When you look at the world around, there are so many things that take place daily – be it discoveries, progressive technologies, natural disasters or merely an activity that can have a negative or positive impact in our lives. I can certainly relate to it. I recently left my phone behind in a taxi I took a ride in. Luckily, because it uses a tracking mechanism that has details of the trip, the driver and what not, I was able to connect with him to get my phone back (phew!). Progressive technologies have helped us take 10 steps ahead and made our lives easier because we are able to voice out our feelings (opinions/problems/solutions) instantly. In the good old days, do you recall the times that you possibly watched a horrific (or terrific) news segment and felt something about it? Sadly, this perception or feeling you had could only be shared with the people you hung out with, at that point in time. Now, times have changed and we have social media to witness a silver lining. With a digitally empowered world revolving around social media as one key aspect, it has changed the way we voice out how we feel individually or collectively. Obviously, it’s not as rosy as it seems. Like everything else, digitally empowered obviously has its pros and cons. But, if you consider the good that can come out of it, I think you’d be a pretty good state none the less. And, even if we aren’t we can always improve things along the way. Like everything else, digitally empowered obviously has its pros and cons. But, if you consider the good that can come out of it, I think you’d be a pretty good state none the less. And, even if we aren’t we can […]
The concept of understanding that employee engagement is the key to drive productivity, reduce employee turnover and boost innovation is arguably one of the critical challenges most organizations face today. A study conducted by MSW Research and Dale Carnegie Training explored key drivers of employee engagement out of which they found out that only 29% of employees are fully engaged while 26% employees remain disengaged. In addition, the study discovered that there are three key drivers that affect employee engagement amidst other factors. 1. Relationship with Supervisor/Manager: As you might be familiar with the statement, ‘People don’t leave jobs, they leave their managers’. And, it is indeed a true saying. Something I can relate to myself. People grow wiser as their working years roll by. The study revealed that a “caring” manager is one of the key elements that drive employee engagement. Employees want a manager who will nurture a good relationship, get to know them, care about their personal lives and support their health and well-being. If a manager can build strong relationships with employees, create the right foundation for dedicated team interaction and lead in a human-centric manner – it creates an engaging environment where employees feel special and can perform at the highest level possible. 2. Belief in Leadership Practice what you preach: Leaders set the tone and define goals for the organization. These behaviors and goals need to be clearly defined, realistic for employees to achieve and communicated throughout the organization. This will create a sense of shared sense of responsibility for the organization’s success. Value who work by you and work for you: If you cannot appreciate what your employees do for you, and value their work for the organization, it’s one of the biggest mistakes you can make as a leader. According to the […]
If you’re an event planner, an event organizer, a publisher, or simply a person handling an audience it is very important that you understand the importance of listening to what your audience has to say. Listening and understanding your audience’s voice lets you plan for the future. This could not only save you a lot of money but it will also help you cater to your audience in a much more optimized manner. The possibilities of growth are endless when you start caring for your audience. A happy, engaged, strong audience 😊 The more you listen to your audience, the more the audience would love to respond and keep engaging with your programs. This will in return reward you with a very powerful audience who is happy all the time. They do not have any problems to do with you or your program at all. A happy audience also easily translates to a higher revenue. We’ll leave that for now but will definitely be picking it up on this article. You get the opportunity to improve 🔺 Once you know how your audience is feeling and what their thought process is, you will be able to tweak things on your end in order to come up with better content or upgrades for your event in the future. The audience will know that their voice is being heard and would love to keep engaging with whatever it is that you come up with in the future. Everybody gets the chance to speak up 📢 The fact that everyone gets a chance to engage in a conversation is very powerful. When there is an additional layer on top of you and your audience where everyone gets the chance to collaborate and share their views especially in the case of a conference makes […]
