Employee Engagement is not Enough

Last week, I had the pleasure of speaking at a conference in Milan, Italy, organized by Lundquist, a  strategic communications consultancy, specializing in online corporate communications and the interface with CSR.  The conference was themed "New Frontiers of online corporate communications" with a focus on social media and employer branding. The conference was well attended by CSR and communications professionals, the creme de la creme of the communications world in Italy. The event was a stimulating gathering and many perspectives were shared and discussed. Othjer speakers included Andrew Thomas, publisher of Communicate Magazine, Caterina Rucci, Head of Employment at Bird And Bird Law Firm, Eric Sundstrom, editor in chief of Dagens Arena, a Swedish daily news service, as well as Joakim Lundquist, the mastermind behind the event, and James Osborne, Sara Rusconi and Cristiano Poian of the Lundquist team.

 

My piece was about, yes, you guessed it, CSR for HR, and I introduced the thought that, when it comes to CSR,
 

Employee Engagement is Not Enough! 

 

I thing we are in danger of diluting the "employee engagement" concept to one which is more passive than active. I am not sure who holds the definitive definition of employee engagement these days but generally it tends to refer to "a measurable degree of an employee's positive or negative emotional attachment to their job" on the assumption that emotional attachment will create the desired behaviors.

Kevin Kruse, who wrote a book on the subject offers his definition in a Forbes article:

 

"Definition: Employee engagement is the emotional commitment the employee has to the organization and its goals.

 

This emotional commitment means engaged employees actually care about their work and their company. They don’t work just for a paycheck, or just for the next promotion, but work on behalf of the organization’s goals. When employees care—when they are engaged—they use discretionary effort. This means the engaged computer programmer works overtime when needed, without being asked. This means the engaged retail clerk picks up the trash on the store floor, even if the boss isn’t watching. This means the TSA agent will pull a bag suspicious bag to be searched, even if it’s the last bag on their shift."

 

This is good because, in Kevin's definition, engagement leads to action.This is right. Employee engagement in CSR should be more than an emotional commitment, it needs to be proactive action. But I think that the more we talk about engagement, the more we may be focusing on emotional onboarding and less on practical action. We should stop measuring "engagement" and start measuring behaviours. If engagement is the driver, action is the output, and business improvement, employee empowerment and social and environmental benefits are the outcomes. More than understanding that employees are engaged, I would like to know how they act, and how they turn their engagement into real deliverables. Therefore, at the Lundquist conference in Milan, I talked about:

 

Employee Activation

Does the CSR-HR Partnership drive employees to action in support of a CSR-oriented business program? Are CSR and HR Managers putting in place the tools that invite, encourage and compel employees to ACT, rather than be emotionally engaged at some sort of philosophical level? Are measures in the business the responses to a survey where we ask employees about their views, or do we ask them about what they actually did to advance CSR? Are rewards processes in place to recognize action rather than engagement?  

 

I think its time for HR to wake up to CSR and for the CSR-HR partnership to work together to drive Employee Activation, and not just employee engagement. Semantics? Maybe. But our choice of words may just influence the way we behave.

 

And while we are on the subject, you may be interested in two upcoming events on CSR for HR:

 

A new webinar training series for CSR and HR Managers about "Making the CSR-HR Partnership work." In this initial 2-session series on March 13 and March 20, we will cover:

• The business case for advancing Sustainable Human Resources Management in your business, large or small.
• The key issues that form the CSR/HR agenda and ways of addressing these in different organizations.
• The employee engagement (activation!) aspects of CSR – what works, what doesn’t work and how to leverage engagement through CSR.
• The measurable business benefits of a CSR-HR approach –quantifying the financial benefit to the organization through implementing CSR-HR tools.
• The CSR for HR Roadmap and Scorecard - what you can (and should) do next, and in what order.

Check this link if you are interested in participating.

And if you are planning to be in the Barcelona area in June, you might want to register for this event on 11th June in Barcelona themed: "Boosting Employee Engagement in the Digital Era". I will be chairing this conference which will also include a case study from a great former colleague, Geoff McDonald, Global VP HR Marketing, Communications & Sustainability, Water at Unilever, on the role of HR in embedding sustainability in organizations.

 

Check this link if you would like to see the full programme





As you can see, my mission is about Activating the CSR-HR Partnership. Hopefully, more CSR and HR Managers will engage in activation too!

