Why are Employees Demotivated & Disengaged? Part 3

In the last 2 articles, we spoke about how big companies have Technology, manpower, budget, and people with great experience. So why is the performance going down, and their employees are disengaged?

And we said that we have one main reason and 9 sub-reasons that follows. These 9 sub-reasons are the consequences of the main reason. And the main reason that we spoke about last time is choosing the wrong unqualified leaders to fill managerial positions, and we also spoke about what to do to resolve this issue.

And in the last article we spoke about 5 of these sub-reasons or consequences, and today we will speak about the last 4.

6-Focusing on the wrong K.P.I's in the company because winning covers mistakes.

Most Managers inside companies and especially inside big corporations focus only on the target KPIs sent to them from the top management, and these target KPIs are mainly related to tangible activities that can either generate more revenue or decrease costs.

Yes, there are mid-year and end-of-year reviews, and the employees are supposed to deliver a development plan for themselves each year. But in reality, managers do not care that much if you achieved your yearly development plan or not. They care more about your performance and how this can be translated or contribute to the company's main KPIs, and not your development and growth plan.

That’s why, If the numbers related to these 2 target K.P.I’s Revenue and expenses are good and the company is winning, then everything is perfect. Which in reality is not.

Winning makes us oversee our mistakes or even underrate them, but in reality, focusing only on winning or focusing only on if the target revenue is achieved or not as the main K.P.I. can be deceiving. Because Revenue was and will never be an indication of good leadership or good company culture.

While Profit, revenue, and costs are very important KPIs, other numbers such as Employee turnover rate within each team or department, or employee satisfaction and engagement rates are also very important.

7-Not enough space for Creativity.

If a company chooses the wrong person to fill a leadership role, especially if this manager’s behavior is bad, then most employees will be worried to make mistakes.

Being creative requires that you break the rules. You will never follow a specific user guide, manual, or instructions and be creative.

Sure, you need instructions and user manuals to learn how to do something in the beginning. But after following instructions for a specific time, you should aim to be creative and to innovate and invent. And to innovate, you need to try new approaches and fail and correct them and fail again...etc. until you achieve something.

If the employees felt unsafe or insecure being supervised by this new manager, they will never try to take new risks and fail.

8-Employees feel that they are not heard.

Do you remember the story that I started our first episode with? The worst thing in any relationship is to feel that you are not heard or that your opinion is not valued.

Unfortunately, nowadays, this happens a lot and especially inside big companies. It's very normal nowadays to hear employees using words such as ‘’they’’ or ‘’them’’ when they are referring to the management. This is a huge indication that the employees perceive the company atmosphere and culture as divided between them and the top management, and that they are not all in the same boat.

9-Focusing more on promoting the company’s image outside than fixing the employees’ problems inside.

This one is very funny because I see it A LOT in this social media era. When I look at LinkedIn for example, I see lots of companies trying to promote their culture by taking pictures of their employees at events and showing them as having fun, or by taking a picture of a new employee’s desk with a new laptop and equipment on it...etc. and they are using hashtags to spread the word and show how life is amazing.

But to be honest, none of these things can truly prove that a company has a great internal culture.

Let me share with you a funny story.

One of my clients was working at a big company. She was feeling demotivated and depressed at her work, and she was having problems with her managers. She always complained that they neglected her and that they rarely listened to her opinion, and that she felt undervalued and disrespected.

During a specific working day, the company that she was working for announced a celebration at the company premises. This celebration will start in the afternoon and until the end of the working day. There will be food, drinks...etc. and on top of that, the employees will not be forced to work on the afternoon of this day because they can attend the celebration.

After the day of the event, she came and shared with me the story, and that there was an event, so I told her ‘’Great. Tell me that you did not attend this celebration or party and that you stayed in your office to take a stand and to show that you disagree with the way that you are being treated.’’

She answered me and said, ‘’no, I attended of course.’’

I asked her ‘’why?’’

She told me ‘’most of the employees in the company are unhappy and disengaged, and they attended also.’’

I told her ‘’well if this is your attitude and your colleagues, then how do you expect things to change inside the company if the management does not see that you are objecting to something and that you are all there celebrating? Why did you all attend the event?’’

And then she answered ‘’well, free food and drinks and on top of that I will not be obliged to continue the working day. So why shouldn’t I?’’

This answer summarizes a lot of what is happening inside corporations.

I want you to imagine with me, how many pictures were taken during this event and spread on the internet to show how life is wonderful at this company location and to promote it.

Taking happy pictures or showing your employees smiling over social media means nothing. And for me, I would prefer that you direct your efforts to really improve your employees' lives and company culture than putting this effort to show me on social media that you are a cool company while most of the employees working there are not happy at all.

If I am an employee, then I am spending more than 33% of my day working at a company. And I do not want to feel pain each day and hate my life doing so. This will not only impact my emotional state at work, but it will also impact my relationships with my family and friends outside of work and my general well-being.

These are all the consequences of choosing the wrong leaders.

Share with me your opinion in the comments section below, and tell me if I forgot any other thing that you would love to mention, or if you believe there is something else that impacts employee’s engagement and fulfillment.

Share with me your thoughts and until the next article.