Not long ago, late on a Friday night, I was driving home from an impromptu party.

Yes, that's a thing.

While driving home I started thinking about employee engagement.

Yes, I do need to get out more, but there's a point to all this so stay with me.

The thing that got me started thinking about employee engagement was the party itself. Again, stay with me, I'll explain this.

When I walked into this party, I quickly realized that almost everyone in the room, with 3 exceptions, had worked for me - I had been their manager - at one time or another.

So driving home, the thought that hit me was, "I wonder how many former managers get invited to parties hosted and attended by their employees?"

Then I thought, "It's been over 4 years since any of these people were on a team I led. I wonder how many managers who have been gone that long, get invited to parties hosted and attended by their former employees?"

The next thought was, "It was interesting how several of them seemed to want to tell me what was going on in their lives, and showed me pictures of new cars and happy experiences with family and friends."

So then I thought about what a singularly unique an experience this was, not to mention I had a blast.

So back to my thoughts about employee engagement.

Since probably very few managers were spending the evening at an impromptu party hosted, and attended by their former employees, there must be something about their experience with me that cemented these relationships beyond workplace walls.

I considered the 12 Elements of Employee engagement and which ones applied to this situation. One in particular came to mind, "I have a best friend at work." This group truly has best friends at work. They did when I led their teams and the party proved that to be the case. I established an environment where the people on my team could strongly agree "I have a best friend at work."

The next element I considered was, "My manager or someone at work cares about me as a person." Why would anybody want to show recent pictures and "catch up" with a former boss?

I also thought about element number 9, "My fellow associates are committed to doing quality work." That's what made these "best friends" stick together after all this time after many of them had moved on to other companies, they had each others backs when times were tough.

When I was part of the organization where I managed this group of friends, I was taken aside by my manager one day. He had the most recent employee engagement results for my team and he said, "We don't ever see results like this." I know I said thank you, but must have appeared not to have been impacted by his statement. Because, he restated it, "No, we NEVER see results like this." The second time it made enough of an impression that I remember it to this day.

So I may not know much, but reflecting on the experience of that Friday night, I have to admit - I know employee engagement. I know it from experience as a manager and from study, and research and from driving employee engagement initiatives in other organizations. I've also studied it for years in articles in journals, books and trade publications.

For me, it's natural; instinctive and I have a passion for it.

Perhaps the foremost study I've found was the research done by Gallup starting back in the 1970s. This research is the basis for the book, "First, Break All the Rules" by Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman. For me, this is the most important management book ever written.

That monumental research project started with asking millions of employees thousands or questions regarding their productive motivations on the job. From those questions and that research, 12 items emerged. Gallup calls them the 12 Elements of Employee Engagement.

When I first encountered the research, it resonated with me. It resonated because, for the first time there was data behind many of the things I'd been doing instinctively as a manager.

When I found out that Gallup allows users outside their organization to access their Q12 Employee Engagement Survey, I knew it was the tool for me.

I've since used the Q12 with many work groups to the rich benefit of their teams and as a basis for a stronger work cultures.

The magic of the 12 elements and the survey, is that I can tell with very little effort, exactly why a manager is struggling with engagement, productivity, profitability, client satisfaction and retention, employee retention, safety, or overall quality,

The even better part, the survey takes less than 10 minutes for their employees to complete.

After Friday, I'm embracing my expertise as an employee engagement superstar. If you, or any manager in your organization struggles, I can fix that.

Shoot me an inquiry.

#Employeeengagement #BestFriendatWork #Someoneatworkcaresaboutmeasaperson