Workplace Relationships and Organisation Culture:

We spend a third of our day at work, forging meaningful work relationships is important.

According to Deloitte’s extensive research leading to the Simply Irresistible Organization model, a Humanistic workplace with an inclusive, diverse work environment is essential for good employee engagement and productivity. According to a Gallup Study, when employees possess a deep sense of affiliation with their team members, they are driven to take positive actions that benefit the business -- actions they may not otherwise even consider if they did not have strong relationships with their coworkers.

Culture is essentially the behavior and actions of people when no one is observing them. Defining and upholding cultural values helps people feel connected and binds them together as a team with shared values and goals. Workplace relationships and organisational culture are important engagement drivers that influence the eNPS.

The lack of workplace relationships and a positive organizational culture can result in employees working in isolated silos, dysfunctional teams, and feeling disconnected from their workplace, leading to a high rate of attrition. The recent trend of "The Great Resignation" has been fueled by people seeking employment in organizations with a good culture and positive work relationships.

To gain a holistic picture of the workplace relationships and organisational culture factors that impact employee engagement, it is important to understand the first-dimension drivers that influence them (building blocks, as we call them).

They are:

To understand the impact of these first-dimension drivers on Workplace Relationships and Organisational Culture, a deeper analysis of the underlying factors impacting each of these drivers is required. To facilitate this, The Empuls Pulse Survey model considers second-dimension engagement drivers (sub-sub-dimensional drivers) that influence each of the sub-dimensional drivers of every engagement driver.

1. Team Relationships: According to Gallup’s research, team relationships impact team performance and employee engagement. The study further adds that if 6 in 10 people have a best friend at work or have friends at work, it would lead to:

In the Empuls Pulse Survey, four-second dimensional engagement drivers impact Team Relationships. They are:

1.1. Committed team: Do the employees believe their team is committed to the team and organization's goals?

Seeing is believing. What employees see in their team influences their opinions about its commitment levels. An employee's perception of working in a committed team is a second-dimension engagement driver in the Empuls Pulse survey, and influences team relationships.

1.1.1. Best Practices to improve the perception of working in a Committed team:

Plan: Conduct frequent team meetings to discuss the goals.

Do: Teams that meet often are more connected. Ensure that every team has frequent meetings. Make it a mandate for every small team to have at least a meeting every week- to stay abreast about what needs to be done and who is doing what. These meetings should also help discuss how individual and team goals can be achieved and clarify member's role. Larger teams/BU units should meet once every fortnight. These meetings should provide a larger picture of what is happening. Regular meetings go a long way in improving team dynamics.

Time: < 2 weeks to start

Plan: Conduct Tell Me Why sessions

Do: Allocate time to conduct weekly or fortnightly Tell Me Why sessions. The agenda is to answer all the whys people have. This should be conducted by the team manager, BU head or other senior team leaders. Understanding the why for an action is important before understanding how to do it. It fosters a shared purpose and goal within the team.

Time: < 2 weeks to start

Plan: Add team praise as a recognition and a performance metric

Do: Team Praise as a recognition and performance metric is often overlooked. Let the leaders and function heads proactively appreciate and reward teams for their performances. Add team performance as a part of everyone's KPI. These initiatives enhance the bond and desire to work well as a unit.

Time: >4 weeks to start

Plan: Conduct informal team AMAs or team chatters

Do: Teams should conduct informal AMAs periodically, promoting equal participation in asking work and non-work-related questions. Individuals are free to choose not to answer a question. These sessions help team members get to know each other on a personal level.

Time: 3 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

HR should use feedback to help the Team Leads improve the action plan.

1.2. Relevant competencies (KSA): Do the employees believe their team has relevant competencies to achieve its goals?

Having confidence in the knowledge and skills of one's team is crucial for building strong relationships among team members. It is important for employees to feel that they are not solely responsible for completing tasks because their team members lack the necessary skills.

1.2.1. Best Practices to improve the employee belief that their team has the relevant competencies to achieve its goals:

Plan: Conduct a quarterly Know your team workshop

Do: Create a quarterly activity called Know Your Team, where team members exchange notes on each other's skills, knowledge, and experience. They should add details of the new things/skills they did/learned in the last quarter. This helps team members know more about their team competencies.

Time: < 2 weeks to start

Plan: Arrange for digital office blind dates and water cooler sessions.

Do: Physical interaction is limited or nonexistent in a remote or hybrid workplace. Arrange for team members to catch up informally by organising weekly blind dates and water cooler sessions. This will help them know their teammates better.

Time: 2-4 weeks to start

Plan: Conduct team skill-building workshops (with internal and external SMEs)

Do: First, ensure every employee creates a list of skills/training they want. Start organising training and skilling workshops for the skills in high demand. You can involve other team members willing to sign up as trainers. Team members with advanced knowledge or skills can train others. Get external trainers whenever the need arises.

Time: >4 weeks to start

Plan: Creation of a team L&D resource

Do: Every team should have an L&D resource-building activity. Each team should also create an internal knowledge repository to help others learn the skills and knowledge they seek to learn. A senior team member should lead this effort.

Time: >4 weeks to start

Plan: Conduct Intra-team Quizzes

Do: Have this as a fun activity where a senior and junior team member is paired as a team. If there are at least five members in a team, one person can be the quiz master. The teams can be quizzed on techniques and knowledge of skills they use daily. This is a fun way to improve team knowledge and bonding.

Time: 2-4 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

-Team Leads should own the initiatives

- They should make the plan, do a part of their KRA for the quarter, and have metrics to measure performance.

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

The Team Leads should use the feedback to improve the action plan.

