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Leading a team in today's technologically advanced and socially conscious world demands exceptional skills and techniques. However, with the right tools, it can also be an incredibly fulfilling experience. While we began this leadership series with humor by exploring the personality traits of the Founding Fathers, it's important to delve into the realities of leadership in the present day. Technology, including social media and its ever-changing trends, continues to disrupt and transform the workplace. As a result, leaders must understand how these changes impact their role.

Personality assessments are an indispensable tool that can aid leaders in their quest for leadership bliss, even though they can't help you learn the latest TikTok dance. With the Omnia Group, leaders can uncover essential factors such as tenacity, expressiveness, flexibility, and need for structure in not only the people they are bringing on, but also in themselves. By understanding these insights, leaders can adjust their approach to their employees' superpowers and kryptonite. It's like having x-ray vision for their team, minus the cape and phone booth!

When navigating modern-day employee-focused leadership, it's imperative to recognize that the employee life cycle is an ongoing process that presents unique challenges and opportunities. However, when handled correctly, it can lead to higher retention scores. Understanding this cycle and addressing each stage with intention and care is crucial to building a successful team.

4 Stages of the Employee Life Cycle

1. Onboarding

Leaders can use behavioral assessments to help new team members understand their strengths and develop action plans to get and keep them on the right path. This can guide the training process and ensure that new hires are equipped with the necessary skills and knowledge.

2. Development

As team members grow and take on new challenges, behavioral assessments can be used to identify areas for improvement and potential roadblocks to success. Leaders can provide targeted coaching plans and mentoring sessions based on these assessments, as well as offer training programs tailored to each team member's learning style and personality.

3. Retention

Personality assessments identify what motivates and engages each individual. Armed with these insights, you can create a positive work environment where team members feel valued and appreciated, which will help to keep top talent. They can also identify potential retention risks and give tips to take proactive steps to address them.

4. Offboarding

When team members leave their current jobs, whether through resignation, termination, transfer, or promotion, leaders must handle the offboarding process with care. This includes providing feedback, conducting exit interviews, and ensuring a smooth transition. It's vital to note that when team members transfer or get promoted, they may go back through the cycle in the new department and new role.

By understanding and effectively managing each stage of the employee life cycle, leaders can cultivate a team that is engaged, motivated, and committed to achieving shared goals. This, in turn, can lead to a culture of development and innovation.

When they concentrate on strategies that foster a positive and productive work culture, leaders can create an environment where their team members feel supported, motivated, and engaged. This can result in higher levels of productivity, job satisfaction, and retention rates, which can benefit the organization in the long term. Additionally, highlighting these strategies can also help leaders build a strong employer brand and attract top talent to the organization.

5 Strategies for Creating a Positive and Productive Work Culture

1. Nurture continuous learning

Encouraging the team to constantly learn and grow will not only benefit them but also the organization as a whole. Providing opportunities for training and development will help employees build new skills and gain confidence.

2. Embrace diversity

Building a diverse team can lead to better problem-solving, increased creativity, and a wider range of perspectives. It's essential to create an inclusive environment where everyone feels respected.

3. Communicate effectively

Clear and consistent communication is key to any successful team. Leaders should be transparent and communicate openly with their team and ask them to do the same.

4. Prioritize work-life balance 

In today's fast-paced work environment, it's essential to prioritize work-life balance. Encouraging employees to take breaks and focus on their mental health can lead to a more productive and engaged team.

5. Lead by example 

As a leader, actions speak louder than words. Modeling the behavior you want to see in your organization can help create a culture of success and accountability.

Effective leadership involves guiding team members through a lifecycle of onboarding, development, retention, and offboarding while utilizing tools, such as Omnia’s personality assessments, to better understand and work with each individual. By fostering a positive culture of continuous learning, embracing diversity, communicating effectively, prioritizing work-life balance, and leading by example, leaders can create a motivated and engaged team that produces exceptional results. An added bonus of using personality assessments is they can help to put team members in roles that align with their strengths and work preferences, making everyone happier and more productive. After all, who doesn't want to be the best version of themselves, both personally and professionally, and in a role that highlights them? Let's lead with intentionality and personality and watch our teams thrive as a result.

