ENGAGE 2023: The State of Employee Engagement

In this episode we’re beginning our season-long exploration of ENGAGE 2023, our latest company culture and employee engagement report.  

Together, with experts from both Up Your Culture and The Center for Sales Strategy, we’ll be breaking down the data and contextualizing it all with actionable strategies to help keep your company campfire roaring throughout the year.  

Joining me to dive into the Employee Engagement section of the report are a couple of Up Your Culture’s awesome Engagement Specialists, Deborah Fulghum and Kelly George.  

Together, they provide so many essential insights, like: 

• How communicating where your company is headed directly affects the emotional connectedness and commitment of your people 
• Why “disengagement contagion” is very real  
• And, finally, why it's important to set expectations around how to best contribute to a healthy company campfire 

Links:

ENGAGE 2023: The Company Culture Report

Grade Your Company Culture

Deborah Fulghum

Kelly George

Beth Sunshine

Up Your Culture

TIMESTAMPS:
(02:39) Company Campfire
(05:46) Even a few disengaged employees is cause for concern
(07:41) How difficult is it for an organization to increase engagement across the board?
(09:23)  A lot of water is being dumped on that company campfire
(12:36) How do leaders know that they have an engagement problem?
(16:37) Think of culture as tending a garden
(19:11) Are leaders themselves engaged?
(23:04) The known is better than the unknown
(26:00) The importance of effective feedback
(27:50) What can leaders do to better retain their top talent?
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Transcript

Beth Sunshine: (00:15)
Hello and welcome to Culture Over Coffee, a podcast focused on improving company culture and fostering employee engagement. Every week we chat with experts and thought leaders about the latest information and proven practices you can use to reduce regrettable turnover, increase productivity on your team, and retain key customers. So, pour a cup of your favorite brew and join us. I'm your host, Beth Sunshine, SVP at Up Your Culture and the Center for Sales Strategy.

Beth Sunshine: (00:50)
In this episode, we're beginning our season long exploration of ENGAGE 2023, our latest company culture and Employee Engagement report, together with experts from both of your culture. And the Center for Sales Strategy will be breaking down the data and contextualizing it all with actionable strategies to help you keep your company campfire warm throughout the year. Joining me to dive into the employee engagement section of the report are a couple of Up Your Culture's awesome engagement specialists, Debra Fulghum and Kelly George. Together, they provide so many essential insights like how communicating where your company is headed directly affects the emotional connectedness and commitments of your people. Why disengagement contagion is very real. And finally, why it's important to set expectations around how to best contribute to a healthy company campfire.

Beth Sunshine: (01:49)
Deb and Kelly, I have been so excited to kick off the third season of Culture Over Coffee with you. I mean, you're experts on this, and I am really excited to get your perspectives on our annual culture report. We're calling it ENGAGE 2023, the culture Report, as you know, and there's a lot to unwrap here. So thank you for joining me in this first episode of this season. Today we're going to focus on some key findings related to employee engagement. We're gonna talk about trends in turnover, talk about what leaders can do to add some fuel to the fire. And you know, I'm using the term fire for a reason. So just to set the stage for our listeners, we often, the three of us and the rest of our team and our clients, we often liken the three levels of em, employee engagement to what you would see around your company campfire.

Beth Sunshine: (02:39)
So if you were to picture all of your employees around that campfire, those who are engaged, they're the ones who are actively rubbing sticks together. They're creating sparks, they're stoking the fire. Those who are not engaged, they're lounging around, they've got their feet kicked up, they're letting other people do the work. Um, and then they're the actively disengaged. They're the ones who are dumping water on the fire, removing logs. Um, so, you know, with that campfire image in mind, I think this will be fun to talk about. This survey gave us a great picture of what company campfires are looking like right now is a whole, and I just, I'll start with you, Deb. Um, just going in alphabetical order. I'd love to know from you, just in general terms, what were your takeaways from that section?

Deborah Fulghum: (03:26)
There's so many good things. Um, the importance of knowing where we're headed, um, being there together to stoke the fire. Um, you know, it's not just a one person job. It's, it takes everybody to keep that fire going. It's not just the leader, it's everyone. So that's that shared mission that gets everybody charged towards the same thing. And that's exciting. So I I, that was a good takeaway for me, and I see that so many people, um, really are motivated by having a vision and knowing where they're headed. So that was a good takeaway for me in this section.