1.3. Team communication: Do the employees believe they can easily communicate with their team?

Team communication is vital for employees to feel comfortable expressing their thoughts and opinions. Communication helps people understand and empathise with each other. Open communication reduces stress and eliminates unexpressed thoughts, leading to better team relationships. Hence, team communication is a second-dimension engagement driver that impacts team relationships.

1.3.1. Best Practices to improve team communication:

Plan: Conduct Active Listening Workshops

Do: Active listening is the practice of preparing to listen, observing what verbal and nonverbal messages are being sent, and then providing appropriate feedback. It must be acquired and honed. Involve an SME to conduct periodic active listening workshops for all your teams, especially the managers and leaders.

Time: >4 weeks to start

Plan: Conduct informal agenda less team meetings

Do: Periodically ensure that every team conducts an agenda less team meetings. These meetings aim to promote open conversations around the team's choice. Such meetings enable people to talk more with each other and get to know each other better.

Time: < 2 weeks to start

Plan: Conduct Monthly 1:1s

Do: Ensure that all the managers in your organisation have at least one monthly 1:1 to help their team members voice their concerns and express their thoughts. Let managers announce the talking points for the 1:1s. They should be around the five broad topics:

The manager should spend at least 80% of the 1:1 listening to the employee

Time: 2-4 weeks to start

Plan: Conduct Team Games

Do: Create an overall games committee for every business unit or function. Every team should have a representative. The aim of this committee is to create a repository of fun games that can be conducted within and across teams. The representative becomes the game's facilitator of their team. The representative can be rotated periodically. Games that focus on team communication, like Pictionary or Dumb Charades, can be played. This enables teams to talk to each other, losing their inhibitions.

Time: < 2 weeks to start

Plan: Facilitate Team Knowledge Sharing Sessions

Do: Pair a senior and junior to form a team to conduct knowledge-sharing sessions. Every pair will host a knowledge-sharing session once a week. Every week, the couple who hosts the session will be different. Once everyone has had a chance to host a session, the two people forming a team can be changed. This initiative will help individuals in a team connect and collaborate better.

Time: 2-4 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

–Team Leads should own this.

- They should make the plan, do a part of their KRA for the quarter, and have metrics to measure performance.

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

The Team Leads should use the feedback to improve the action plan.

1.4. Team collaboration: How do the employees perceive the extent of collaboration within their team?

Collaborating with ease and efficacy with team members leads to good workplace relationships. Hence, Team collaboration is a second-dimension engagement driver in the Empuls Pulse survey.

1.4.1. Best Practices to improve team collaboration:

Plan: Create a Peer-to-peer learning program

Do: Create smaller groups of 2s or 3s within teams and let each group member teach a skill they are good at. The smaller groups should present their group's effort to the larger team. These skills taught can also be added to the knowledge repository.

Time: >4 weeks to start

Plan: Conduct in-person (bonding) events

Do: Once every month or at least a quarter, let every team meet and do some fun activity- which goes beyond eating and drinking. It could be solving in a mystery room or hiking- any activity where teams must collaborate.

Time: 4 -12 weeks (about 3 months) to start

Plan: Set team goals as KPIs

Do: Setting goals for teams and making the individual members responsible for making progress is a way to nudge team members to collaborate and connect. By making them a part of the KPIs. Individuals would be nudged to take ownership and work towards them.

Time: 2-4 weeks to start

Plan: Team Community Building

Do: Create a community for the team members to connect and collaborate on work and non-work activities. Mandate that every individual collaborates on some project or activity with their team members at least once a month. As a process, highlight and celebrate the collaborations, no matter how small.

Time: < 2 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

-HR and Team Leads should co-own the initiatives

-It should be a part of their KRA for the quarter

- Metrics to measure performance should also be decided upon

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

The Team Leads should use the feedback to improve on the action plan, taking HR’s support

Actionable Insights on the Pulse Survey Results

Weak: Score less than 3.

Insight: Most of your employees are unhappy with their team relationships.

To improve the perception of working in a Committed team:

Conduct frequent team meetings (formal and informal) to discuss the team's goals.

Tell me Why sessions

To improve the employee belief that their team has the relevant competencies to achieve its goals:

Introduction Workshop

Arrange for digital office Blind dates and water cooler sessions

To improve team communication:

Conduct fortnightly agenda less team meetings

Team Games

To improve team collaboration:

Team Community Building

Overall: Focus on communicating about the actions taken

At risk: Score between 3 and 4, showing a downward trend in the last 3 pulse runs

Insight: While more than 50% of your employees are happy with their team relationships, there is a negative trend, which is at risk of becoming a weakness.

To improve the perception of working in a Committed team:

AMA team sessions

To improve the employee belief that their team has the relevant competencies to achieve its goals:

Arrange for digital office Blind dates and water cooler sessions

Team Quizzes

To improve team communication:

Monthly One-on-ones

Team Knowledge Sharing

To improve team collaboration:

Set team goals

Overall: Focus on communicating about the actions taken

Acceptable: Score between 3 and 4, showing no change in the last 3 pulse runs

Insight: More than 50% of your employees are happy with their team relationships; however, this has not improved.

To improve the employee belief that their team has the relevant competencies to achieve its goals:

Adding team praise as a recognition and performance metric

AMA team sessions

To improve feelings about the organization structure:

Team L&D

Team skill building workshops (with internal and external SMEs)

To improve team communication:

Conduct Active Listening Workshops

To improve team collaboration:

Conduct physical bonding events

Peer-to-peer learning program

Overall: Focus on communicating about the actions taken

Improving: Score between 3 and 4, showing an increasing trend

Insight: More than 50% of your employees are happy with their team relationships, and there is an increasing trend in this sentiment. Work on converting this to a strength.