 

elaine cohen, CSR consultant, Sustainabilty Reporter, HR Professional, Author of CSR for HR: A necessary partnership for advancing responsible business practices.    Contact me via www.twitter.com/elainecohen  on Twitter or via my website www.b-yond.biz/en  Check out my new book! Sustainability Reporting for SMEs: Competitive Advantage through Transparency

7 Ways to get started with CSR for HR

It's always nice to be published in a language other than my own, even if I can't understand it :). Today, my article called 7 Ways To Get Started With CSR for HR was published in a newsletter called HRM Scope, which is published in Dutch for the Netherlands and Dutch-speaking Human Resources community.

It starts like this:

HR-beleid in 7 stappen duurzaam

Duurzaamheid is al lang geen hype meer en groeit wereldwijd gestaag uit tot standaardnorm, ook voor HR, zegt HR-auteur Elaine Cohen. 'Steeds meer organisaties kiezen ervoor de verantwoordelijkheid te nemen voor de gevolgen van hun handelen voor de samenleving, de planeet en volgende generaties. In die keuze voor duurzaamheid kan het HR-beleid een grote rol spelen,' zegt Elaine Cohen, auteur van het boek 'CSR for HR, A Necessary Partnership for Advancing Responsible Business Practices'. Read the full version here.

For all those of you for whom English is preferable, or even essential, here is the original article I submitted, as, despite being a polyglot, Dutch is not part of my repertoire.

7 Ways To Get Started With CSR for HR

All over the world, the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) movement has been mainstreaming as a business approach which goes beyond the letter of the law and accepts responsibility for impacts on stakeholders. Every business impacts on people, society and the environment through the way it employs people, serves customers, erects buildings, inhabits offices, uses transportation, manufactures products, develops new product ranges, launches marketing campaigns and more. In determining business strategy to generate growth and profit, CSR thinking demands consideration of society and environment alongside financial considerations. It has been proven that businesses who do this well deliver improved financial performance over time and contribute not only to the sustainability of the planet, but also to their own sustainability as businesses. CSR is changing the way companies develop strategy, take decisions, execute processes, engage with employees, consumers, external pressure groups and communities and respond to the diverse expectations of all these groups in this fast-moving, transparent age of business. It is demanding a different sort of contribution from the HR function.

The key partnership role of HR in this context is embedding a culture of CSR because the business performance is only as good as the decisions its people make and the way they perform. As the guardian of corporate culture, HR's role in embedding a CSR mindset in any business is critical.

I propose that the Human Resources function has a responsibility to be proactive in leading the establishment of a CSR-enabled culture within any business. This includes adapting recruitment and retention processes, training and development programmes, remuneration and reward programmes, new tools for employee engagement based on platforms of community involvement and more. HR Managers should lead processes to engage employees with sustainability strategy at each stage of their life-cycle and create employee ambassadors for responsible business. HR Managers should develop a CSR-mindset, whether or not there is a corporate CSR strategy which directs them to do so and whether or not their next career move depends on it. Why? Because CSR for HR is an imperative. It's a route to better business, more engaged employees, improved impacts on society and environment and ultimately a stronger, more influential and more effective HR Function.

The following are 7 examples of how HR can adapt its approach:

Create a culture built on a social mission: All companies have a social mission, even though they might not have articulated it. Walmart has "Save Money, Live Better" to indicate a business which improves people's quality of life; Nokia is "Connecting People" highlighting that access to mobile and digital technology is an important driver of social and economic development; Campbell's Soup has "Nourishing People's Lives", which indicates a much broader social contribution than making a profit on selling cans of soup. Employees today are looking for meaning in their work; they are less motivated by pay-checks alone. The HR Manager should ensure that each and every employee understands and identifies with the company's social mission, and leverage this to attract and engage employees in both an emotional and professional context. Indra Nooyi, CEO of Pepsico, said recently that the Pepsico's "Performance with Purpose" agenda is the single biggest recruiting tool they have at Pepsico.

Take a Stakeholder perspective: HR Managers all too often are inward looking and tend to work in the space between management on the one hand and employees on the other. However, by considering and engaging with all stakeholders, which include employees' families, local communities, environmental groups etc., HR can understand the broader implications of HR decisions on these stakeholders and adopt policies and processes which ensure maximum positive impact. This is good for the business as well as good for stakeholders.

Advance Diversity: At Intel, for example, diversity is a way of life. HR processes can be leveraged to create an inclusive culture where the entire workforce can contribute to greater innovation, improved customer relationships, reduced workplace conflict and enjoy higher motivation, productivity and workplace loyalty. This means designing HR processes which actively seek out candidates from diverse backgrounds, proactively training managers to hire with an inclusive mindset, purposefully creating a workplace which respects the needs of different employees, especially minority groups, and sensitively promoting diversity in internal communications.

