Key Engagement Question: Would You Recommend a Friend to Work Here?

One of the most important questions when it comes to employee engagement is, “Would you recommend a friend to work here?”

One of my Gen Y mentee’s called me last week. The problem was I was in Boston on business and she knew that. So when she called I knew there was a problem. As I glanced at the phone, my thought was, “What now?”

When we finally talked she told me that a friend of hers was applying for a position at her company and had asked if she could do an internal transfer of her resume to the hiring manager. She wanted to know, “what is it like to work there?”

Would you recommend your organization?

The New Org Chart: Identifying the REAL Information Brokers in Your Business

New York City is known as a city to people watch.

As I ride the subway each morning, the ride takes me through neighborhoods that have both private and public schools. The cars are inundated with teenagers on their way to school. Just try and imagine a room full of teenagers, all divided into small groups.

I always look up as they come in the subway car: Youth and lots of noise. I watch and try to pick the leaders in each group, and it is so easy to spot them in their clusters.

Who are the real leaders?

Volunteering: How You Can Turn It Into the Ultimate Team-Building Event

My daughter decided to volunteer through a program at her job.

Each employee has the opportunity to volunteer their services and receive a day off in return. She was up early on a Saturday morning and headed into New York City to work at a soup kitchen in the Bowery.
To her surprise, basically the entire division that she worked with was there. She was really surprised to see the senior executives there in their jeans and sweatshirts.

She could not stop talking about the experience and how wonderful for her company to sponsor such an event even if there was not a day off in return. She met many of the people in the kitchen and got a chance to really have a conversation with a number of them one-on-one.

Employee Engagement? In a Business, It Needs to Start at the Very Top

A fish rots from the head down, as the saying goes.

While the word rot sounds offensive, let’s just say it starts from the top.

This week, I was having a conversation when someone mentioned to me that their new CEO of her company was in town. She was slated to be in the New York office for a couple of days.

This CEO met with the senior staff, and as they gave her a tour of the building, she passed numerous employees. In that passing she acknowledged no one — no eye contact, no nod of the head, and basically no “how are you?”