Founder of the Virgin family of corporations, Sir Richard Branson has been quoted as saying, “The best way to take care of your customers is to take care of the employees who take care of your customers.” As per Branson happy employees will result in good customer service, this will help companies thrive in business. Employee retention and training is a key part of successful business. Low employee retention will result in loss of corporate memory, cost in training a new employee and reducing work efficiency. Training a new employee will cost three times as much as retaining an employee. That is why it is so important to understand the “Voice of the Employee” (VoE). VoE Program is? A VoE program is designed to increase employee engagement and identify the areas to improve. Also, this will help you identify root causes for existing issues that matter to your employees and possible solution for the problems. Collection of information like this makes it easier to increase employee engagement, develop better performance reward programs, identify areas to improve, reduce attrition and gage overall satisfaction of the employees. As per the latest studies, benefiting employees in their daily life is the key, which means that the employees care more about the benefits that they see on a daily basis and the employee voice is been heard over their size their paycheck. Benefits of a VoE Program? Higher retention rates Lower development cost Feeling appreciated Feeling understood Happy and engaged staff Higher employee morale and fewer complaints Higher ROI How to Start a Voice of the Employee System 1. Start at the Top The value of the employee engagement program should be understood by the CXO level, especially the chief people officer of the organization. This would be the primary step towards implementing a […]
This is a given. Having emotionally intelligent employees will help any organization dive into the great divide of providing a spectacular customer experience, at any given point in time. Are you aware that 90% of top performers in various businesses have ‘Emotional Intelligence’ in common? Their levels of self-awareness and self-management get them ahead and may even outrank their colleagues who have elevated levels of IQ – because IQ is simply not enough – when trying to satisfy your end customers. Now you must wonder what ‘Emotional Intelligence’ really is. It is simply the ability for an individual to recognize their own emotion alongside other people’s emotions, distinguish between different feelings and label them correctly, use emotional information to guide their thinking and behavior, and manage and/or adjust emotions to adapt to environments or achieve their goals. In the business world, high EQ levels in leaders will certainly foster stronger emotional connections with employees. But, do keep in mind that it’s also important to encourage your employees to utilize an EQ approach in their day-to-day responsibilities, especially, in terms of nurturing meaningful customer experiences to increase brand loyalty and to increase your customer base – because you can never get enough of an increasing, loyal army of followers. Emotional Intelligence is for Everyone EQ is for everyone – starting from your front-line managers to your front-line executives. There is no difference there. If you look at your front-line customer executives, they have to deal with various customers who are indifferent, hostile and simply difficult and it can be a nightmare for them. And its obvious that situations of this nature can wear out these executives down, reduce a positive attitude towards their work and result in low levels of employee engagement. You wouldn’t want that, now would you? When you provide a […]
Emojis are now keywords! Social media giant Twitter recently announced a new way for advertisers to target users. Companies will now be able to target ad campaigns based on people’s emoji usage. How do you feel about Twitter adding emojis to their tweeting platform? You might be asking why this matters. Picture this tweet: Or this one: With over 110 billion (you heard us right, billion) emojis tweeted since 2014, emoji rich tweets like these are a common sight. Traditional targeting isn’t very effective here. A phrase like “so ready for” wouldn’t attract much, and what it did target would be vague and inaccurate. Emoji keywords allow marketers to narrow in on their audience’s sentiments and wants. Now advertisers can know exactly what a “girls night” means to this user. With emoji keywords, Dominos can place an ad in this user’s feed, RedBox could send them a coupon and Franzia could request to follow them. Not only do emoji keywords hone in on what a user wants, but they also allow marketers to gain a more complete view of a tweet. The phrase “we have some exciting news” alone doesn’t point advertisers to anything. Neither does the vague hashtag #ComingSoon. But with Twitter’s new targeting tool, potential advertisers can see the real meaning of this tweet, because Emoji keywords remove the blind spots. Now, Pampers and Gerber can target this user, instead of the Grand Cinemas or the New York Times
In any business; restaurants, coffee shops, bakeries, cafes, it’s very important to know how customers perceive you and your products. This is because you would want to create a good impression so you can easily get these people to buy from you. According to a study conducted by Conversion, 54% of millennials said they stopped doing business because of poor customer service. Additionally, 50% of Gen Xers and 52% of baby boomers felt the same way. Any business requires customer engagement, customer loyalty and customer satisfaction to enhance its growth. I doubt that anyone gets up in the morning to say, “I’m going to provide terrible service today.” In fact, the intention usually is to provide good service but somewhere during the actual interaction with customers; we lose that sense of commitment to create an emotional connection and provide an excellent service during each interaction. Here are some things to keep in mind when you are in the process of providing service. Remembering these will help you maintain a high level of service with the understanding that you can’t please everyone. Listen to each customer – You can’t provide excellent service to anyone if you don’t take the time to listen to what the customer is saying. Customers say things and however subtle or incredibly loud it is; you will need to pause and listen to get the message. They are giving you information that you can use to direct you to satisfy their needs. There’s nothing as damaging as not listening and providing products and services that they don’t want or want in the way you are providing them. Act promptly – There’s no point in getting customer feedback if you aren’t prepared to act on the results. If the results show that you need to make a change to how you provide a service or […]