Go Green: Reducing environmental impacts is one of the most serious business challenges of the day. Businesses can gain advantage only when the entire workforce is engaged. HR support for employee-driven Green Teams to enhance employee contribution to improved environmental impacts including lower electricity consumption, reduced use of paper for printing, recycling, waste reduction and more delivers benefits of reduced operating costs, improved environmental protection, and employees who derive satisfaction from becoming ambassadors for a more sustainable planet.

Care for employee well-being: Investment in employee well-being delivers big returns. In a program  implemented in Unilever, employee well-being programmes for managing stress, nutrition and exercise delivered a return of $6.59 on every $1.64 invested. HR policies which help employees to manage their own well-being deliver an ROI in reduced absenteeism, reduced health care costs, higher productivity and longer job tenure. If HR does not drive this, no one else in the business will.

Protect Human Rights: There are over 200 million children illegally employed in businesses around the world, over 12 million people in forced labour and millions of employees who do not enjoy the basic right to freedom of association. HR managers need to help identify the human rights risks in their operations and supply chains and ensure robust HR policies to uphold human rights. Creating a culture in which these issues can be openly addressed requires a new skill on the part of HR Managers. Doing it well protects and advances the business, employees, and communities.

Skills-based volunteering: Employee volunteering programs help build motivation, team-work, sense of belonging and help retain employees while making communities stronger. What most HR Managers do not realize is that volunteering is also a platform to provide unique skill-building opportunities which can be valuable in the workplace. GlaxoSmithKline's CEO Andrew Witty says that their "Pulse" volunteering program causes employees to "come back with a different world-view of a corporation and help change the company from the inside-out." Given that CSR is also about creating change, community volunteering programs can be a superb tool for HR Managers.

These 7 ways to get started with CSR from an HR perspective will help the HR Manager contribute to long-term sustainable growth and a sustainable planet. It is time for HR to rise to the challenge of preparing themselves and their organizations for a sustainable future.

elaine cohen, CSR consultant, Sustainabilty Reporter, HR Professional, Author of CSR for HR: A necessary partnership for advancing responsible business practices.Contact me via www.twitter.com/elainecohen on Twitter or via my website www.b-yond.biz/en

CSRI reviews CSR for HR

For those of you who don't know, CSRinternational.org (CSRI)  (Corporate Sustainability and Responsibility) hub founded by Wayne Visser, whose new book, the Age of Responsibility is just hitting the shelves,  publishes monthly reviews of a wide range of CSR books. Occasionally, I also contribute reviews from my CSR books blog. I was delighted and flattered to have my book, CSR for HR: A necessary partnership for advancing responsible business practices included in the CSRI February Book Review digest. Registered (it's free) users can download  the monthly digests, and the February on in which the CSR for HR review is featured can be downloaded here.

The review was written by Matthew Maguire and goes like this:

"In CSR for HR: A Necessary Partnership for Advancing Responsible Business Practices, Elaine Cohen takes a ground-up approach to CSR that focuses on corporate engagement with individual employees. As Cohen says, “This book is both a wake-up call for the human resources (HR) profession and a tool-kit written to help members of that profession to act.” Cohen develops a concept she calls corporate social human resources (CSHR) that redirects traditional HR responsibilities such as organisational development, recruitment, training and compensation toward CSR goals and practices.

To build her case, Cohen tells the story of Sharon, a fictitious HR manager from a medium-sized firm, who, over the course of the book, transforms herself from a CSR novice to a powerful CSR advocate within her company. The narrative approach may be distracting for some readers, but it makes the material accessible for those new to CSR. The book is about more than what HR can (and must) do for CSR, however. It is also about how managers and employees learn about CSR and begin to change their behaviour, as well as the contribution that each employee makes toward a company's overall social and environmental impact. Unlike many CSR books out there, CSR for HR is not preaching to the choir. It is intended primarily for HR managers who may have heard of CSR but don't really know what it means in practice, or how it relates to the job they currently have. Elaine Cohen, currently co-founder and managing consultant of Beyond Business Ltd., has more than 25 years of experience in executive positions at various global companies, including 8 years as an HR executive at Unilever. As a result, she offers a unique insider-perspective that breaks CSR down into real terms.