Beth Sunshine: (04:04)
Yeah, yeah, I agree. And I'm glad you brought that up. We'll even spend some time on it in a little bit. That was a, a a big thing for me too. Kelly, coming to you, did anything else stand out to you when you read the report related to just the company campfire and engagement overall?

Kelly George: (04:20)
I was so, so excited to see that 77% of those who responded are all in mm-hmm. . I just love seeing that they're feeling emotionally, just to what you were saying, Deb, emotionally connected and committed to their companies. They're feeling committed to the work they're doing, and that is definitely keeping those campfires mm-hmm.  burning bright every single day. Um, and the other thing that I thought about is that we also know even a few disengaged people can have such an overwhelming negative effect on the operation mm-hmm.  any organization and dampen that fire. So I know we're gonna talk a little bit about that.

Beth Sunshine: (04:57)
Yeah, we will. And that's true. And, um, just to kind of, uh, fill in, I, I'm glad you mentioned that 77% are feeling engaged. Um, let, let me share a little bit more on that just so our listeners have the, the bigger picture there. So you've got 77% of our respondents who said they are stoking the fire. They're keeping it burning bright. They're 23%. So nearly a quarter of the respondents describe themselves as not engaged. So those are the ones feet kicked up. Beverage in hand, they may be happy. This is not to say they're not happy at work, but it is to say they're not actively engaged. And then you've got the disengaged, 11% of our respondents admitted that while they are physically present, they can be emotionally absent. And that was a really big number. So, Deb, what would you say to organizations that feel as though having a few disengaged employees isn't that big of a concern? Because we've heard that before, you know, most people are engaged, you know, you can't get everybody. What would you say to that?

Deborah Fulghum: (06:01)
It makes me, it hardens makes me sad to hear that because I know how important the engagement of everyone is. Mm-hmm. , you know, that old adage that we've heard one bad apple spoils the whole barrel. Right. All it takes is one, it takes one person to dowse that fire while you're not paying attention. When you think everything's on course, you know, I, I likened it to being, having an infection. One person can infect somebody else and it just spreads like a cold or like covid did. Right. It can just spread and before you know it, it's taken over and you didn't think it was gonna be a big deal.

Beth Sunshine: (06:36)
Right. That's a really good point.

Deborah Fulghum: (06:38)
So, you know, I, I think it's so important for people to think about that when they make hires. Is this person gonna fit with our team? Are they a culture fit? Yeah. And we have to think about what a culture fit is. Are they gonna bring, do they live by our values? Are they gonna bring more to our team in an help with our innovation and help us grow and expand and get the whole team excited to move to the next level? Are they gonna be fanning the flame and making it brighter? Where are they gonna dosse the fire? Because we don't want those people dowsing things. Right? We want that flame to keep going. So I think it's important to think about people who may be on your team who are dowsing that fire, and it's, it might be time to share expectations that we are here to get this fire burning bright. And if you wanna be part of that, come on. If you don't, let's have a conversation.

Beth Sunshine: (07:28)
Great message. So Kelly, that leads to a question I'd love to ask you. We, we know how important it is for people to be engaged. We know that there are people, dowsing the fire. Deb was talking about the need for action to be taken. How difficult, in your experience, is it for an organization to increase engagement across the board and really create that kind of thriving culture where their people have their SLS rolled up and they're, you know, they're all in?

Kelly George: (07:55)
Yeah, that's such a great question. And you know, Beth, if you're starting from scratch, it's hard , um, to create a culture of engagement takes a lot of time. It takes effort, it takes commitment. And as Deb said earlier, it's from both the leaders and the employees. You know, it's a joint effort. So it's, it's, it takes a lot of attention, takes a lot of nurturing, and it's not a one and done kind of thing. It's a forever kind of thing. But over time, if you build good habits, it will definitely feel easier and become more second nature. Absolutely. Uh,

Beth Sunshine: (08:32)
You know, we've seen, we've done run engagement programs many times together, and we have seen, just kinda listening to you say this, um, examples where people kind of, at the beginning, they were engaged, leaders were engaged in the program, they were like, you know, excited to make change. They did whatever they had to do, and then they kind of felt like, all right, right. Done. And so you saw some slowdown in some areas where they weren't building those habits you talked about. Mm-hmm. , I think that's a really important point. Mm-hmm.

