employees up for success.

"An organization can say that they're engaging their employees as much as they please, but employee motivation and satisfaction cannot be sustained with one quarterly empowerment workshop or a monthly group lunch. The rate at which employees are engaged and driven is relative to the daily environment that is provided for them. Creating a workspace that encourages a resilient work ethic and smart business choices will perpetuate a happy employee because the company will naturally experience a higher rate of success."

In this podcast, Dr. Rod Hewlett joins HRIQ to discuss the most important goals to consider when driving employee engagement as an HR professional.