You let out a heavy sigh as you scan through the resignation letter on your desk. Employee turnover has always been somewhat of an issue at your organization. But lately, there’s been a mass exodus of talent. Unfortunately, this critical departure will leave you and the rest of your team scrambling to hit the targets on your scorecard.

You think there must be something you can do to stop the bleeding, and you’re right! We’ll share 17 ways you can boost your employee retention strategy. That way, you can spend more time crushing company goals than recruiting replacement workers.

Why Your Employee Retention Strategy Needs a Boost

Before we dive into the tactics you can use to keep staff happily employed by your firm, let’s review why implementing them will be worth your effort. Sure, turnover creates chaos in the office, disrupts workflows, and brings down morale.

But, did you know that it can cost your company up to 33% of your team member’s annual salary to replace them? That means the business may spend more than $80,000 to replace an executive earning $250,000 per year. This staggering figure accounts for lost productivity, overtime wages (to cover the departed employee’s shifts), and recruiting, onboarding, and training expenses.

The financial damage of employee turnover alone should prompt you to take action. But, the rewards of strong employee retention extend beyond the firm’s bottom line. Benefits also include happier team members, stability, and a sense of calm — all tough to put a price tag on.

17 Boosting Ideas to Try

Here are 17 of the best approaches to incorporate into your employee retention strategy:

1. Hire the Right Person

When you hire the right applicant for the job, your chance of retaining them for the long haul goes way up. That’s because they’ll be more likely to handle position responsibilities successfully and fit in well with the team.

But, when you bring in the wrong person for the role, the reverse will likely be true. They’ll probably struggle to complete their work or bond with their coworkers, ultimately leading to frustration, conflict, and turnover.

2. Onboard New Hires with Care

Selecting the best-suited professional for the position is only part of the battle. Now, you must onboard them effectively — or risk losing them early in their tenure with your company. A proper onboarding process includes:

Pro Tip: Consider pairing each new hire with a company veteran that can help them get acclimated.

3. Pay Competitive Wages

Your organization must pay competitive wages, or your workers will leave for a company that does. Conduct market research at least annually to ensure your salaries meet or exceed those of your competitors. If you find that your pay severely lags the market, plan to update your salary ranges for new hires and provide raises to your existing staff as soon as possible.

4. Offer a Robust Benefits Package

While your employees value money, many are even more concerned with their benefits package. So first, be sure you’re offering a solid suite of traditional benefits, like health insurance, paid time off, and a retirement savings plan match.

Then, supplement those with a wide range of perks that cater to various life and career phases. Popular examples include pet insurance, student loan repayment assistance, and legal or financial advice programs.

5. Respect Time Away from the Office

Let your employees forget about work when they are out of the office. That means don’t email, call, or text them between shifts or while they’re on vacation. Your respect for their personal time will be appreciated — likely in the form of better performance when they return or extended tenure.

6. Invest in Employee Development

Most of your team members don’t want to stagnate for the rest of their careers. They have professional dreams that they want to realize before they retire. You can help them achieve those goals by investing in their development. That investment might look like providing:

Remember: While they may take their newfound skills and knowledge to another employer, your organization will benefit from their enhanced capabilities in the meantime.

7. Promote from Within

Now that you’ve spent a lot of time and money on employee development, you should strive to promote your all-stars whenever possible. Lay out clear career paths during annual reviews and performance check-ins. If your team members can see a future with your firm, they won’t have to look to hit their next professional milestone elsewhere.

8. Select Leaders Carefully

Bad managers drive out good employees faster than you can blink. That’s why it’s critical to select your leadership team carefully. Be sure each manager has the traits and skills required to achieve company objectives while taking care of their employees.

9. Maintain a Welcoming Company Culture

Every employee wants to feel welcome in their workplace, like they belong. So, your company should establish and maintain a culture that champions diversity, equity, and inclusion. The firm should also ensure that employee policies are fair and promote transparency through open and regular communication.