Kelly George: (09:04)
. Yeah, that's right.

Beth Sunshine: (09:05)
Yeah. So something else that really caught my attention was how people perceived the engagement levels of others. So not so much at this point, how do they feel? Are they engaged? Mm-hmm. . But when they look around the campfire, what do they see their coworkers doing or feeling? Sadly, most people reported a lot of water being dumped on that company campfire. 84%. I've got it up here on my screen. If, uh, you're, I'm not, I haven't memorized all these numbers yet, but I know I will  I'll, uh, but 84% say that they believe some or a few employees at their company are actively engaged, um, are disengaged, rather. So 84% said that some or a few around them are actively disengaged. And 10%, this totally blew my mind, 10% said that most of their coworkers are actively disengaged, dumping water on the fire, pulling logs out, undoing all the good that they're doing. I found that a little worrisome. Um, and a significant 32% also have that one on the screen believe that their company has a serious engagement problem, 32% reflecting on their companies saying, we have a serious engagement problem here. That was worth us stopping down on. Mm-hmm. . So Kelly, I wanna start with you. First of all, how important do you think it is that people look around them and see engagement, feel that their coworkers are, are engaged in the mission?

Kelly George: (10:40)
It is incredibly important. And, and I couldn't agree more, Beth, when I saw those numbers, they were really sobering. You know, I, I, I was just really a little bit in shock about those and to what Deb was saying earlier, also around that one apple or that, um, infection. You know, sometimes we can refer to this as disengagement, contagion. Mm-hmm. , but we definitely wanna stop any spread around this type of contagion. So what this data tells us is people are looking around and they're seeing that many of their coworkers are not actively engaged or disengaged. And as you share, 32% believe their company has a serious engagement problem, 32%. And let's face it, no one wants to work hard. No one wants to actively stoke the fire while others are pouring water on it. That alone lower engagement across the board. So I believe it's very, very important that you wanna feel that your coworkers are engaged. Mm-hmm.

Beth Sunshine: (11:43)
, I agree. I mean, most of our jobs are not easy, regardless of what our job is. Um, most of our jobs are not easy, easy. And when you show up and you like put it all out there and you feel like you're all in, and yet others aren't carrying the weight, it almost can have a negative effect on you. Mm-hmm. , I know, I, I feel a little energy drained when I'm around people who, who are just checked out. So it really interesting, Deb, that's a lot of people who said that they think their company has a serious engagement problem. Mm-hmm. . Um, wow. So I wanna ask you, as an engagement specialist, what does an engagement problem look like and how do you spot one? And once you do spot one, how do company leaders, um, know that they have a problem be if they're not an engagement specialist? How do right. Leaders know that they have a problem?

Deborah Fulghum: (12:39)
Yeah. You know, it's easier than you think. You know, if you, you notice increased, um, absenteeism, people are sick a lot or, or out of the office or have an excuse for not getting things done. I mean, that usually shows that's a sign and you can, that's obvious. You can see that performance can be off. So we're not churning out the work or getting excited about things. Like you just said a moment ago, that contagious of wanting to be involved in something doesn't show up. You notice that also we find that, um, quality of work can be lower. Like they're not churning out the best they could. It's just the bare minimum just to get high and collect that paycheck. Um, turnover rates, I mean, if we think about that, if you, if you have a higher than normal turnover rate happening, that's a clear sign that there's something wrong with your, your culture mm-hmm.

Deborah Fulghum: (13:31)
, that you should open your eyes, pay attention to what's happening. And, um, let me think of a couple others. Um, you know, this is huge. I, I would say that if your customer satisfaction rate's going down, that's a clear sign that your people are not taking that in contagious enthusiasm about their job and how excited they are. It's not transferring, you know, what if I don't have that, it's not gonna, the negative's gonna transfer to my client, not the positive. So I think, you know, we can touch base with our clients to see how motivated they are to work with our, our team and our, our company. That's a sure sign. Um, I also think that when you don't see as many innovative ideas populating, people getting creative or feeling free to share, they're not as engaged.

