Employee Morale Wilting? Grow a Customer Focused Culture

By Priscilla Kohl | HRTools.com Business Writer

Customers are the direct beneficiaries of a service or a product.

Human resources (HR), therefore, has customers. Its customers are employers and employees.

How does HR effectively market itself to those customers?

First, it’s important to understand that HR is in the business of helping employers recruit, hire and develop engaged and productive employees. It’s a very significant role; after all, employees hold the glue sticks that keep an organization together. Employee surveys will also tell you how well you're doing.

Before continuing, consider the following two questions first:

1. Do you find some truth in this quote (author unknown)? "Those who can—do. Those who can do more, volunteer."
2. If so, how can paid workers be motivated to want to do more, as well?

Obviously, volunteers as unpaid workers are not attracted by compensation packages or motivated by titles, promotions, pay raises, commissions or bonuses.

In a way, watching highly motivated, highly engaged volunteers is like watching children at play. They appear to be having such a good time that they don’t want to stop. When volunteers roll up their collective sleeves to work, they’re the epitome of high performance achievers.

So what motivates volunteers? Generally, as most successfully led nonprofits would agree, committed volunteers are normally motivated by:

• a desire to make a difference; and
• organizations that know how to nurture them.

And, as many will tell you, when organizations fail to nurture their committed volunteers, they can lose them.

Bottom line: Successful nonprofits nurture committed unpaid workers as a business would nurture their valued customers or clients.

This is why HR will want to subscribe to similar customer focused marketing principles.

A business and its workers are intertwined. Employees are the heart and soul of any organization.

In fact, many HR strategists claim: When employees are neglected and not nurtured, businesses can often end up losing on many fronts. Lackluster or waning employee productivity and high employee turnover are just two costly consequences that come to mind.

In contrast, when employers nurture their employees and treat them as valued internal customers, you will usually find a corresponding return-on-investment (ROI). And the employer investment costs usually are in the form of time and efforts.

To nurture employees by growing an internal customer focused culture, consider the following marketing techniques:

1. Communicate regularly and consistently. Stay in touch, be available, be responsive and keep employees informed.

   When employees are not nurtured through communication, they can also feel neglected and morale can start to wilt. Communicating helps employees feel valued and important, so it’s essential to show that in many ways. For example, just as you would with a customer—return or respond to messages within 24 hours, whenever possible.

2. Address employees by name, if feasible. Take a little time and effort to personalize their experiences—again, just as you would with a customer.

   If your organization employs hundreds of employees, of course, this gesture is not always possible. However, for instance, when you’re riding the elevator or walking the halls with other employees, make an effort to introduce yourself. Ask a few questions to engage employees, such as, "What department do you work in?" Or, "What did you think about the new client service initiatives announced the other day?" You also might benefit from what you hear and learn from employees.

3. Thank employees and let them know you appreciate them and their relationships throughout the organization. Nonprofits and businesses certainly know the value of expressing a simple "Thank you" to a volunteer or to a customer. Sure, employees work to earn a paycheck, but even a short verbal or written note of gratitude can go a long way in recognizing and reinforcing employee efforts. So, just as you might express to a customer: "Thank you for your business, and I look forward to our continued relationship;" you can likewise acknowledge an employee by replacing the word "business" with the words "hard work." What you’re striving for with customers, of course, is repeat business; and what you’re striving for with employees is repeat results.

4. Deliver on commitments, but when you can’t—take swift actions to explain why and what to expect instead. Relationship experts will tell you that credibility and trust are vital to developing and maintaining productive relationships. Trust is more than a feeling, and it involves following through with a plan. In other words, action validates trust, and this applies to all business relationships—customers and employees alike. Granted life is full of uncertainties, and every organization is faced with changes beyond their control. If, for example, economic pressures force you to re-evaluate your commitments, make sure you act promptly to explain why alternatives are necessary. Then, make sure you follow up with those alternatives. Employees perform better when they can better predict their employer’s behaviors or expectations.

5. Strive to assess employees individually and place them in the right positions. Successful nonprofits know the value of paying keen attention to volunteers and assessing their individual passions, skill sets and abilities. Effective nonprofit leaders place a high priority on matching individual traits to respective tasks or roles. This awareness is most important in the nonprofit world; because, if volunteers are assigned to a dreaded task or to a role they are sure to fail at, they certainly don’t have to come back for more.

Likewise, a successful customer focused business recognizes the value of paying close attention to its employees—their personalities, backgrounds, skills, abilities, passions, needs and career dreams. A hiring manager with a large Houston-based corporation asks his people questions such as, "What jobs or tasks fulfill your strongest identity needs?" This is a great open-ended question, one that can help guide both the employee and the manager.

On the other hand, it would be a recipe for failure to assign an extroverted type person with poor math or accounting skills to work in some remote part of the building, away from people, and crunching out numbers on an Excel spreadsheet.

It’s positively contagious—when the above customer focused marketing practices are followed, employers can expect to prosper and grow through:

• higher levels of employee morale
• lower rates of employee turnover
• invigorated levels of team camaraderie
• recharged levels of productivity
• growing numbers of happier and more fulfilled employees

At the end of the day, HR customer focused marketing principles serve to rally the troops and keep employee morale high.

What’s more: A customer focused marketing return-on-investment (ROI) virtually speaks for itself. As studies show, employees who are highly motivated and productively engaged are less likely to be distracted by looking for greener pastures.