A recent Gallup survey reported that less than one-third of U.S. employees are “actively and genuinely engaged” in their jobs, while 17% are “actively disengaged.” That means over 50% are simply going through the motions of their jobs, flying under the radar trying not to get noticed.
As front-line managers, it’s up to us to create and maintain the relationships that stimulate employee engagement, while reducing physical and psychological turnover. The worst employee is the one who quits mentally, but stays in your employ and has no inclination to leave.
Therefore, one of the primary goals of all training programs should be to not only generate enthusiasm and staff involvement—and ignite commitment—but also impart the needed knowledge and skills required for the specific duties of particular job responsibilities. Making sure that our training programs include components for these critical motivational purposes will prove to be important factors in how successfully we can improve employee retention and service consistency, create customer loyalty, and drive business results.
Ready for the Call
This becomes especially critical in industries like hospitality, where there has always been a traditional emphasis on promoting from within. If you’re going to first look to fill positions by advancing people who are already on your staff, you certainly want to have confidence that those who are sitting “on the bench” waiting for their chance are eager and motivated, not disgruntled and disengaged. If we have people on board who are not only not ready, but also not willing (or even just one of the two), we are setting them up to fail. As one of my favorite sayings holds, “You can’t send a Duck to Eagle School.” And if our training programs fail to recognize this, we will be forever trying to fit square pegs into round holes.
A friend and colleague of mine and I recently had a conversation about this very subject. He accepted the position of General Manager at a very fine city club in Florida. Prior to his appointment, the member-owned club’s Board of Directors had to terminate the previous General Manager, who had been promoted from within, simply because he was not capable of fulfilling the responsibilities of this role.
To get the opportunity, this manager must have done a good job in his former position. But it sounds like this may have been another case of someone failing largely because they hadn’t been trained effectively for the next step in their career.
Yes, it could certainly have also been a case of the old “Peter Principle,” which held that many people will eventually be promoted beyond their competencies. Truth be told, though, I think that principle has largely gone by the wayside, especially in the hospitality industry.
In this day and age, we’ve become much better about identifying the people who “have what it takes” to move up in the managerial ranks, versus those who are also valuable contributors, but clearly have limits. But—and this is a big but—that doesn’t mean we have also become much better about making sure those people who “have it” will be properly prepared when we do move them up.
Firing Up the Floaters
Effective training programs can only occur when we have gained the trust, loyalty and commitment of our employees—and a big part of gaining this trust and commitment is making sure they don’t see, or know about, examples like the one at the Florida city club.
Our employees aren’t stupid. If they sense situations where someone is being set up to fail, or feel that training programs are largely self-serving and designed only for the organization to feel good about itself, they will understandably do all they can to settle in as part of that 50-plus percentage identified by the Gallup study: People who just try to keep their heads low, get through the day, and float through their careers.
If we are to energize and excite our employees and maximize the talents and strengths of our entire workforce, we must do more to align their own individual needs with our organization’s strategic plans. The first step to accomplishing this is to recognize that we shouldn’t “force feed” everyone into the same standard training programs. Rather, we should do more to shape and customize our training efforts around three key initiatives:
- identify special training needs for individuals or groups through “skills assessments” of our employees;
- focus on continuous employee development, rather than ramming everyone through upfront training and then assuming that will be enough to carry them through, no matter how long they stay with us or what roles they advance to;
- create an overall “learning culture” within the organization that requires more of a partnership with our employees.
Coaching ‘Em Up
In my experience (both as an employer/trainer and employee/trainee), a key to pursuing these initiatives is to shift from the Boss to the Coach mentality. As managers, we need to find ways to interact and identify with each individual employee in ways that give us better insights into their desires and aspirations. Through a conversational process, we need to probe into not only their strengths but their weaknesses, so we can help to coach them beyond where they may see themselves going.
This is a real transformational process that requires time and patience—but the results speak for themselves. We have to base our approaches as managers in the belief that if an employee has a learning attitude, desire, passion, and the willingness to commit to something greater than themselves, we can teach them to achieve levels of success they’ve never imagined.
This notion of unearthing and nurturing hidden abilities, as a coach or talent scout would do, is especially apt in the hospitality industry. In fact, I have always believed that we are entertainers in this business, and that our workplace is the stage. There is nothing more beautiful to me then to see a server on the dining room floor executing what they know how to do flawlessly (and instinctively) in the heat of the action on a busy night. It is like watching and listening to a ballet or symphony of the highest caliber.
But if our training programs don’t touch the inside of our employees individually, they will not change on the outside, and then instead only go through the motions. And when that happens, they will be depriving us (as managers), themselves (as employees) and most importantly and sadly, our members and guests (as customers) of their best performances.
Employees must also know, and believe, that they can benefit from whatever training we require of them. We must have strong recognition and benefit systems in place that reward growth and performance. In addition, we must continually reexamine the effectiveness of our current training programs, to monitor their success.
Group Dynamics
We must also not forget the importance of group training. At The Club at Longview, we recently developed a program we call our Employee Member Experience Team. Using an individual employee from every department of our club, this group learning experience is designed to identify and develop “Moment of Truth” opportunities that can define and enhance our members’ experiences, every time they come to the club.
We make sure that this group training program is interactive and engaging for the employees who participate in it, and it has led to significant contributions to our programs for members. We have also found that this type of training encourages a spirit of teambuilding that is critical to our organization’s success. Too many properties have a disconnect among their employee groups, because they just don’t have enough chances to get to know or work with each other. When you work out on the golf course, it is difficult to get to know the cook in the kitchen. But with this type of group training program, we are also building effective interrelationships among our various employee groups. It’s true: Working together works!
You should also encourage your employees to take full advantage of the amazing array of valuable free or low-cost training resources that are now available to them on the Internet or through local or national organizations. And, if your club or resort hasn’t yet considered “Webinars” (Web-based training programs), you’re missing out on an approach that can be very cost-effective for supervisors, as well as more time-efficient for entry-level management employees.
Rather than discourage or restrict computer use among your staff during “work hours,” in fact, you will find that one of the most productive aspects of your training regimen these days can be to encourage everyone to take a specified amount of time each day or week to research specific topics that you’ve assigned to them, and then report back to your group on what they’ve found. (And when you do this, don’t forget to encourage them to use clubandresortbusiness.com as one of their primary information resources!)
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