Continue doing what you are doing and use the good practices document to incorporate new initiatives that will turn this second-dimensional engagement driver into a strength.

Strength: Score above 4

Insight: More than 80% of your employees are happy with their team relationships. This is an area of strength for your organisation. Keep up the good work!

Continue doing what you are doing, document your actions and share them with us. Use the Good Practices document to incorporate new initiatives to ensure this second-dimension engagement driver remains a strength.

2. Managerial Relationships: According to Gallup's research, the manager alone accounts for 70% of the variance in team engagement. This is driven by the manager's innate tendencies, engagement, and the employee's perception of the manager's behaviours. The relationships that each manager forges with their team become an important indicator of the team and employee happiness.

In the Empuls Pulse Survey, five-second dimensional engagement drivers impact Managerial Relationships. They are:

2.1. Supportive manager: Do the employees perceive their manager as supportive?

Like the famous saying goes, "people don't quit organisations, they quit managers". When employees have supportive managers, they are less likely to quit.

2.1.1. Best Practices to improve support from the manager:

Plan: Conduct a GROW framework training for Managers to turn into Coaching Managers

Do: Every quarter, conduct an ongoing training session for all your managers on progressively transforming into excellent coaching managers. The training should provide actionable insights, role plays, and real-life examples to explain the GROW framework. Your managers should be trained to help your employees establish a Goal, examine the current Reality, explore Options, and decide What they will do. Joseph Weintraub defines this type of coaching as "an ongoing dialogue with the goal of increasing learning and improving one's ability to perform effectively now and in the future". This manager should be trained to use the GROW approach, which uses open-ended questioning combined with listening to lead employees to think about situations differently and be open to new ways of acting, all intending to bring out their best.

Time: 4 weeks to start

Plan: Create a Mentor a manager program

Do: Create a program where senior managers and management leaders turn to mentors. Then, allocate a mentor for every manager. The mentor's role is to coach the managers on how to manage their teams by providing advice and insights. Mandate that every mentor and manager connect at least once a fortnight. Let them both periodically monitor progress by reviewing the feedback the manager receives.

Time: < 2 weeks to start

Plan: Create an Employee to Manager Feedback System

Do: Create a feedback system where employees actively seek out their managers for any support they may require. This feedback can be anonymous, and managers can be presented with a list of things to work on. Based on the feedback generated, the manager should also communicate to their team what they have focussed on for the month.

Time: >4 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

- The HR should co-own it along with the Managers and Senior Leaders

- While HR should help implement the initiatives, the managers and senior managers should ideate and develop plans and actions.

- The initiative and its outcomes should be part of the KRAs of all three owners, and the outcomes should have metrics to measure efficacy.

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

The HR and Managers should use the feedback to improve the action plan.

2.2. Coaching & mentoring: Do the employees feel that their manager is a coach and mentor to them?

In Gallup’s How Millennials Want to Work and Live report, one of the key findings was that millennials wanted coaches, not bosses or managers. The ability to coach is more important now than ever for managers to keep their teams happy. Coaching and mentoring are a second-dimension engagement driver in the Empuls Pulse Survey

2.2.1. Best Practices to improve Coaching & mentoring from the manager:

Plan: Run a team-specific KYT (Know Your Team) Program

Do: Every team should have a KYE program. The aim of this program is to know an employee better. All details of every team member, including their skill, experience, and aspirations, should be captured. Managers should know all these details about their employees and be tested on them.

Time: 2-4 weeks to start

Plan: Conduct Art of delegation workshops

Do: Let senior managers or members from the management team run a two-hour workshop for managers on how to delegate tasks. The workshop should also cover how managers can enable their teams to handle their tasks efficiently. Delegation gives ownership and by enabling the team members to fulfill a task completely, coaching between the manager and their team member happens organically.

Time: < 2 weeks to start

Plan: Monthly and Quarterly 1:1 goal setting and tracking session

Do: Managers should individually work with each of their team members to help them set their monthly, quarterly, and yearly goals. They should also have a 1:1 session every month to just track the progress on the goals and to help their team members find ways to improve and stay on track.

Time: >4 weeks to start

Plan: Begin with the leaders

Do: Every leader and business unit head should be giving meaningful feedback and applause to their reportees frequently. They should also offer tips and hacks to help their teams improve. This creates an organization where mentorship and coaching happen as a part of the process and hence is easy to feel and perceive.

Time: > 2 weeks to start

Plan: Conduct a GROW framework training for Managers to turn into Coaching Managers

Do: Conduct an ongoing training session for all your managers on progressively transforming into excellent coaching managers every quarter. The training should provide actionable insights, role plays, and real-life examples to explain the GROW framework. Your managers should be trained to help your employees establish a Goal, examine the current Reality, explore Options, and decide What they will do. Joseph Weintraub defines this type of coaching as "an ongoing dialogue with the goal of increasing learning and improving one's ability to perform effectively now and in the future". The managers should be trained to use the GROW approach, which uses open-ended questioning combined with listening to lead employees to think about situations differently and be open to new ways of acting, all intending to bring out their best.

Time: 4 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

- The Leadership and Managers should co-own the initiatives

- It should be a part of their KRA for the quarter and have metrics to measure performance.

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

The Leadership and Managers should use the feedback to improve on the action plan.

2.3. Taking employee opinions seriously: Do your employees feel that their manager cares for their opinion and acts on any feedback?

Feeling that their voice matters to their manager is important for employees. It helps them feel empowered and motivated to work. Taking employee opinions seriously is a second-dimension engagement driver in the Empuls Pulse Survey.

2.3.1. Best Practices to improve your employees feeling their manager cares for their opinion and acts on any feedback:

Plan: Periodic Engagement Surveys by Managers for Employees

Do: Create a system where every manager runs customized engagement surveys to understand what their teams care about and want to be listened to. They should then collate and act on the feedback, keeping their team aware of the survey learnings and action taken.

