Engaging your Employees
It may be a highly controversial suggestion to make, but Singapore’s workforce could be reaching a state of complacency. Things might have just become too good and easy, with our workforce losing the motivation it possessed when Singapore was a flourishing Tiger economy.
The image of Singaporean workers going through the motions of work, mired in disengagement, should be of concern as the workforce is silently losing its competitive edge. However, the local worker is too ‘busy’ running on his treadmill to recognize this dangerous undercurrent, suggests David Lock, a leading local consultant. This is hardly a happy picture. Happy employees are apt to be productive and creative. Intuitively, you can gauge a large proportion of workers in Singapore are not happy. But why? “This nation suffers from ‘economics of affluence’,” answers Lock. When you have material success, it is easy to lose your hunger and the ability to be happy.
Although Lock staunchly affirms that employees are responsible for their own attitude to work and life, Human Resource (HR) is the corporate platform for managing employees’ special talents. “For instance, when HR develops a job scope, it should only be seen as a guide.” What HR needs to do more is to analyze employees’ unique strengths and their “X” factor, and apply them to the organization’s needs. Fundamental to Lock’s philosophy is that an organization’s human capital is not a production resource. Employees have a much more latent potential. It is perhaps time to take more interest in job alignment with unique talents than with KPIs.
Furthermore, Lock believes that engagement is an emotion, not a skill or metric. “Management has to understand that disengagement has a lot to do with management styles and the culture of the organization.” For most cases, employees begin their jobs being engaged, but are gradually worn down with red tape, hierarchy, mismanagement or outdated practices. Lock suggests that it is time to look at employees holistically, and not fit them only to a job description. This leads only to severe underutilization.
Lock also promotes the inclusion of family life in the workplace, as well as the consideration of employees’ drives and motivations, in order to tap into their emotional energies. KPIs merely produce people that give you numbers. It is indeed gratifying that some companies, such as local SME, HSL Constructor, embrace holistic development and family involvement in its workers. However, examples like HSL are rare and it is vital for HR departments across Singapore to step in and spread the word.
Adapted from All too Easy...? HRM Issue 8.5, www.hrmsingapore.com

  Back to Organization/Back to Home