Pro Tip: Another way to make employees feel like they belong is to foster a strong bond between your team members. Consider organizing regular picnics, cookouts, potluck dinners, or coffee shop crawls so workers can hang out with each other.

10. Set Well-Defined, Straightforward Goals

Your workers must understand what’s expected of them to succeed in their roles. So, you need to set well-defined and straightforward goals for them to hit. If you don’t, they’ll fumble around in the dark, guess at what you want, and likely miss the mark. If that happens for too long, they’ll grow frustrated and quit. Or, they’ll get fired for poor performance.

11. Provide Continuous, Useful Feedback

It’s not enough to give your team members a target to aim at — you also need to guide them along the way. That means you can’t reserve your feedback for annual review time. Instead, you should give your employees a steady stream of your observations that they can use to course correct or enhance their performance.

12. Appreciate Achievement and Dedication

A little praise goes a long way to keeping your team intact. So, be sure to appreciate and celebrate each employee for their contributions. Contributions could range from consistently coming to work on time to hitting a significant milestone.

Pro Tip: Be sure to learn and respect how each worker likes to be recognized — publicly or privately.

13. Regard Employees as People

Your employees may get assigned numbers in your payroll system, but they’re much more than that. If you have empathy and treat them as people with meaningful lives outside of the office, you’ll be much more likely to keep them on your team.

So, ask them about their weekend, take an interest in what they do for fun, or lend an ear when they’re struggling. They’ll remember those gestures.

14. Trust Your Workers

You hired each employee because you know they can fulfill their responsibilities. So, take a step back, and let them do so. If you micromanage your team members, they’ll withdraw further and further from you — until they work for another company. But, if you show that you trust them, you’ll inspire them to work hard for your firm.

Pro Tip: Many professionals want a remote or hybrid position. So, accommodate them unless they absolutely must be in the office.

15. Demonstrate the Impact of the Work

Many professionals want to know that what they’re doing is making a difference. If they feel a sense of purpose, they’ll be more likely to keep working for your organization. So, show each employee how their efforts impact the team, company, and world.

16. Facilitate Opportunities to Give Back

Your workers will feel a stronger connection to your firm if it shows that it cares about more than its bottom line. So, consider giving your employees paid time off to volunteer. You can also help them give money to their favorite charities via payroll deductions.

Pro Tip: Volunteering as a group can be a great team-building activity.

17. Gauge Satisfaction and Ask for Suggestions

The best way to improve your employee retention program is to ask your workers for their perspectives. Have them rate their satisfaction with various aspects of their employment experience. Allow them to make suggestions to increase morale and engagement. And most importantly, use their feedback and implement their recommendations whenever possible. When employees feel listened to, they’ll be more likely to stay.

How Omnia Can Help

Knowing which candidate to hire can be challenging — especially when it’s a close call between two candidates. Don’t worry, though. Our cognitive and behavioral assessments can help you decide.

Our cognitive assessment gauges your candidate’s aptitude. It will reveal their ability to think, learn, comprehend, adapt, solve problems, and more. With these results in hand, you’ll know if they have the mental acuity to handle the open role.

Our behavioral assessment looks at your candidate’s personality. It will dive into their communication style and work preferences. After reading the report, you’ll know if they’re a good fit for the position — and your company. Our behavioral assessment insights can also help you train, lead, motivate, and reward workers once they’re on your team.

Candidates (or employees) can complete each test in a few minutes, and you’ll receive actionable results instantly. Plus, you can request a deeper analysis of the behavioral assessment findings.

See the behavioral assessment in action with this complimentary demo!

Final Thoughts

If you’re not actively trying to keep your team members, you will lose them. The market is highly competitive, and professionals won’t hesitate to jump ship for a better arrangement. Fortunately, there’s a lot you can do to boost your employee retention strategy. If you implement even a handful of the methods we’ve discussed here, you’ll be well on your way to outshining your competitors as an employer of choice.

Tell us: What are you doing to improve employee retention at your organization?