Beth Sunshine: (14:19)
That makes sense. Because they may be feeling burnt out. Mm-hmm.  just not, not excited, not not bringing their A game. I like what you shared because some of the things you talked about are, I, I don't know what the word would be, but sort of anecdotal. Like, you can look around you and just see it or feel it, but many of the things that you talked about, you can actually measure turnover. You can measure mm-hmm. , customer satisfaction, you can measure even quality, um, productivity. Mm-hmm. . So lots of things to keep your eye on very specifically. And then when you put those data points together over time, think, could this be an engagement problem? Right. Yeah. Ooh, I like that. Um, alright, so we've talked about some kind of, you know, down information here. Not all, so feel good. So I wanna move on to something that's a bit more feel good.

Beth Sunshine: (15:12)
Um, when asked about their company culture, overall, this is a good number. Mm-hmm. , 76% reported that they felt it was improving. And I like that. Especially because when we compared it to last year, that's up from 69% last year. Mm-hmm. . So people are feeling some improvements, some momentum. Um, of course we want everyone to believe their companies are going in the right direction. I'd like that number to be a hundred percent. Um, but I, I'm glad to see that it's improving. So I wanna ask you both the same question, and Deb, I'll start with you. How would you advise company leaders to build on this momentum? So there's some traction happening, what can they do to improve their company cultures and really keep this going so it maybe eventually becomes a hundred percent?

Deborah Fulghum: (15:58)
I love that, that we're having an upswing. Mm-hmm. , it tells me how important it's to leaders, right? Yeah. This is a big deal and we need to pay attention to it. And you pointed this out earlier, you know, mck Kelly, you may have done that, but culture isn't a one and done. It's not something we do once to move on from Right. It's something we have to tend, so tending to your culture, making it a priority is a big deal. Our company has tended to our culture for forever 10 plus years. Right. It's that important to us. It's, it defines who we are and how we treat our people, how we work with each other, how we work with our clients. It's a, it's, it's paramount to our success. I like to think of culture, um, like a garden. And, you know, I'm a huge gardener. And this is,

Beth Sunshine: (16:43)
I was about to say that the perfect analogy for you, and

Deborah Fulghum: (16:46)
This is my favorite time of year because the first of my labor are seen, right? Yeah. I spend fall planting bulbs, pruning, cutting back. I know when to cut my hydrangeas back so that they really give me the best blossoms in the, the summer. You know, I pay attention to all that. I, I, um, water, I fertilize, I make sure I'm mulch to keep the, the moisture in. I mean, it's a constant thing. Yeah. And in the spring, I'm, I'm still doing that. And then in the summer, what am I doing? I'm, I'm pulling weeds. I'm making sure the bad things don't spread like those apples. Right. So it, it's very much that I, if I didn't take one weed out, what happens to the rest of the garden? It gets overtaken by weeds and it's not beautiful anymore. And for me to keep that beautiful garden, or for people to keep their beautiful culture, it's something you have to work on all the time, but it should bring you joy like my garden does for me.

Deborah Fulghum: (17:44)
But it's not something that, it's a one and done. You know, I I I wanna share that this waving of the W thing and I think about Disney, Disney World or Disneyland. Yeah. When you go, when you may go one day and the next day you're like, gosh, what do they do? How do they keep these flowers and this, these gardens so beautiful. Well, it's Disney magic. As soon as the, as soon as the park closes, they're people who are replanting, rearranging, pulling out dead, putting in line better. They're, they're making sure that when you walk in, you're awed. So it doesn't just happen. Somebody is intentional about it all the time. And I think that's what we have to do with our, our cultures. We have to continue to have that excitement to bring that culture to its best. And that takes time and intention. Mm-hmm.

Beth Sunshine: (18:32)
. Yeah. I th I think just the imagery of the garden and the extremity of Disney, their gardens, that, that's a really nice mental image you've left us with. Mm-hmm. , thank you for that. Mm-hmm.  Kelly, how, how would you recommend that leaders improve their company cultures? If maybe, you know, they've spotted an engagement problem or they are one of those who are feeling some momentum, but they're not there yet. What would you recommend?

Kelly George: (18:59)
Well, here's some more good news on the good news note

Beth Sunshine: (19:02)


Kelly George: (19:03)
So much that leaders can do. Um, so there's, there's lots of things we can do. Uh, one of the things I believe is that leaders need to look first at themselves, start with themselves. Are they themselves engaged? Mm-hmm. . Cause you know that engaged leaders are the ones who inspire and motivate employees to perform right at their best. So if you're leader, can you answer yes to knowing your why and your sense of purpose in your work? And then again, do you live by your company's core values? And are you holding your team accountable to them? Mm-hmm. These are some questions you can ask yourself and are you personally motivated as a leader mm-hmm. By the long term vision of your organization? So I think that's a great place to start. And then another way that you can learn a lot more about how your employees are perceiving your culture is using an engagement survey mm-hmm.

