You Can`t Kiss A JPEG

Recent research by the Institute of Leadership and Management (ILM) shows senior management need to do more to win the trust of their employees.

The Index of Leadership Trust 2009 report suggests that employees have far more confidence in their line managers than chief executives. Interestingly, it suggests that CEOs need to demonstrate more integrity whilst line managers need to demonstrate more empathy to win the trust of their workforce.

Penny De Valk, ILM’s chief executive, said: “Teams are more effective in a trusting environment, and people work better and harder if they trust their leaders.

“For leaders, being good at their job is simply not enough anymore. The more senior you are, the more gap between what you say and what you do… is amplified.”

Listen to what Penny has to say in her interview with BNet.

Closing the gap. That’s what we help organisations do; helping them build trust between employees and leadership and management at all levels.

We know from experience that employees are influenced more by leadership actions than words. It’s all about Leadership; Leadership by example.

Last week the Prime Minister and his wife added their Tweets to thousands of heartfelt declarations from patients, nurses and other medical practitioners on Twitter’s #welovetheNHS topic.

PM: NHS often makes the difference between pain and comfort, despair and hope, life and death. Thanks for always being there,”

Sarah Brown: “#welovetheNHS – more than words can say.”

What a shame the 45,000 NHS workers* who call in sick each day dont exhibit the same level of advocacy. This is one and a half times the average for private industry.

*From a recent government review assessing links between staff habits and NHS productivity Fat, unfit NHS staff top the sick league 

Unsurprisingly, the report shows that hospitals with the poorest staff health are less productive. Three-quarters of staff  believe that the state of their health affects patient care. Disturbingly, they are proven right as hospitals with the worst staff well-being have higher patient mortality rates.

The report concludes that there must be a complete NHS culture change to make workforce health “the responsibility of every single member of staff”. It underlines the irony of the NHS’s focus on the public health agenda whilst not investing in their own staff to become exemplars.

“High quality care for all” has always been the central guiding principle for NHS staff – it’s what the NHS brand stands for. They now have evidence that there is a large gap between what they do and what they say they do.We see this gap in a lot of organisations we work with.

Closing the gap. That’s what we help organisations do; helping them to improve the health of their brand. 

We know from experience and from research that the health of any brand is directly related to the level of internal advocacy. Investment in engaging employees around the organisation’s central guiding principle (their brand) is the medicine to boost internal advocacy.

The contents of the MacLeod report saved as a word cloud.

Here are 2 other perspectives of MyCloud, which I suppose proves that it doesn’t matter which way you look at it, it says the same thing.

It’s been a long time in the making but we are now on the eve of the publication of MacLeod review of employee engagement. see here

I have 3 hopes for this report

1. It goes beyond the study commissioned by the Scottish Executive 2 years earlier see here

2. It is more enlightening than the author’s presentation to ACAS CIPD in April see here

3. It builds on HMG’s vision for Britain’s economic recovery in New Industry, New Jobs published last week see here

Whatever the content, my belief is that the timing of this publication is perfect.  

We have recently witnessed British brands struggling to remain competitive under existing regulatory frameworks – BA, BT, National Express, Royal Mail, RBS, Lloyds Group to name a few. 

Lord Mandelson recently fired warning shots over the bows of British business by making it clear that HMG is not an ATM for bailing out British brands who cannot remain competitive. 

I think most business leaders understand the link  between engaged employees and performance and can also see the link between driving innovation in products and services and brand differentiation. 

I don’t think that the Macleod review will draw the explicit link between employee engagement and brand, which is unfortunate as I believe that employee brand engagement absolutely addresses why Macleod believes engagement matters in the future: realise untapped potential; enable the best of people; compete with BRIC economy; provide public services we want; innovate; bespoke.

But three hopes in one day is enough for anyone, right?

Recent coverage of the clash of the birthday bash between M&S (125 years) and Sainsbury’s (140 years) (Nostalgia the battleground amid birthday celebrations) got me thinking about which party I would rather attend. If I had the choice I’d have gone for Sainsbury’s in the hope of meeting a well known celebrity. Not Jamie Oliver (I’ll come back to him later) but Anya Hindmarch. Her partnership with Sainsbury’s helped make reusable bags sexy, and featured on their nostalgic TV ad.

That is assuming that any of her other brand partners (Creme de la Mer, Food Doctor, Selfridges, Blink, Chantecaille, Norris Ices, Scarlet & Violet, Primrose Bakery, British Airways, Grazia, Organic Pharmacy and Elemis, to name a few) would not be having a party on the same night.  Malcolm Gladwell would probably call her a Connector I think I’ll coin the phrase Brand Socialite.

I’d like to make one thing perfectly clear – handbags aint my thing, on the other hand engagement is and Anya’s recession busting engagement strategy is probably one accessory that most organisations would die for  FT 19.06.09 pg. 14 (Bags of fun puts humour into recession busting strategy)

But what of Jamie and his association with Sainsbury’s? I recall a shopping experience when Sainsbury’s launched “Jamie Oliver’s 21 Day Extra Matured Taste The Difference British Beef” the supermarket claimed the product to be the culmination of 18 years of research and development and the celebrity chef endorsed the meat that “surpasses all other meat” in tenderness, succulence and flavour, as it was matured on the bone to ensure “maximum flavour”.

Now I like a good steak and was keen to see how Jamie’s sirloin weighed up. As I stood perusing the goods at the aisle end I was spotted by two employees behind the deli counter opposite. 

“Jenny, have you tried that new Jamie Oliver beef yet?” asked one

“Oh, don’t talk to me about Jamie Oliver beef” her colleague replied, I bought a couple of steaks last Saturday but I wouldn’t get them again – I couldn’t taste the difference“

Mmm… the cost of 18 years of R&D and an expensive celebrity chef endorsed advertising campaign was suddenly wasted on me. The influence of this knowledgable, perhaps cynical, employee was enough to tip the balance the wrong way.  Gladwell would call her a Maven, in this context I’ll use the expression Brand Assassin.  What a difference it could have made if this employee had been engaged with the brand and acted like Gladwell’s Salesman or , in my language, a true Brand Advocate.

My experience is that the cost of building employee advocacy is a fraction of the cost of external advertising and will yield greater return on investment.  Gladwell desrcibes The Tipping Point as “How Little Things Can Make A Big Difference” I think we all agree.