Time: 2-4 weeks to start

Plan: Listening Court

Do: Every team should have a listening court once every two weeks, where the manager's only role is to listen. Employees are given a free hand to provide feedback, complaints, and accolades about all aspects of their work and life. They should be encouraged to share their thoughts. Whenever there is a lull, managers can use pointers to initiate discussions around topics of employee relevance.

Some examples of pointers to keep the discussion flowing:

Time: < 2 weeks to start

Plan: Seek quarterly feedback at every stage of an employee’s lifecycle

Do: The HR, through the managers, should seek feedback through forms on hiring to exit stages of an employee. These should be administered every quarter.

Feedback received should be incorporated and the changes made must be conveyed to the teams.

Time: >4 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

-The HR and Managers should co-own the initiatives

-HR should help the Managers design and implement the initiatives

- It should be a part of their quarterly KRAs and have metrics to measure performance.

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

The HR and Managers should use the feedback to improve the action plan.

2.4. Objective and transparent decision making: Do your employees perceive the decision-making process of their managers and your organisation as objective and unbiased?

Transparency and objectivity in decision making goes a long way in the employees trusting their managers and respecting the decisions made. It is also an important influence on the employee-manager relationship.

2.4.1. Best Practices to ensure your employees feel that the decision-making process used by their managers and your organisation is objective and fair:

Plan: Adopt OKR framework in your organisation

Do: The Objectives and Key Results goal-setting framework not only helps your entire organization set aligned goals but also helps track and measure them objectively. This way, managers can measure, align, and track their teams' performance while ensuring that team members are aware that the entire process is transparent and not biased.

Time: 2-4 weeks to start

Plan: Create an Organizational Decision-Making Philosophy

Do: The Leadership should work together to create a framework for decision making which explains how all kinds of decisions are taken in the organization. This framework should be published and circulated across the organization. The Leadership should then conduct periodic training sessions for managers on how to use this framework. The Leadership should give real examples and do role-plays to explain the framework practically. Managers should be tested after every training session is conducted.

Time: 4 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

- The Leadership team here should own the initiatives

- It should be a part of their KRA for the quarter

- One of the metrics for measuring the performance would be the manager approval ratings

How to communicate?

Measure: The Leadership and Managers should run a survey and seek feedback after implementing every initiative.

Another measure would be looking at if the manager approval ratings are improving or not

Act:

The Leadership should use the feedback to improve the action plan.

2.5. Autonomy to employees: Do your employees feel that they can autonomously take decisions?

Autonomy is one of the key pillars of employee engagement according to Daniel Pink. According to Pink, autonomy serves as an intrinsic motivator which results in employees having more creativity and ownership.

2.5.1. Best Practices to improve the feeling of autonomy in your employees:

Plan: Define clear cut goals, processes, and roles

Do: To enable autonomy for your employees, the first thing is to ensure they are aware of their role, the goals they seek to achieve, and the processes in place. Have a clear dos and don'ts list to ensure that your employees know what is acceptable and what is not.

Time: 4 weeks

Plan: Improve internal communication

Do: Communication is the key to developing autonomy. Internal communication channels should enable two-way communication between the employees and their managers/leaders. This way any hitch that employees face can be quickly communicated and removed.

Time: 2 weeks to start

Plan: Get out of the way! Training for managers and leaders

Do: Leaders and managers should be trained to stop micromanaging and learn to move out of the way after telling their teams what they want. This ensures that the leaders and managers consciously avoid influencing decisions that individuals can make by themselves. To conduct this training, have an external SME or a senior leader who is appreciated for being a great manager. The training should help managers:

Time: 2-4 weeks

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

- The Leadership team should own the initiatives

- It should be a part of their KRA for the quarter and have metrics to measure performance.

How to communicate?

Measure: The Leadership should run a small team-wise survey and seek feedback after implementing every initiative.

Act: The Leadership should use the feedback to improve the action plan.

2.6. Actionable Insights on the Pulse Survey Results

Weak: Score less than 3.

Insight: Most of your employees are not happy with their managerial relationships.

To improve support from the manager:

Mentor a manager program

To improve Coaching & mentoring from the manager:

Art of delegation workshop

Begin with the leaders

To improve your employees feeling that their manager cares for their opinion and acts on any feedback:

Listening Court

To improve your employees feeling that the decision-making process adopted by their managers and your organization is objective and fair:

Adopt OKR framework in your organisation

To improve the feeling of autonomy in your employees:

Improve internal communication

Overall: Focus on communicating about the actions taken

At risk: Score between 3 and 4, showing a downward trend in the last 3 pulse runs

Insight: While more than 50% of your employees are happy with their managerial relationships, there is a negative trend, and this is at risk of becoming a weakness.

To improve support from the manager:

Training for Managers

To improve Coaching & mentoring from the manager:

Run a team specific KYE (Know Your Employee) Program

To improve your employees feeling that their manager cares for their opinion and acts on any feedback:

Periodic Engagement Surveys by Managers for Employees

To improve your employees feeling that the decision-making process adopted by their managers and your organization is objective and fair:

Adopt OKR framework in your organisation

To improve the feeling of autonomy among your employees:

Get out of the way! Training for managers and leaders

Overall: Focus on communicating about the actions taken

Acceptable: Score between 3 and 4, showing no change in the last 3 pulse runs

Insight: More than 50% of your employees are happy with their managerial relationships; however, this has not improved.