One of the many cool things about personality assessments is that they are a springboard for any human resource initiative, problem, or interaction. Filling an open position? Assess your top performers to build a job benchmark. Having conflict on a team? Use the Omnia assessment to understand the communication style of the parties involved. Getting ready to facilitate a training class? Start with the assessment to determine the learning preferences of the participants. Ready to promote employee well-being? Our assessment can even help with that.

How?

Certain kinds of stress can be good, like the stress that accompanies reaching for goals or going through positive life changes, even the stress we feel exercising. But when we think of stress normally, especially at work, it’s not in a good way. Bad stress can be quite insidious and unhealthy.

Picture this:

A manager, we’ll call her Joan, sends an email first thing Monday morning to her employee; we’ll call her Maeve. Joan writes, “I’d like to see you in my office at 2 pm” and immediately sends out a calendar invite. Location: Joan’s office. Joan just wants to check in, see how Maeve is doing, and thank her for always doing such a great job. Joan respects Maeve, enjoys working with her, and feels confident Maeve’s assignments will get done right without any intervention from her… she wishes more employees were just like her. She also wants to ask for Maeve’s opinion on a project that the product team will be working on. She knows Maeve is an expert with terrific insights. Joan just has to draw those insights out sometimes.

Sounds great, right?

Not so much. At least not for Maeve.

That email created a high-anxiety, stressful, worry-filled day.

Crazy?

Well, not if you understand Maeve’s personality type. Maeve is a supporter. She’s naturally cautious, reserved, and analytical. It’s what makes her so great at her client service job. She falls into the Administrator personality group (one of Omnia’s 17 personality groups). She is naturally accommodating and always wants to be counted on to get things right. She has natural attention to detail and works hard to avoid criticism. She is conscious of people’s feelings; she never wants to be perceived as pushy or demanding though she demands excellence from herself. Individuals in this personality group can dwell on mistakes, analyze conversations a bit unproductively, and operate within a fairly constant state of tension…and that’s on a regular, stress-free day!

As a result, Maeve worried about the conversation with Joan. Did she do something wrong? Did she make a mistake in her documentation? Did she say the wrong thing to a customer or to Joan? Maybe she forgot to log off her computer and run the required updates? Was Joan upset that she needed to leave a little early last Tuesday? Was the company downsizing? Was she going to get fired? She’s seen people get terminated in that office -- why does it have to be in Joan’s office?! And as she spiraled just a little bit more and more between Joan’s email and the meeting at 2 pm, the stress in her was, of course, building.

That kind of stress is, simply put, bad for our health and our emotional well-being. The last thing you want is for your employees to get heart palpitations from a meeting request or feel any unnecessary stress at work. We all have plenty of stress as it is without, however unintentionally, creating more.

So, what could Joan have done?

It was all so simple really. Reading Maeve’s Omnia report, Joan would have had the answers. Most analytical supporters, like Maeve, need information and time to process their thoughts. The meeting request simply needed details or at the very least a reassuring word that the meeting was going to be a positive one.

Here is an example of various ways to avoid the stress-spiral day.

Email 2 (we know how email 1 turned out): Good morning, Maeve. I’d like to meet with you at 2 pm. All good stuff, need to talk about a project. Invite to follow.

Maeve has an okay day, though she worries that she should have something prepared for the meeting. What project? Her hands are so full right now, what if she can’t do the project. At least she’s not getting fired.

Email 3: Good morning, Maeve. I’d like to meet with you at 2 pm. All good stuff, you’re doing a great job. Would also like to talk about a project that the product team is working on. Invite to follow.

Maeve feels good, but insecure because she hates being put on the spot. She wishes she knew more about the product project so she can think it over and come to the meeting prepared. Being put on the spot is the worst!

Email 4: Good morning, Maeve. You’re doing such a great job! I’d like to meet with you at 2 pm and just touch base on how things are going for you. We haven’t connected one on one in a while. Is there anything you need? Also, the product team is working on a new usage-trend report for clients and is looking for some advice on what should be included. Since you talk to our clients every day, I’d really like to hear your thoughts.