Through her narrative, Cohen shows HR managers how to engage employees, develop corporate culture, and communicate progress through CSR reporting. The story is informative as well as inspiring. As Cohen tells us, “Sharon realizes she doesn't need to sit around and wait for her CEO or executive team to develop a comprehensive CSR strategy for the HR function.” HR managers interact with employees (a key stakeholder group) in innumerable ways. CSR strategy can come from the top down, but for it to really stick, the employees need to be ready for it. Cohen's book gives HR managers the information and confidence needed to open their companies up to the opportunities that can come from CSR. "

Thank you to CSRI and to Matthew Maguire for a great review !! It is time for HR to wake up to CSR!

elaine cohen, CSR consultant, Sustainabilty Reporter, HR Professional, Author of CSR for HR: A necessary partnership for advancing responsible business practices. Contact me via www.twitter.com/elainecohen  on Twitter or via my website www.b-yond.biz/en

8 things that work in embedding a CSR culture

This week saw the release of an interesting report on the subject of Embedding Sustainability in Organizational Culture  by the Network for Business Sustainability. As anyone who has read CSR for HR knows, haha, CSR without embedding is like Chunky without Monkey. Yet embedding culture is no small feat and very few companies actually reach the point where it becomes a self-perpetuating feature of the way they do business, despite the fact that more and more CEO's are confirming that sustanability is the only way forward. The folks at NBS couldn't sit back and let this embedding thing get lost behind a wall of good intentions so they commissioned the most comprehensive research done to date on this topic, spanning 179 different studies and over 15 years of research.

The report itself is an academic study of  the embedding of sustainability initiatives and their outcomes based on review of a wide range of research papers. Each separate initiative is classified into its own unique place on a comprehensive framework moving through fostering commitment to clarifying expectations to instilling the capacity for change and building the momentum for change, defining a culture of sustainability as one in which "organizational members hold shared assumptions and beliefs about the importance of balancing economic efficiency, social equity and environmental accountability". The report classifies all the examples of initiatives supporting an embedded culture of sustainability into three classes: those which someone proposed but which have never actually been put into practice, those which have some practical backing as they have been shown to work as part of a broader intiative, and those which are supported by empirical evidence in research.

Unfortunately, most busy HR professionals will not want to crawl through 73 pages of academic analysis,and  the report does not include a handy summary list of all the things that work. So, I did the homework for you :)

Support - make it easier for employees to make choices that favour sustainability. Examples given include providing corporate vans for ride-sharing, or ensuring management support for employees' sustainability activities

Model - enact the roles and behaviours organizational leadership wishes employees to emulate. Well, we all know how important it is to talk and walk the talk, right ? The opposite is also true, according to this report, for example, when a CEO denounced green iniatives at a Christmas party as nonsense, it dampened the greening efforts being undertaken. That was back in 2002. Wonder if he is now a green CEO or an ex-CEO ? 

Allocate - back up the commitment to sustainability with an allocation of time, money, and people. Ah yes, budgets. That's where things always seem to stick.

Create roles - expand existing roles or develop new roles within the organization to capture essential sustainability responsibilities. Hired your Chief Sustainability Officer yet ?

Train - training employees in systems or procedures related to sustainability. Actually, it suprises me that I don't see sustainability as a core element of management training in most companies. I think it's a subject that is important enough to every single role in the organization that it should be as commonplace as safety or quality training.

Frame - construct and present a fact or an issue from a sustainability perspective. Talk about sustainability as quality, or as safety, or as a financial return to the business, or simply as "the right thing to do". Deliver sustainability messages in clear language. That's what the NBS report says. Oh, and I say, hold off on the jargon and the acronyms. IMHO.

Champion - champion  individuals who defend a cause or a course of action supporting sustainability. Internal champions, the evidence shows, seem to be more effective than external. Yep, I'll buy that. Even though I am a consultant.

Experiment - encourage employees to try new things or develop their own solutions. Agree. It's amazing what people come up with when you let go of the leash for a while. This is especially important in fostering a culture of innovation, the sister of sustainability.

All the above, however, are the tip of the iceberg of what you can find in this review. It includes many more interesting aspects of embedding sustainability and  is peppered with specific examples from different companies. In many cases, even if there  no specific proof that the intiatives mentioned actually work, many intuitively sound right. In any event, the range of initiatives covered are surely a great source of ideas and can serve to spark some creativity in your own attempts to develop a sustainability-enabled culture.

My advice:

Take a look and use this review as a reference guide as often as you need it.

Alongside CSR for HR, of course.  

 

elaine cohen, CSR consultant, Sustainabilty Reporter, HR Professional, Author of CSR for HR: A necessary partnership for advancing responsible business practices.  Contact me via www.twitter.com/elainecohen  on Twitter or via my website www.b-yond.biz/en

Embedding Sustainability Practices in Organizational Culture

Excellent toolkit produced by the Network for Business Sustainability

Download PDF here

Uses Jay Galbraith's STAR Model and offers several best practice examples from diffrerent businesses.

elaine cohen, CSR consultant, Sustainabilty reporter, HR professional. Contact me via @elainecohen on Twitter or via my website www.b-yond.biz/en