To improve support from the manager:

Employee to Manager Feedback

To improve Coaching & mentoring from the manager:

Monthly and Quarterly one-on-one goal setting and tracking session

To improve your employees’ feeling that their manager cares for their opinion and acts on any feedback:

Feedback forms for every stage of an employee’s lifecycle

To improve your employees’ feeling that the decision-making process adopted by their managers and your organisation is objective and fair:

Create Organizational Decision-Making Philosophy

Adopt OKR framework in your organisation

To improve the feeling of autonomy in your employees:

Define clear-cut goals, processes, and roles

Overall: Focus on communicating about the actions taken

Improving: Score between 3 and 4, showing an increasing trend

Insight: More than 50% of your employees are happy with their managerial relationships, and there is an increasing trend in this sentiment. Work on converting this to a strength.

Continue doing what you are doing and use the Good practices document to incorporate new initiatives that will turn this second-dimensional engagement driver into a strength.

Strength: Score above 4

Insight: More than 80% of your employees are happy with their managerial relationships. This is an area of strength for your organisation. Keep up the good work!

Continue doing what you are doing, document your actions and share them with us. Also use the good practices document to incorporate new initiatives to ensure that this second-dimension engagement driver remains a strength.

3. Values: An organisation's values determine how its people are treated and made to feel. A research report states that Shared organizational values provide comfort to employees and meaning and purpose to work, which ultimately leads to better performance.

In the Empuls Pulse Survey, there are six second dimensional engagement drivers that impact the Values engagement driver. They are:

3.1. Ethics: To what extent do the employees believe that their organisation will adhere to the highest standards of ethics?

Quoting from a research report: Employee engagement is influenced by business ethics, as business success is strongly influenced by ethics nowadays. Organisational ethics are important indicators of the organisation’s values and so they are a second-dimension engagement driver in the Empuls Pulse survey.

3.1.1. Best Practices to improve the perception of working in an ethical organization:

Plan: Create an Ethics Manifesto and publish it

Do: In case the ethics of your organization are not documented or published, create an Ethics Manifesto for your organization and print, publish, and share it. The Leadership should be directly involved in this initiative. One member from the Leadership team should oversee the process of creating the manifesto and publishing it. This manifesto should be available in public domain and should be individually shared with every employee as well.

Time: 2-4 weeks

Plan: Conduct periodic training on your organizational ethics

Do: While your employees might have access to your ethics manifesto, they need to be proactively trained on them. At induction and afterwards, senior leaders should conduct a one-two hour session on your organisational ethics.

They should cover the following:

Time: < 2 weeks to start

Plan: AMA sessions on ethics

Do: Senior leaders should conduct periodic AMA sessions to clarify the ethics code and to proactively help the employees adhere to them.

Time: 3 weeks to start

Plan: Create an ethics committee to address any breach of ethics

Do: The leadership should create an ethics committee to which any breach can be reported. This committee will address and correct any violation of ethics. The committee should also create suitable redress mechanisms and punishments for any violation, depending on the severity of the breach. This committee should comprise a heterogeneous mix of employees.

Time: 4 weeks

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

-The Leadership team should own the initiatives

-It should be a part of their KRA

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

The performance in the quiz is indicative of understanding and should be used as feedback to improve on the action plan.

3.2. Transparency: To what extent do the employees believe your organisation is transparent?

Transparency in an organisation is essential for employees to feel motivated and engaged, as Deloitte's research also points out. In the Empuls Pulse Survey, Transparency is a second-dimension engagement driver that influences an employee's opinion on the organisation's values.

3.2.1. Best Practices to improve transparency in you organization:

Plan: Conduct a transparency audit for all processes

Do: Create a process audit committee comprising employees of different designations from different departments. The committee should audit and evaluate the transparency in existing processes, department-wise. Each process should be able to answer the 5Ws and 1H for your employee. If it does not, then make a note of it to improve it. Seek feedback from the stakeholders using the process to understand how it can be made better and then take actions to improve it.

Time: > 4 weeks

Plan: Enable periodic communication and discussion between Leadership and the employees

Host AMAs, Town Halls, and make your leadership members send periodic emails to your employees to clarify any queries or concerns about anything related to the organisation.

Time: < 2 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

- The Senior Leaders and HR should own the initiatives together.

-The initiatives should be part of their KRA continuosly.

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

The Senior Leaders and HR should use feedback to improve on the action plan.

3.3. Trust: To what extent do the employees believe your organisation is transparent?

Quoting a Forbes article, Trust is a cornerstone of work relationships and a key component of organizational effectiveness. It’s also a fundamental requirement in creating a great place to work. For employees usually, their employers are the most trusted organization and hence it becomes an important second dimension engagement driver.

3.3.1. Best Practices to improve trust in you organization:

Plan: Conduct an audit and remove punitive practices

Do: Create a committee to evaluate all the policies and practices in place. Remove any practice which takes punitive measures. For example, offering a wellness program which penalises smoking or a mandatory attendance policy which monitors the hours an employee is logged in and deducts from the PTO when the hours fall below a minimum threshold. Instead, the focus should be on bringing in practices that empower your employees.

Time: < 4 weeks

Plan: Create norms of trust

Do: Organizations can create norms and cultures of trust by weaving care into the daily interactions of their employees.

HR should identify trust-building opportunities such as:

They should then work with the leadership to incorporate the trust-building activity in the company’s DNA. When trust and positive social exchanges are encouraged, it then becomes an expectation and a norm among employees.

Time: < 2 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

-The Senior Leaders and HR should co-own the initiatives

-The initiatives should be a part of their KRA, on a continuous basis.

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

Used the feedback to improve on the action plan.

3.4. Equity: To what extent do the employees believe that your organisation treats everybody fairly? Does everyone have access to the same growth opportunities and the same resources to achieve them?

