Disengaged employees costing companies dearly

Many companies today are operating at one-third of their people potential because the remaining two-thirds of their employees are not engaged, says an internationally respected specialist in employee engagement and internal communication.

And according to Ken Milloy, President of Ken Milloy Management Consulting Inc. those disengaged employees are costing their companies dearly through lower productivity and profits and by chasing away potentially loyal customers.

“The collective capability of a company’s workforce is a source of competitive advantage – a unique characteristic of the business that cannot be copied,” he told human resources and corporate communications professionals at a recent workshop hosted by the International Association of Business Communicators, Barbados Chapter. “But that competitive advantage cannot be tapped unless employees are truly engaged.”

Milloy said engaged employees are those who feel a “heightened emotional connection” towards the organisation that influences them to exert greater discretionary effort.

“Discretionary effort is that extra effort that employees can give or withhold – it’s their choice,” he explained.

The Vancouver-based management consultant said engaged employees can be recognized by the passion that drives them to build and innovate and to find new and more effective ways to accomplish their roles.

“They will take less than half as many sick days off as the average employee, and they are 87% less likely to leave the company,” he added.

Milloy identified several “core drivers” of employee engagement, including how well managers “walk the talk”, how well employees understand how their work contributes to the company’s performance, and whether the company makes an effort to develop its employees’ skills.

But the most important of all, he stressed, is the nature of the relationship between employees and their managers and supervisors.

“If employees don’t have a strong relationship with managers who set clear expectations, knows them, trusts them and invests in them, they are less likely to perform or stay,” he said.

(An IABC Barbados Release)

Be Remarkable!

I copied this from Judette's Facebook. Why? - because only last weekend someone asked me about putting merchandise from my company PRMR Inc. in a bag of give-a-ways for a Jazz show.

Not being prepared I insisted that there was nothing I had suitable to project my brand image at the show, and here it is I stumbled on Judette's Facebook post and she says it succinctly for me. Have a read.


By Judette Coward-Puglisi

I swear most marketers have no clue whatsoever what to do. So we do unoriginal things, or stall, or fail to deliver on our brand's promise.

Take this weekend for instance, master designer Claudia Pegus launched her resort collection," Breeze" at the picturesque Crews Inn. Pegus' line was stunning, what was in the goodie bag was not.

I imagine that the designer's team asked the show's sponsors and corporate partners for stuff that could be placed into the bag and guess what they all did? Each (with the exception of one) gave the exact same thing: flyers, brochures, newsletter, all good stuff, sure, but nothing bold or remarkable.

The exception here was the Jamaican milliner whose stuffer included a stunning red and black pin that could be worn on a hat or dress. It was something tangible. Something that the fashion savvy crowd could use. It was cleverly branded.

Marketers need to give deeper thought to how they position their products in the context of each situation instead of rolling out the same things, the same collateral in the same way.

Truly brilliant positioning is hard to quantify or predict. Same is true with marketing.

Free Webinar to Help NGOs Strategy

I have been working for a number of non-profits recently and one thing is true of all of them - they are very budget conscious. Sometimes you find the program you are working on has to be self sufficient.

You may find yourself having to raise the funds to pay yourself. Despite the budget challenges, working with non-profits is always morally fulfilling.

Just got this email from PR Newswire and I thought I would share it for all of you who are working with non profits.

Register its free!


Great Marketing and PR Strategies on a Non-Profit Budget

Wednesday, November 19, 2008
10:00 AM Pacific, 11:00 AM Mountain, 12:00 PM Central, 1:00 PM Eastern
Duration: Approximately 45 minutes

You don't need to have deep pockets to execute a successful marketing or PR campaign, but you do need to have a great strategy. Even big businesses with huge marketing budgets will fail if they don't have effective strategies backing up their campaigns.

Join PR Newswire for a FREE webinar and find out how you can use your resources and creativity to come up with great communications strategies that will help you get results and leave you with money to spare in your marketing and PR budget.

Guest Presenter: Kelley Weir, American Humane Association

IABC Barbados Host Its First Panel Discussion

IABC Barbados is gathering momentum. Members are trickling in and the organisation will host its first event since its launch this September.

It will be a panel discussion on What Is PR's real function and Who should it report to. Yours truly is on the panel which also features Sara Odle of Cable and Wireless, Debra King of First Caribbean International Bank and Greg Hoyos of GHA DDB.

My take on the matter is that PR is a strategic function which informs organisations decision making process with regards to its relationships. It therefore must report to the most senior executive if it is to be effective. Of course a lot of organisations devalues or undervalues relationships as they cannot or refuse to see the correlation between the relationships they have with their various stakeholders and their success.

Not having a pr strategy is like having cancer. You go along oblivious thinking that everything is fine and then a serious crisis come along and your dead.

Come to the Panel Discussion and here more on this, or check out my paper on the topic later on this blog.