The millennial marketing tactic your competitors aren’t using
Some helpful tips for marketing with Snapchat from Employee Benefit Adviser, by Eric Silverman
“Hey cuz, do you Snap?” That’s the question my millennial client asked me a couple of years ago via text message. My response was probably not very different from yours would have been at that time and probably is still: ‘Isn’t Snapchat just for teens sending each other questionable videos?’
Similar things were initially said about text messaging, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Most social media experts have said that Facebook is so full of baby boomers and Generation X that millennials aren’t using it nearly as much as they used to. Recent reports have even shown that the same thing is now happening with Twitter.
If the natural progression for millennials and Generation Z is to quickly migrate to whatever the newest cutting-edge social platform is when prior generations finally catch on, then why wouldn’t you want to market on a platform that currently consists of a younger demographic? After all, recent history has proven that the migration from one generation to another on new social platforms happens fairly quickly. With that in mind, I’m convinced that Snapchat will evolve to Generation X and even baby boomers at some point in the near future.
If we’re going to help boost your enrollment participation and millennial recruiting, then we must talk ‘geofilters.’ What’s that, you ask? With your smartphone’s location services and filters enabled, a geofilter is a fun and engaging way for a Snapchat user to share where they are, or what they’re up to, by simply swiping left or right on their device and adding what’s known as an ‘overlay’ to their Snapchat message.
These geofilters appear at thousands of places around the world. For instance, while I’m at the ballpark, I can swipe and see a geofilter that adds a fun Oriole Park at Camden Yards overlay to show my Snap followers that I’m at the game. Or, if I keep swiping, I can see overlays from the various cities in Baltimore near the stadium, or even a sponsored overlay from Starbucks reminding me that it’s the first day of fall.
The key with geofilters is that Snapchat won’t let you design them as true “advertising” with any call to action buttons or messages, so you’ve got to be creative. Overlays should be fun and engaging and make users desire your product or service. For example, the Starbucks overlay is very simple, clean and non-intrusive, and on a chilly autumn evening, makes me crave a piping hot cup of pumpkin spiced coffee.
Pro tip: If you’re not the creative type, consider hiring a social media designer to make your geofilter and overlay for you. It’s not hard to find creative freelancers to help you for about $10-$20 dollars per project.
Translating geofilters into higher enrollment engagement and participation
Let’s say you have a 500-employee enrollment where most of the employees are in the same location throughout the day. You can design a simple Snapchat geofilter that covers the geographic square footage of the company’s building for a set timeframe during your enrollment. Don’t worry; Snapchat geofilters are very affordable ways to market right now. The last time I checked, you could cover nearly 200,000 square feet for about 10 hours for less than $40 dollars.
Imagine how useful this could be to boost your enrollment engagement if you knew the demographic of your client happened to be heavily dominated by millennials, who are more likely to be using Snapchat these days than any other social platform. Be creative and make your Geofilter something they want to use and you could ‘go viral’ (that’s a good thing) at your enrollment. Worse case, even if your target audience doesn’t use your filter, it was a small investment to serve as an on-demand reminder that it’s open enrollment time for your client and all of their employees.
Translating geofilters into new recruits
Similar to the enrollment example used earlier — but let’s change the enrollment location to a college internship and career fair — talk about the right demographic to implement Snapchat geofilters. I’ve personally participated in hundreds of internship and career fairs to recruit college kids, and I can assure you that students are never lined up in droves to speak with me or any other insurance company at the fair. Let’s face it, just as I wrote in my June 3, 2015 article, internships and careers in insurance just aren’t very sexy, and if you’re like me, you never dreamed of working in insurance any more than your peers did or these students do now.
Snapchat to the rescue. Here, you have hundreds or even thousands of millennials who will likely be using Snapchat geofilters all day long with their friends. Creating a unique and fun geofilter for your benefits company is an excellent use of your firm’s investment dollars that when done properly, will generate a tremendous ROI in the form of higher engagement levels at your booth. Once they’re at your booth, that’s your problem!
The use of Snapchat to engage and recruit millennials not only shows that you and your company are with the times, but moreover, it makes you more attractive to them as opposed to the non-appealing and boring insurance company that they already perceive and stereotype you as.
