First Quarter 2009 Views About Leadership

A new snapshot is out on first quarter 2009 views about leadership. According to Towers Perrin’s Workplace Watch, a new quarterly report on employee opinions, “favorable views about leadership — the top driver of employee engagement — are down in some key areas:

• Most notably, the percentage of employees agreeing top management provides a clear sense of direction dropped significantly, to 63% from 71% in the fourth quarter of 2008.
• The percentage of employees agreeing that top management provides effective leadership also declined to 50% from 56% at the end of 2008.
• In addition, only 69% of employees agree that they clearly understand their company’s broad goals, down a striking 10 percentage points from 79% in the fourth quarter of 2008.

The report compares the first quarter of 2009 with the preceding five quarters and was culled from the opinions of 650,000 employees across a spectrum of organizations, world-wide.

The authors lay out a strategy for leadership to address employee engagement during this time.

• Get leaders out front to talk with employees about the business environment and how the organization is responding, as well as the long-term vision and what the organization stands for.
• Involve employees in efforts to manage costs to help them feel like active contributors.
• Communicate consistently and candidly about both short- and long-term objectives.
• Listen and gather input from employees.
• Promote development opportunities so people can see a future for themselves worth working toward.

Considering the economic climate, several positive signs also emerged from the report. Worth the read.