Equity theory is based on perception, however: what we perceive to be fair and just. Equity, in today’s work environment, is also used in the context of diversity and inclusion and plays an important role in the employees’ opinions about the organisation’s values.

3.4.1. Best Practices to improve equity in you organisation:

Plan: Create and publish a DE&I policy and strategy document.

Do: Involve a heterogenous group of your employees in creating, documenting, and publishing your DE&I policy and strategy document. This group should be a fair representation of all the diverse sets of employees in your organisation. The aim of your DE&I policy document is to (if need be) create and capture your organisation’s DE&I policy. It should also elucidate the strategy in place for DE&I, capturing:

- The status with respect to the current employee ratio across various diversity dimensions

- The plan, including a 3-month, 6-month, 9-month, 1 year and 3-year plans

- The metrics to measure performance

- The ways in which the DE&I initiatives will be monitored

Time: 4 weeks

Plan: Conduct periodic DE&I Trainings

Do: Involve internal and external resources to conduct DE&I training. The aim of these trainings is to:

Time: < 2 weeks to start

Plan: Create employee resource groups (ERG)

Do: Involve senior leaders in your organisation to create and run employee resource groups that address employee concerns and foster their growth. Each ERG would be affiliated to a particular cause/community of people such as ethnic minorities, women etc. These ERGs should be employee-led groups that allow employees from a variety of backgrounds to find a community of like-minded individuals within the organisation, fostering feelings of acceptance and future shared experiences. ERGs are particularly helpful for remote workers, as a remote structure can make it more difficult for employees to build community and experience inclusion inside their organisation.

Time: 2-4 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

-The Senior Leaders and HR should co-own the initiatives

-It should be a part of their KRA, on a continuous basis.

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

The Senior Leaders and HR should use the feedback to improve on the action plan.

3.5. Sense of Belonging: Do your employees feel they belong to your organization?

A sense of belonging to an organization is important for employee loyalty and motivation. It plays an important role in the employees’ opinions about the organisation’s values. A study found that Employees with a high sense of belonging take 75% fewer sick days than employees who feel excluded.

The Empuls Pulse Survey considers belonging as a second-dimension engagement driver.

3.5.1. Best Practices to improve the sense of belonging in your employees:

Plan: Create an ally network for your employees

Do: Invite employees to form an ally network. The first step in forming an ally network is to involve senior leaders and employee volunteers to form a group that seeks to answer the following questions:

The answers can be found by having discussions with under-represented employees and new-joinees. The ally network then proactively engages with the employees and the organization to try and eliminate exclusion. The ally network should also open communication channels for employees to reach out when they experience exclusion.

Time: 4 weeks

Plan: Create a Dos document to handle circumstances of exclusion

Do: There may be times when a team-member is excluded for unavoidable reasons. To mitigate the impact of exclusion on the employee, create a Dos document to help them.

Time: 2-4 weeks

Plan: Have periodic celebrations and recognitions

Do: Celebrations and recognition increase bonding and the feeling of equity. Encourage teams to celebrate together by going out for dinners and outings. It also promotes a culture of recognition in the company.

Time: 2 weeks

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

-The Senior Leaders and HR should co-own the initiatives

-The initiatives should be part of their KRA, continuously.

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act: The Senior Leaders and HR should use the feedback to improve the action plan.

3.6. Caring: Do your employees feel that your organization cares for them?

The feeling of being cared for boosts security and happiness, leading to more engaged employees. The Empuls Pulse Survey considers belonging as a second-dimension engagement driver.

3.6.1. Best Practices to improve the of being cared for in your employees:

Plan: Invest in well-being programs

Do: Offer physical and mental health well-being programs to your employees as part of their benefits packages. Work stress and the pandemic stress have led to a lot of fatigue in the workplace. Offering well-being programs and benefits will go a long way in making employees feel cared for.

Time: 4 weeks

Plan: Meet the Extended Employees aka Family Event

Do: Periodically conduct events that involve the employee families also. With WFH becoming the norm, the families of employees have become a part of the workplace. Involving them in events is a great way to engage and get to know your employees.

Time: 2-4 weeks

Plan: Offer Family benefits

Do: Offer benefits tailored for the employee's entire family. These include medical care, childcare facilities, child education support, etc. Such benefits make the employees feel that their organisation cares for them.

Time: < 2 weeks to implement.

Plan: Impromptu Check-ins

Do: Encourage the managers and senior staff to check-in with their colleagues spontaneously. Discuss their health and their families.

Time: < 2 weeks

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

-The HR should own the initiatives

-They should be a parr of their KRA, on a continuous basis.

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

Use the feedback to improve on the action plan.

3.7. Actionable Insights on the Pulse Survey Results

Weak: Score less than 3.

Insight: Most of your employees are not happy with your organisation’s values.

To improve the perception of working in an ethical organization:

Create an Ethics Manifesto and publish it

Ethics training

To improve transparency in your organization:

Enable periodic communication and discussion between Leadership and the employees

To improve trust in your organization:

Create norms of trust

Audit and remove punitive practices

To improve equity in your organization:

DE&I Trainings

To improve the sense of belonging in your employees:

Have periodic celebrations and recognitions

To improve the of being cared for in your employees:

Offer Family benefits

Impromptu Check-ins

Overall: Focus on communicating about the actions taken

At risk: Score between 3 and 4, showing a downward trend in the last 3 pulse runs

Insight: While more than 50% of your employees are happy with your organisation’s values, there is a negative trend, and this is at risk of becoming a weakness.

