Is employee satisfaction important? Does it really matter if I look for ways to satisfy employees within my organization? Aren't there more important things I can be doing?

Those are good questions, and deserve an answer. For five years at the 400 bed hospital where I worked, I was involved in training new employees in our plan for customer satisfaction. As part of that training, I began each class talking with the orientees about the things they considered important as customers of the company. It was interesting, and the answers were very consistent. Over those five years money was always in the top ten, but it was also never above number six! Interesting, huh? Most of the clients I work with now (business executives) would place it at number one or two, but that's not so with their employees.

Looking for Number One

What was number one? In over 150 informal surveys taken during those sessions, the answer listed over 100 times as most important to employees was "respect from my boss". Respect. Now why would that be considered so important? These new staff told me about jobs they'd had where, even after years of experience, they were never asked how things could be improved. It was particularly frustrating when the company was loud about it's policies (customer satisfaction, quality, service, etc.) but staff were faced daily with broken processes that made such policies difficult - or impossible.

Built-In Headaches

And that's the reason good employees leave. People who want to do a good job are especially irritated by recurrent problems on a job. That kind of problem is a built-in headache, often occurring every single time a certain process is followed. What's the starting activity a good leader can do to begin eliminating such problems and raising morale? LISTEN! Make it a regular habit to listen to employees about the issues they're facing - then DO something about it.

Gotta Do Both

Now those two steps together are important. If you just listen and don't act on what you hear, people will not only stop talking, but their faith in you will disappear. On the other hand, if you act on what you see as problems without listening to the "players", your fixes will not address the key details of the problem, and you will likely cause anger and disillusionment, and likely make things even worse. Very soon people will begin looking elsewhere for work.

What's It Cost?

When a good employee leaves, you've got a basketful of steps to go through to replace him or her, and productivity among other staff will drop while you're doing it. In fact, if a $10 an hour employee leaves, and it takes 45 days for you to fill that position, your actual loss in dollars is going to be $802.51 - and that doesn't include losses in sales or services. So what happens when you both listen to and apply what you hear from your staff? You'll find that your company will not only become more productive, but customers will be happier, spirits will rise, your profits will get better, AND you'll keep your good employees. Try it - it's worth it.