Top Employee Engagement Myths

Myth #1: Engagement is something you can buy

A good pay or salary increase will have a short-term impact on employee engagement. After an increase in salary, for sure, an employee will feel energized and happy. But, only for a short period of time.

The truth is, you can't buy engagement. Remember that most of the employees want to find meaning and connection with their job as well as to the people they work with. If you are seeking for an encouraging environment using purely monetary means, you are doing it wrong as you only attract employees who are after for big pay.

On the other hand, aside from salary, you may also look into improving your overall packages such as employee rewards and recognition programs that aim to foster teamwork, excellence and engaging environment.

As a leader or an HR manager, you have to attract talents who will believe in what your company does and will take their job with passion and commitment. Like you, it will be dreadful for them to go to work every day and just earn for a living while not having that deep connection with what they do.

Myth #2: Top performers are the most engaged

Good job performance can be a factor for engagement but still, these two are not the same concept. An employee can be a good worker with excellent output but still not engaged. This is the sad reality, if your employee is a high performer, chances are he/she has high employment mobility. Meaning, top performers have more chances of seeking opportunities outside of your company.

Don't measure engagement by simply measuring your team's excellent outcomes. Excellent jobs may simply a mere reflection of their skill, natural talent, and experience. Here several behaviors you can consider if you want to truly know if your employees are engaged:

1. They refer their friends or any of their networks to join your company.
2. Your employees are performing beyond their job description.
3. They strive and think of ways to better their teams or even the entire company.

Myth #3: Disengaged employees are in the wrong job

When you hire an individual, you expect them to perform well but if their performance is poor, you may think that you placed that individual in the wrong job. This is a possibility of course but you have to also consider that there are other several reasons behind that poor performance. Before you make your final decision if you want to throw them under the bus, try to ponder on the following:

1. Do they have the right support from you and your team to do a good job?
2. Have you given the right tools and resources to bring a better outcome?
3. Are the expectations from them are clear enough?
4. Are your expectations fair enough or at least doable?

Let's deep dive on one of these factors. Are your expectations fair enough? For example, when you hire a marketing or a sales manager and expect him to skyrocket your overall revenue within a month without basing expected revenue on historical data, do you think that's fair enough? The truth is, you have to set fair and doable expectations as a leader.

When your employee performs well, it is 2-way. It is because you provided the right support, tools, and expectations for them. When you successfully identify what is lacking, a poor performer can change things for the better. You may find they’re the best person for the job. Who knows? Maybe that poor performer will turn into a unicorn employee.

Do you have any other myths in mind about common employee engagement myths? Share your thoughts and let's debunk it together!