Kelly George: (19:58)
To uncover the factors that are driving engagement or dragging it down. And the good news is you don't have to fix everything at once. You can start with choosing one to two items that have the highest impact on engagement at your company, and create a few strategies and start, you know, really quickly moving the needle or instead saying, get that garden growing. Um, get those things planted. Um, I think it's also really important that leaders especially and organizations have a clear reason for being core values and vision. Um, as a leader, you have to hold people accountable by refusing to tolerate behaviors that don't align with your values and could really compromise the integrity of your team. Um, one of the things Deb, Beth, you and I, we all say is, is what's hanging on the wall happening in the, the hall? Um, and I think that's a great question to, to touch base on.

Kelly George: (20:51)
Um, but really it's, it's so much about making sure you're taking time to invest in your people, really showing them how much you value them and the work that they do, having regular growth conversations with them around their goals, their motivations, the areas where they need support. Um, and similar to what be, um, Deb was saying earlier about what's different for a hydrangea versus another type of plant. Every person that you manage is wired differently and they're all going to have their own work style and they're all going to thrive in different conditions. So he is taking that time to understand how your people work best and how you can work with them as a leader to optimize their work environment. Mm-hmm. , those are some good places to start. Wow.

Beth Sunshine: (21:37)
, so many good tips there. Mm-hmm. , so many good tips. And I like the way, I don't know if you did this intentionally, but where you started was look in the mirror yourself. Mm-hmm.  start with how do you feel, and you guys' have to correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the stat, um, we share is that a, if a leader is engaged, their people are three times more likely to be engaged. Do I have that right? So I love that that's where you started. Well, look in the mirror, really take stock of, of your own engagement, your own feelings. Um, and then you gave some great tips ending on just the individualization that goes into treating each person the way they need to be treated to feel engaged. Uh, I hope everybody's taking notes. Really good stuff there. , , I wanna talk to you about what happens when people don't have the information they want and they need.

Beth Sunshine: (22:31)
I think it's human nature and Deb, you and I actually talked about this earlier, just transparency and, um, the need for information. I think it's human nature to wanna know what's ahead. Um, but right now we're dealing with a lot of uncertainty. We have economic uncertainty that is looming and increasing concern about inflation. Um, it can have a very negative effect mm-hmm.  on how people feel. And as a matter of fact, one out of every four people we learned on this survey feels unsure about what to expect in the next year. Now, personally, I don't know, you'll have to tell me if you agree. I have found that people actually deal better with bad news and disappointment than they do uncertainty. Um, do you, do you feel the same way

Deborah Fulghum: (23:16)
The known is better than the unknown?

Beth Sunshine: (23:18)
Yes. What is it the w know  better than the one? You dunno Right now, it's just hard to know what's ahead. So Deb, well, company leaders don't have that crystal ball that I know they wish they had. In your experience, are there techniques they can use to help their people feel more grounded?

Deborah Fulghum: (23:39)
Yeah, I think that, um, as you and I were talking about earlier, peek behind the curtain is always good, right? People, people will start guessing or wondering what's happening and start their own rumors if we don't address something. Yeah. So we talk about having a shared mission. If we are giving a peek behind, we're saying, here's where we're headed, here's the role you're gonna play in that. You know, I think it's, it's smart to not just talk about long-term goals, but short-term, you know, here's where we're headed, here's what the role you're gonna play so that you feel invested in this. Um, but I think that that's some, a conversation that has to happen frequently. I find that so many leaders, I mean, we, we see this when we work with leaders in co and markets that they'll say, well, I already had that conversation.

Beth Sunshine: (24:25)
Right?

Deborah Fulghum: (24:26)
Right. But to me, they feel like they close the loop. Mm-hmm. , but people, they need the consistency of hearing it over and over and over again. So instead of a loop, you kind of need to have in your mindset, I need to have a coil conversation. I need to bring this up over and over again so people feel comfortable. They don't feel like I just said something and that, that, you know, didn't change every time. It's kinda like when a manager says, when I have more information, I'll let you know mm-hmm. . And then three months later they're still waiting and they're like, they didn't get back to me. Right.  and you say, I still don't have information. I know this is probably still on your mind, but you know, you have to address it because yeah. People are still thinking and worrying about that.

