How many times have you heard one of so many rules of employee engagement quoted as set-in-stone fact? But why have some become so accepted, and how does it help us to question them?
“Employees will never agree to using a personal mobile device to view company information.”
How many times have you heard this statement played out around the senior table when discussing channels strategy or an internal communications plan? It’s a statement I’ve heard often enough, or at least similar declarations of certainty or truth around the rules of employee engagement. I may have even said it myself at some point (#notproud).
A few years back, there was a buzz about Malcolm Gladwell’s book – Outliers. The 10,000 hour rule lodged itself in our collective brain. I still see and hear people claiming this is what it takes to be an expert. Last week, I saw a post on LinkedIn claiming that you needed to commit 10,000 hours of time to writing LinkedIn updates to be an expert!
Of course, it’s all nonsense. The original research seized upon by Gladwell (a study titled The Role of Deliberate Practice in the Acquisition of Expert Performance K. Anders Ericsson, Ralf Th. Krampe, and Clemens Tesch-Romer) actually says nothing of the sort. In fact, study after study has found that the 10,000 hour rule popularized by Outliers is just bunk.
And, likewise, the 10,000 step rule, 5-a-day rule, 2 litres of water rule are actually not backed up by scientific evidence. They’re great ways to promote healthy living, but not really evidence based. They may be worthy, but they’re still wrong.
The rules of employee engagement
So, back to the rules of employee engagement and our execs discussing the use of personal mobile devices. Remember our (assumed) statement is that this isn’t the right way to share company information.
We recently helped a client conduct focus groups on channel and content preferences. The strongly held assumption was that employees would not be prepared to use personal devices to access company information.
When we asked the question to actual employees, the answer was a bit of an eye-opener. “Well, most of us spend our breaks staring at our phones, so that would be a great way to share information with us.”
In fact, over two-thirds of those asked were more than happy to consider using a personal device to access information provided by the company.
Now, we all know there is a difference between stated intent and actual behaviour, but it remains our responsibility to make sure any rules of employee engagement are based on real evidence, not just guesswork.
Taking the time to understand employee views and preferences and gathering data to test assumptions is a vital role we can play to support the senior table. It’s not always easy to be the disruptive voice, but good data and insight inevitably make that job a lot easier.
If you’d like help to find out what your people REALLY want, get in touch.
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