Eureka! Maeve is excited. How nice to hear that Joan thinks she is doing a great job and just wants to see how she’s doing. That’s so thoughtful. And, YES, she does have ideas about usage trend reports. A client was just asking about something like that the other day. She’s glad she has most of the day to get her speaking points together. Joan is the best manager ever!

Joan, feeling confident now, sends a similarly detailed message to Jared, a top sales rep and a member of Omnia’s Visionary personality group. He’s assertive, talkative, fast-paced, and big-picture-focused. Jared doesn’t read the whole email, wishes Joan would just send a calendar invite and save the info for the meeting. Jared is briefly annoyed he had to open an email in the first place. “It’s such a waste of my time, I need to be selling!”

Joan decides to take a nice, long vacation.

Want to know the communication preferences of your team? Omnia can help. Our quick, accurate personality assessment is ideal for selection, retention, engagement, and yes, even employee well-being. Stop the stress spirals today!

Chances are, you’ve been blindsided by the resignation of an all-star employee. You probably watched productivity and morale take a nosedive — and wondered what went wrong. While some turnover on your team is ultimately inevitable, much of it can be prevented. So today, we’re gifting you our top 10 tips for employee retention. The ultimate gift is keeping more of your top performers within your organization longer.

Our Best Advice for Employee Retention

Take a read through our best pearls of wisdom on keeping your employees engaged and working for your company. Which ideas have you already implemented, and which do you still need to try?

#10: Onboard Thoughtfully — and Thoroughly

New employees need to feel welcomed and supported as they begin their tenure with your organization — and a one-day orientation isn’t going to cut it. Instead, you should create an extended onboarding program that acclimates them to their work environment, introduces them to the team, and gets them comfortable in their new role. Consider including formalized training, mentorship, team events, and regular check-ins and feedback as part of your process.

#9: Evaluate and Adjust Your Payscale

It’s tough to keep (and attract) A-players if you don’t offer a competitive salary. So, be sure to keep tabs on industry compensation trends and adjust your payscale as needed. That way, you don’t lose your next all-star to your competition over money.

#8: Offer a Robust and Customizable Benefits Package

While salary is important, your benefits package plays a big role in attracting and retaining talent. Professionals expect staples like health insurance, vacation time, and a retirement plan. So you need to find a way to make your suite of perks stand out.

Strive to provide a range of benefits that caters to employees at different stages of life. For example, you could offer student loan repayment assistance for college grads, paid parental leave for new parents, or long-term care insurance for pre-retirees. Then, your team members can pick and choose what matters most to them as their situation changes.

#7: Allow Flexible Work Arrangements

During the pandemic, many employees became accustomed to working from home and didn’t want to return to the office full-time. Plus, many workers still need a flexible schedule to care for children, aging relatives, their own health concerns, and other personal matters. So, if you can offer a remote or fluid work arrangement, your team members won’t have to look for that perk elsewhere.

#6: Recognize and Reward Often

Your staff puts in a lot of hours working towards organizational goals. Don’t let it be a thankless job. Be sure to recognize and reward them whenever possible and let them know they’re appreciated. Depending on the situation, the budget, and each employee’s preferences, you could offer them things like praises, raises, extra perks, or company swag.

#5: Focus on Professional Development

Most employees are driven to advance professionally, so they need to know that they have a future with your company. To help them see that, map out clear career paths for each team member, and offer ample opportunities to grow and develop. Your development plans could include training, conference attendance, job shadowing, job rotation, mentoring, professional organization membership, etc.

#4: Provide the Necessary Tools

Workers need adequate tools and resources to do their jobs. But, if those things aren’t readily available, your employees will get frustrated. Then, their productivity and morale will suffer. You can save your staff from a lot of irritation at work (and the potential aggravation of looking for a new job) by equipping them with the gear they require.

#3: Invite (and Listen to!) Employee Input

If your employees feel like they have a voice at work, they’ll be more invested in the company’s mission — and more likely to stay with the organization. So, give them regular opportunities to make suggestions and provide feedback. Then, try to implement as much of their input as practically possible.