Deborah Fulghum: (25:06)
Another piece that I find is very important is, in this uncertain time, let's take that opportunity to develop our people. You know, let's help them grow so that they feel like we're still investing in them. It doesn't, you know, we can invest in people without a cost. We can find trainings that don't cost a lot of money or any money. If we can find any way to develop our people, I think that it makes them wanna invest themselves in the job role, you know, and no matter what the future holds, they still feel that there's a calm because you're still investing in them. So those are a couple things that come to

Beth Sunshine: (25:42)
Mind for me. More great imagery too. I'd never heard the term a coil conversation instead of a loop. I think I might steal that from you. Kelly, any others you would recommend before we move on?

Kelly George: (25:53)
Well, I, I love Deb, what you shared. I think, I think those are both so important. And one other thing that occurred to me was just the importance of effective feedback. Mm-hmm. , one of the things we saw in, in, in the data this year is one in four respondents reporting that they are only one in four receiving meaningful feedback on a regular basis. Mm-hmm. , that's disappointing. Yeah. That's so difficult. Um, because we need feedback about our performance and our work, and people really need more positive feedback because it helps them to recognize their strength so that they can keep using those more often. Um, we always recommend the ideal ratio of positive to negative feedback, five to one. So as far as helping people feel more grounded, receiving positive feedback really helps them with that. That, because it helps 'em feel safe, and then it also helps them to be more open to receiving and actually hearing constructive feedback. Ali. Yeah.

Beth Sunshine: (26:52)
Love that. Thank you for adding that. All right. So let's switch gears just a littlest bit and talk about turnover. We're back to some good news here. People are recording less turnover mm-hmm.  this year than last year. Um, last year, 47% of people said their company had experienced more resignations than usual. This year, it looks like that number's 31, so significantly better. Before we get too excited though, I do wonder if this will last because this year's data also shows that only 58% believe their leadership team consistently strives to retain their employees. Mm-hmm. , so barely over half see an effort being made. And 33% report that while some leaders do work to retain people, others do not. Um, so a lot of numbers there. Again, I'm looking at my notes on the screen, but, um, yeah. Some good, good news. Some not so good news. Kelly, what can leaders do to better retain their top talent? When you go to all the work that goes into recruiting and selecting and hiring and onboarding someone, I mean, surely there's some good advice you can give that will help them retain them over time.

Kelly George: (28:06)
I say commit to culture, that, that's my answer. Um, we saw 24% of the respondents said their culture is getting worse. So those individuals could roll up their sleeves, they could try to make a difference, but the likelihood is they will seek another opportunity at somewhere that ha they think has a better culture. Mm-hmm. . So one of the n most notable negative side effects when we have disengagement is employee turnover. And we just know how costly that is, whether you're a big company or a small company. So people join a company, they quit a boss mm-hmm. . And when leaders can demonstrate, as we were talking about earlier, how much they care and they strive to retain their people, we're gonna see good things happen. And I think this is where leaders can make a really positive impact by they, but they can talk about their culture, they can invest in, as you said, Deb, in developing their employees.

Kelly George: (29:01)
So we wanna give our, you know, teams to clear expectations. We wanna give them meaningful feedback. Um, you know, we saw also in the survey data this year, there's a widespread desire for greater recognition and reward in the workplace. Yeah. Um, yeah. So people really wanna feel valued, they wanna feel appreciated for the work that they do, and when they have that recognition for their work, they wanna repeat those positive behaviors that led to success. Mm-hmm. . That's true. Yeah. So I think when we have leaders who are really engaged themselves and committed to improving culture at their organizations, they're the ones who are going to benefit from retaining that top talent. Mm-hmm.

Beth Sunshine: (29:41)
. Yep. Yep. I agree. And everything you said I'm listening to and I'm thinking, yes, that you are exactly right. That would keep people from leaving more than throwing even a bonus at them. Mm-hmm. , um, really changing how they feel every day at work. That would work. But everything you said also takes time. It takes attention. So it's, it was interesting to hear you share those things all valuable. Mm-hmm. , that was a lot. Any, any other great retention tools or strategies that come to mind for you that you wanna share?