To improve the perception of working in an ethical organization:

Create an Ethics Manifesto and publish it

Ethics training

To improve transparency in your organization:

Enable periodic communication and discussion between Leadership and the employees

Audit and embed transparency in every process and share all organizational information

To improve trust in your organization:

Create norms of trust

Audit and remove punitive practices

To improve equity in your organization:

Create employee resource groups (ESG)

To improve the sense of belonging in your employees:

Create Dos to handle circumstances of exclusion

To improve the of being cared for in your employees:

Meet the Extended Employees aka Family Event

Overall: Focus on communicating about the actions taken

Acceptable: Score between 3 and 4, showing no change in the last 3 pulse runs

Insight: More than 50% of your employees are happy with your organisation’s values; however, this has not improved.

To improve the perception of working in an ethical organisation:

AMA sessions on ethics

A mechanism to address any breach of ethics

To improve transparency in your organisation:

Audit and embed transparency in every process and share all organisational information

To improve trust in your organisation:

Audit and remove punitive practices

To improve equity in your organisation:

Create and Publish DE&I policy

To improve the sense of belonging in your employees:

Promote the creation of an ally network for your employees

To improve the of being cared for in your employees:

Invest in well-being programs

Overall: Focus on communicating about the actions taken

Improving: Score between 3 and 4, showing an increasing trend

Insight: More than 50% of your employees are happy with your organisation's values, and there is an increasing trend in this sentiment. Work on converting this to a strength.

Continue doing what you are doing and use the Good Practices document to incorporate new initiatives to turn this second-dimensional engagement driver into a strength.

Strength: Score above 4

Insight: More than 80% of your employees are happy with your organisation values. This is an area of strength for your organisation. Keep up the good work!

Continue doing what you are doing, document your actions and share them with us. Use the Good Practices document to incorporate new initiatives to ensure the second-dimension engagement driver remains a strength.

4. Culture: Borrowing the definition of Culture from Deloitte: "Culture describes "the way things work around here." Specifically, it includes the values, beliefs, behaviours, artefacts, and reward systems that influence people's behaviour on a day-to-day basis. It is driven by top leadership and becomes deeply embedded in the company through many processes, reward systems, and behaviours. Culture includes all the behaviors that may or may not improve business performance. Today, culture is a CEO-level issue and something that can be measured and improved to drive strategy." Elaborating on the connection between culture and employee engagement, Deloitte states that when culture is aligned with an organisation's business strategy, it attracts talent who are comfortable with the culture and, hence, are highly engaged at work.

In the Empuls Pulse Survey, five-second dimensional engagement drivers impact the Organisational Culture. They are:

4.1. Collaboration: To what extent do your employees feel that they can collaborate across all functions in your organization?

A Stanford study pointed out that employees who collaborate with their colleagues or are perceived to collaborate on a task are more productive, report less fatigue, and have higher engagement levels. In the Empuls Pulse Survey, Collaboration features as a second-dimension engagement driver.

4.1.1. Best Practices to Improve Collaboration:

Plan: Incentivize collaboration

Do: One reason people do not collaborate is that there is no incentive to do so. Incentivize collaboration by making collaborative assignments a part of everyone's KRA. Every single employee should have at least one task that requires collaboration with other team members.

Time: 4 weeks to start

Plan: Think out of the box sessions

Do: Hold fortnightly team sessions titled Think Out of the Box. Here, the team lead should propose a real or imaginary problem faced by the team/organisation, and team members should pair up to solve the problem. The solutions can be documented, and every suggestion used—even if for another problem—credit the employees behind it.

Time: 2-4 weeks to start

Plan: Fortnightly team chime-ins and shout outs

Time: < 2 weeks to start

Plan: Publish POCs list for inter-team collaborations

Do: Create a POC list which is accessible to every employee. This way an employee can get in touch with the person on the POC list to collaborate with other teams/functions.

Time: < 2 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

The Team Leads should own these initiatives

They should be a part of their KRA for the quarter

They should have metrics to measure performance.

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

The Team Leads should use the feedback to improve the action plan.

4.2. Attitude towards failure: Do your employees feel they can try new things and fail without fear of retribution?

Research has repeatedly pointed out that when supervisors strongly believed the organization was

trustworthy in risky situations, their reporting employees' trust on perceived organizational support for any failure related was higher, leading to better performance and trust. It becomes pertinent for organizations to let their employees know that it is all right to fail.

4.2.1. Best Practices to improve your employees’ feeling that they can try new things and fail without fear of any retribution:

Plan: Celebrate an unsuccessful attempt day

Do: Consider holding a celebration day once a month or once a quarter to acknowledge unsuccessful attempts at problem-solving. This can be done at both business function and company-wide levels. Encourage leaders to speak about their unsuccessful attempts and invite others, including managers and employees, to share their experiences. The gathering should be a fun event where everyone is cheered for trying, and individuals are recognised or rewarded for their efforts.

Time: 4 weeks to start

Plan: Fail to succeed document

Do: Create a team-wide fail to success document which is publicly available. The document should contain the following:

Time: 2-4 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

One person from HR and every Team Lead should co-own these initiatives.

They should be a part of their KRA for the quarter and have metrics to measure performance.

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

The Team Leads should use the feedback to improve the action plan.

4.3. Learning Culture: Do your employees feel that you nurture a learning culture in your organization?

Deloitte’s extensive research has pointed out that the single biggest driver of business impact is the strength of an organization’s learning culture. Learning culture enables organizations to identify and solve problems in their products, services, and business processes. It is an important second-dimension driver in the Empuls Pulse Survey.

4.3.1. Best Practices to foster a learning culture in your organization:

Plan: Create rewards and recognition to incentivize learning

Do: Your R&R strategy should also incentivize learning by appreciating and applauding team members who learn to acquire new skills, clear certifications, or enrol on educational programs. HR, in collaboration with the leadership, should discuss how this can be enabled and implemented.