#2: Give Regular Feedback

Your employees need to know how they’re doing to stay on track or make adjustments as necessary. So, give them feedback on their performance often. You can do so informally when teachable moments arise, at planned meetings, or both. Just make sure that your team members always know what’s expected of them and that they have your support along the way.

And the #1 Tip for Employee Retention is…

Hire the Right Person

The best onboarding process, compensation and benefits package, and professional development program in the world can’t make up for a bad hire. When recruiting mistakes happen, it not only hurts the team’s productivity, it sets up the new employee to fail because they’re not suited for the role. Eventually, they’ll either get fired for poor performance or quit, and you’ll have to start the hiring process again. But, you can reduce disruptions in production and unnecessary turnover by hiring the right person for the job from the get-go. I know, easier said than done sometimes, but…

How Omnia Can Help

To successfully retain your top talent, you need to understand what they want and how they tick. That’s where we come in. Our research-backed and proven behavioral assessment can help you unlock valuable insights into each employee’s communication and work style, motivations, personality, and more. That way, you can hire professionals who are a good match for your open positions and team dynamic. Plus, the same results will help you manage your workers effectively throughout their entire tenure with your organization.

The best part? The whole process is fast and easy. So if you’ve got a few minutes, try a complimentary assessment to see our tool in action.

Final Thoughts

It hurts when an employee leaves your company — especially if they’re a key player. Fortunately, there’s a lot you can do to keep your team members happy and engaged for the long haul. So tell us: what are some of your favorite employee retention tips?

Remember: We’re here to help! Contact us today to learn more about our assessments and other resources.

It’s that big gift. Remember the one, when you were a kid? The one thing that you weren’t expecting, but it made your eyes light up. And you kept playing with it long after the holidays. Maybe for years. It’s the one that pops into your mind when someone asks, “What is the best gift you’ve ever received?” It was special because it lasted and made a difference, and it showed you that the giver really knew you.

That’s what employee engagement is. Going into each day with interest and curiosity, feeling seen and understood by management, feeling important, knowing you can make a difference, having room to grow in your career… all this wrapped in a package called Employee Engagement is an eyes-light-up kind of gift.

But this isn’t just a gift for the recipient – it’s one for the giver, too. According to Natalie Wickham at Quantum Work, leaders who invest their time, effort and resources into employee engagement receive the following benefits in return:

And much more. Talk about a gift that keeps on giving!

Act now! Even though there is no one place to click or operators standing by, employee engagement is not too difficult to obtain. Here are 7 important parts of employee engagement.

1. Respect: Having a culture of employee/employer respect is crucial. This is the most basic aspect of engagement. On its own, it’s probably not enough, but without it, nothing else will work. To foster a culture of respect: Treat people fairly/equitably, offer corrective performance advice in private and diplomatically, discourage gossip, follow through on commitments, hire sufficiently to keep workloads manageable, listen to and address concerns, and be prepared to apologize.

2. Appreciation: Let employees know their work is valued. When someone goes above and beyond, acknowledge it. Say thank you out loud and in public if the employee is the outgoing type who likes being in the spotlight. Email a thank you to the ones who would rather not. But go ahead and cc the team because, even if the employee is reserved, it feels good to be acknowledged.

3. Getting to know people: While we’re on that subject, knowing what type of recognition a person prefers is a great way to keep them engaged. Engagement, like most aspects of leadership, is not a one-size-fits-all matter. Learn about each person’s personality. How do they prefer to communicate? When do they seem to do their work best? What seems to stress them out? A leader’s job is to remove obstacles from a performer’s path. You do that by getting to know what makes them tick. If you’re not sure or you want to dig deeper, consider a personality profile, like the Omnia Assessment.

4. Openness: This goes along with respect. As a leader, you may not always be able to tell your staff everything, but be as open as you can about what’s going on in the company, projected problems and possible changes that will impact everyday life for the employee. Secrecy shuts people down, but feeling like management is being open and authentic makes employees feel involved and engaged.

