Thought I’ll feature part of a guest post I wrote for the Employee Factor, a blog about Employee Engagement.
Managers don’t need proof to tell them that someone who’s more engaged is much more productive. There is plenty of experiential and anecdotal evidence to support this. For those who like some empirical data there’s always the long-term tracking study –the Q12 study– by Gallup that serves as “a macro-level indicator’ of a healthy workforce.
I tend to look at this through a communications lens. So when studies make a case for engagement, I see it not simply as good management strategy, but as great communication strategy. When they refer to it as ‘maintaining a line of sight’ I see it as keeping people on the same page. They sound analogous, but they have key differences.
Maintaining employee line of sight (L-O-S) involves bringing clarity between actions and outcomes. But it also means doing away with too much hierarchy, unlocking the holds on information, and also creating an attitude that welcomes suggestions for how employee goals can match corporate vision. Keeping those employees on the same page has deeper implications in a digitally enhanced workplace. Not just via emails and web conferences, but a willingness to open up two-way conversations. Line of sight in today’s workplace is not limited to being able to see ‘up and down the chain of command’ but sideways and diagonally –much like the connections of a social web.
Print on demand, and Personal URLs (‘those ‘PURLs’) are some of the solutions that almost every printer now offers. PODI, the Print On Demand Initiative, educates members and everyone else about print and social media, QR codes etc. So yes, the print industry has done some good things to erase the dead-tree stigma. This campaign though seems to push the envelope (bad choice of word?) a bit.
“But it’s when you become the punch line on The Colbert Report that you know you’ve made the big time.”
Today that mentality is shifting, and I really like how this challenge reflects that. It’s called The Power of AND. It’s promoted by a group holding the 
I speak to plenty of young people to whom Facebook is like email –something they leave on and check every few minutes. But they are chatting on other channels as well. If you look carefully some folks even check their phones for incoming mail at …church.
But that’s not the part I was feeling guilty about. He then goes on to talk about how there’s a big difference between joining the conversation and crashing into it.
Unvarnished is still in Beta so unless we try out the service we won’t know what it entails. Maybe it is not another site that attracts dirty linen basket cases. Maybe they do have a great idea, based on their description: That it is going to be “community-contributed, business-focused assessments” about “building, managing, and researching professional reputation” and “professional reviews.” They do advice being fair and balanced.
Hoipolloireport 