Deborah Fulghum: (30:15)
Me or Kelly,

Beth Sunshine: (30:18)
You?

Deborah Fulghum: (30:21)
Well, yes. We have a tool that we use called The Growth Guide, and I absolutely love the growth guide. I had a manager ask me years ago, do you have a tool to, um, an exit interview or do you have a stay interview? That's what his question was, do you have a

Beth Sunshine: (30:37)
Stay interview? I remember this. And I'm like,

Deborah Fulghum: (30:39)
Yes. It's called a growth guide, . But by the time you're doing a stay interview, it's a little late. Right? Yeah. You need to be doing and having those conversations consistently. And the tool that we use is a growth guide because it allows me to understand what you need from me, how you want me to treat you. It's, it really allows us to understand people and treat them by the platinum rule, which is how they wanna be treated, uh, to the Golden rule, which is how most managers think, well, that's how I wanna be treated. Right? But you're not me and I'm not you. We all need different things, and it's just the best stay interview you have. And if you are consistently paying attention to Kelly's point of where's somebody wants to grow and develop, and you're investing in them and putting your time and effort in them, it shows you care. And we know people don't leave a company, they leave a boss.

Beth Sunshine: (31:32)
Mm-hmm. ,

Deborah Fulghum: (31:33)
And if if you care, they won't leave. Right. And they're not as likely to leave. So, cause they don't know what's on the other side, they know what they can expect from you. And that could be consistency of caring and not just about, I mean, when that caring goes deep, it's a personal and professional caring. Right. It's that you deeply and sincerely care about that person's success inside and outside of work.

Beth Sunshine: (31:56)
Yeah. And

Deborah Fulghum: (31:57)
That's  retention.

Beth Sunshine: (31:58)
Yeah. It's hard to leave something or someone when you feel deeply cared about. The Growth Guide is a great tool. I'm glad you brought that into it. Yeah. All right. So that brings us to our last question. And it's a simple one, but also very hard because I'm gonna make you think of only one thing that you would recommend that leaders do, or I I'll even just say, people can do to better contribute to a roaring campfire. If you could recommend one thing, what would that be? Deb?

Deborah Fulghum: (32:27)
I would say set expectations about how we build that campfire and how many people need to be, how everybody needs to be contributing to that campfire, what's allowed and what's not allowed. And if you wanna sit around this campfire, here's what you're expected to do. I think expectations are huge and you make no exceptions to those expectations.

Beth Sunshine: (32:47)
Yeah, I like that. I like that because your culture is what you will tolerate. That's right. I, I really like that. Good, good message to end on. Kelly, how about you? If you could only give one, one suggestion, one recommendation, what would

Kelly George: (33:00)
It be? Make sure you're all in. If you're a leader, make sure you're engaged. Make sure you're actively rubbing those sticks together to create the spark and stok that fire engagement, I think really begins with the leaders. So, you know, just making sure you're all in with your emotional connection and commitment to the company.

Beth Sunshine: (33:20)
Awesome. Thank you both for spending time with me today talking about Culture Over Coffee. I know we chat about these things all the time, so it's kind of nice to do it in this kind of a, a forum. You've shared tons of information and ideas that will be valuable for anyone listening. So for everyone listening, I'm gonna drop Deb and Kelly's LinkedIn information in the show notes so you can connect. I'm also going to add a link to the Engage 2023 culture report so you can dig into that data yourself. And both Deb and Kelly mentioned throughout this how important it is that as a leader you feel engaged, um, and have a sense of what's going on around you in order for a culture initiative or an an improvement engage in an engagement to happen. So we're also gonna put in there, there's a self-inventory that you can take, um, just to give yourself some, some ratings and see at the end what you come up with. It'll tell you really how your culture compares to a healthy cul uh, culture. And you can get a sense of what your campfire might look like. So you can find those in the show notes. As we wrap up, I just wanna remind everyone listening that regardless of what role you play in your company, a strong company culture begins with you.

Beth Sunshine: (34:34)
Thanks so much for spending time with us on Culture Over Coffee. If you've enjoyed the conversation, be sure to subscribe and join us for every episode. For more helpful information on the topics of company culture and employee engagement, visit us@upyourculture.com.