Time: 4 weeks to start

Plan: L&D as a KRA

Do: HR should work with the leadership to create a policy where L&D can be seamlessly incorporated within the organization’s DNA. They should make L&D as a part of every employee’s KRA covering the following:

Time: 2-4 weeks to start

Plan: Internal L&D repository

Do: HR with Leadership should embark on creating an internal repository. This internal repository should be created as both an organisation-wide document and a team-specific one. Every team member should be involved in contributing to this. The plan to develop or make it better should contain the following:

Time: < 2 weeks to start

Plan: Offer L&D training on specific topics and skills.

Do: Create a budget, tie up with external partners, and offer employee training on specific topics and skills. The topics can be chosen based on popular demand or industry trends.

Time: 2-4 weeks to start

Plan: Offer L&D reimbursement as benefits

Do: As a part of your benefits package, you can offer to reimburse or partly fund any L&D program employees take.

Time: 4 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

The L&D committee should use the feedback to improve the action plan.

4.4. Risk Taking: Does your organization encourage employees to take risks?

Extensive research has often pointed out that an employee's ability to take risks, promoted by the organization's culture towards risk-taking, leads to enhanced creativity in the employee. This, in turn, results in more creative outcomes. Hence, it is a crucial second-dimension engagement driver in the Empuls Pulse Survey.

4.4.1. Best Practices to encourage employees to take risks:

Plan: Create a smart-risks framework

Do: Involve all the function heads and create a framework.

The framework should contain the following:

A defined framework and process will help your employees not only know what kind of risks are promoted but also help them align with what your organization can advocate and handle.

Time: 4 weeks to start

Plan: Identify models of risk-taking within the organization

Do: To help define and emulate risk takers, identify the ideal risk takers in your organization and showcase their behaviour. They are your model risk-takers because they subscribe to your organization's perception of ideal risk-taking. Have them speak on what they did and how they went about it.

Time: < 2 weeks to start

Plan: Yes, to risk-taking, yes to rewards!

Do: Use rewards and recognition to applaud risk-takers for their efforts and discuss their accomplishments.

Time: 2-4 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

The Leadership member should use the feedback to improve the action plan.

4.5. Innovation: Do your employees think that your organization encourages innovations?

If we don't innovate, we stagnate is a famous saying. Organizations that foster innovation grow rapidly, create new product and service lines, and have happy employees.

4.5.1. Best Practices to encourage innovation:

Plan: Create a digital suggestion box

Do: Create an email account where employees can mail in suggestions or innovations for any product, process, or aspect of your organization. Periodically remind your employees to mail in.

Time: < 2 weeks to start

Plan: Creative Hour/retreats

Do: Allocate time team-wise for employees to brainstorm ideas around specific team goals and challenges. This should happen periodically. Encourage them to think outside the box and use design thinking principles wherever needed.

Time: 2-4 weeks to start

Plan: Conduct Innovation tournaments

Do: Host an Innovation tournament quarterly or half yearly. You can go about hosting it in the following way:

Time: 4 weeks to start

Plan: Document every idea

Do: Create a centralized repository that documents all suggested ideas, whether implemented or not, and grant employees view access.

Time: 4 weeks to start

How to manage the above Plan and Do?

How to communicate?

Measure:

Act:

The leadership members should use the feedback to improve on the action plan.

4.6. Actionable Insights on the Pulse Survey Results

Weak: Score less than 3.

Insight: A majority of your employees are not happy with your culture.

To improve Collaboration within your organization:

Publish POCs list for inter-team collaborations

Fortnightly team chime-ins and shout-outs

To improve your employees’s feeling that they can try new things and fail without fear of any retribution

Fail to succeed document

To foster a learning culture in your organization:

Internal L&D repository

To encourage employees to take risks:

Identify models of risk-taking within the organization

Overall: Focus on communicating about the actions taken

To encourage innovation:

Create a digital suggestion box

At risk: Score between 3 and 4, showing a downward trend in the last 3 pulse runs

Insight: While more than 50% of your employees are happy with your culture, there is a negative trend, which is at risk of becoming a weakness.

To improve Collaboration within your organization:

Think out-of- the-box sessions

To encourage your employees to take risks and learn from their mistakes without fear of consequences.

Fail to succeed document

Celebrate unsuccessful attempts day

To foster a learning culture in your organization:

Offer L&D training on specific topics and skills

To encourage employees to take risks:

Yes, to risk-taking, yes to rewards!

To encourage innovation:

Creative Hour/retreats

Overall: Focus on communicating about the actions taken

Acceptable: Score between 3 and 4, showing no change in the last 3 pulse runs

Insight: More than 50% of your employees are happy with your culture; however, this has not improved.

To improve Collaboration within your organization:

Incentivize collaboration

To improve your employees feeling that they can try new things and fail without fear of any retribution

Celebrate unsuccessful attempts day

To foster a learning culture in your organization:

Create rewards and recognition to incentivize learning

Offer L&D reimbursement as benefits

To encourage employees to take risks:

Create a smart risk framework

To encourage innovation

Innovation tournaments

Document every idea

Overall: Focus on communicating about the actions taken

Improving: Score between 3 and 4, showing an increasing trend

Insight: More than 50% of your employees are happy with your culture, and there is an increasing trend in this sentiment. Work on converting this to a strength.

Continue doing what you are doing and use the good practices document to incorporate new initiatives that will turn this second-dimensional engagement driver into a strength.

Strength: Score above 4

Insight: More than 80% of your employees are happy with your culture. Your organization's culture is an area of strength. Keep up the good work!

Continue doing what you are doing, document your actions and share them with us. Also, use the Good Practices document to incorporate new initiatives to ensure that second-dimension engagement driver remains a strength.

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