5. Opportunities: Make sure there are opportunities for growth. Few people are comfortable doing the same thing over and over forever. Some are – hold on to them, and check in with them regularly to make sure they still have everything they need. For the others, talk to them about the future – their future with the company. Make sure they know you want them there in the future. Keep in mind that not all opportunities have to be advancement to management. Consider cross-training, introducing new technologies, offering courses in employees’ areas of interest. What they learn can benefit the company as well as them.

6. Flexibility: If these last two years have taught us anything, it has been the need for flexibility. Most companies learned that they could move ahead and even thrive by being flexible. Don’t forget that lesson when it comes to making adjustments that benefit your employees. If someone is more effective at different times, if family concerns make certain schedules impossible for star performers, if a different approach to the job produces the same results, make a change. It’s not always possible, but we’ve learned that a lot more is possible than we ever thought before. If you feel like saying “no” to an ask, explore why. “Because it’s always been done this way” is not a good enough reason to disengage or lose an excellent employee.

7. Innovation: One step beyond flexibility is innovation. Explore with employees the different ways of approaching goals, processes and operations. An engaged employee is not a cog in a lifeless machine. This is a person you selected because of experience, intelligence, personality or an undefinable special something. You’ve trained them, and they are succeeding. Now, let them train you. No matter how much you think you know about a job, someone who does it every day knows more. This is what you want! Listen to them, act on ideas, and reward successes.

I know, there is no “add to cart” button or free express shipping on employee engagement! It’s a little more complicated, but it is a gift that is worth giving. It’s so good, you might want some for yourself!

The holidays are here... already. Is it just me or do they seem to come around faster and faster every year? While some people are asking for the latest Bluetooth gadgets, meal prep subscriptions, and trendy socks, knowledge sharing tops our wish list this holiday season. As 2021 ends and we look back on the year, a year that was just as hard as the year before it, we should focus on lessons learned, experience gained and the power of handling the unexpected. We were tested in so many ways, both personally and professionally, and we continue to be tested.

We all want out of this pandemic, out of this new constant of uncertainty. We want a way back to each other that involves handshakes and hugs, time spent with family, friends, coworkers, and new business contacts. One way to get that is to go into this season of holiday gift giving with a new perspective, one that focuses on the gift of knowledge sharing. Let’s all make a resolution (a full month early) to share what we have learned with one another. Let’s talk about what worked, what didn’t and what just needs some refinement. We’ve all done so many new things over the last two years, things we didn’t know we could or that we simply weren’t expecting.

Many of us were thrown into remote work, some happily, some begrudgingly. We embraced new technologies as a way to stay connected even when we weren’t in the same room, building, city, state or maybe even country. We learned how easy it is to get ready just from the waist up, how important lighting is on video calls, and how it’s possible to be late to work even when your commute involves walking from the kitchen to your couch. We learned how to adapt, how to grow and how to thrive in a world turned unexpectedly upside down. It’s been tough, sure. It’s been frustrating, definitely. But it’s also opened our eyes to what’s important. It’s created a new level of resourcefulness that we can use to make our businesses even more successful.

But have you taken your lessons learned and paid them forward? If not, think about it now. It’s never too late. Write them down, email them to a colleague, share them with another manager facing a challenge that you’ve already faced. Do you know someone who is hiring virtually for the first time or setting up a hybrid work environment? If you’ve done it, pass on your advice for what worked and what didn’t.

This month, we plan to give the best advice we’ve gathered throughout 2021 on topics like leadership, employee engagement, development, retention and, of course, on how to use employee development assessments to optimize productivity and build thriving workplace cultures. We will also host our popular “Ask the Experts” Take-Away Tuesday Webinar on December 14th at 12:30 pm EST, so please join us if you have questions. We’ll be “gift-exchanging” your questions for answers. You see what I did there? I know it’s about as subtle as an ugly holiday sweater.

This holiday season lets share our triumphs with one another and give the hottest gift for 2021… knowledge!

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