Pro tip: Try blanketing a college campus or in the least, near the college dorms, with your custom-made geofilter and overlay. I recommend it at the very beginning of a semester for a couple of set days and times and then again at the end of a semester. I can tell you from years of college recruiting that college kids are typically looking for internships when the semester starts and always looking for internships, and definitely career opportunities, when the semester ends, since they usually have no idea what they’re doing next.
My goal was never to educate you on everything there is to know about Snapchat — heck, we didn’t even discuss creating your own Snapchat ‘Lenses’ that morph your face into various crazy and wacky shapes. Bottom line: Plan your marketing well in advance of your next enrollment and career fair, strategically implement Snapchat with a heavy dose of creativity, and you’ll be watching your profitability soar. Happy Snapping!
Have a question or comment about Snapchat or adding Snapchat to your benefits business? Contact me directly using any of the boring old communication methods you’re accustomed to or why not just Snap me? Snapchat user name: “dsdaddio.” (My Gen-Z daughter helped me pick it and Snapchat doesn’t allow user names to be changed.)
See the original article Here.
Source:
Silverman, E. (2016 October 3). The millennial marketing tactic your competitors aren't using. [Web blog post]. Retrieved from address https://www.employeebenefitadviser.com/opinion/the-millennial-marketing-tactic-your-competitors-arent-using
3 things NAHU told the IRS about ACA premium tax credits
The National Association of Health Underwriters has tried to show Affordable Care Act program managers that it can take a practical, apolitical approach to thinking about ACA issues.
Some of the Washington-based agent group's members strongly supported passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 and its sister, the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010. Many loathe the ACA package.
But NAHU itself has tried to focus mainly on efforts to improve how the ACA, ACA regulations and ACA programs work for consumers, employer plan sponsors and agents. In Washington, for example, NAHU has helped the District of Columbia reach out to local agents. NAHU also offers an exchange agent certification course for HealthCare.gov agents.
Now NAHU is investing some of the credit it has earned for ACA fairness in an effort to shape draft eligibility screening regulations proposed this summer by the Internal Revenue Service, an arm of the U.S. Treasury Department.
Janet Stokes Trautwein, NAHU's executive vice president and chief executive officer, says she and colleagues at NAHU talked to many agents and brokers about the draft regulations.
For a look at just a little of what she wrote in her comment letter, read on:
1. Exchanges have to communicate better
The IRS included many ideas in the draft regulations about ways to keep consumers honest when they apply for Affordable Care Act exchange premium tax credit subsidies.
ACA drafters wanted people to be able to use the subsidies to reduce out-of-pocket coverage costs as the year went on, to reduce those costs to about what the employee's share of the payments for solid group health coverage might be.
To do that, the drafters and implementers at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the IRS came up with a system that requires consumers to predict in advance what their incoming will be in the coming year.
Consumers who predict their income will be too low and get too much tax credit money are supposed to true up with the IRS when the file their taxes the following spring. The IRS has an easy time getting the money when consumers are supposed to get refunds. It can then deduct the payments from the refunds. When consumers are not getting refunds, or simply fail to file tax returns, the IRS has no easy way to get the cash back.
The exchanges and the IRS also face the problem that some people earn too little to qualify for tax credits but too much to qualify for Medicaid. Those people have an incentive to lie and say their income will be higher than it is likely to be.
Trautwein writes in her letter that the ACA exchange system could help by doing more to educate consumers when the consumers are applying for exchange coverage.
"The health insurance exchange marketplaces [should] be required to clearly notify consumers of the consequences of potential income-based eligibility fraud at the time of application, in order to help discourage it from ever happening," Trautwein writes.
2. Federal health and tax systems have to work smoothly together
Trautwein notes in her letter that the ACA exchange system has an exchange eligibility determination process, and that the IRS has another set of standards for determining, based on a consumer's access, or lack of access, to employer-sponsored health coverage, who is eligible for premium tax credit subsidies.
NAHU is worried about the possibility that a lack of coordination between the IRS and the HHS could lead to incorrect decisions about whether exchange applicants have access to the kind of affordable employer-sponsored coverage with a minimum value required by the ACA laws and regulations, Trautwein writes.
"We believe that it is fairly easy for consumers to mistakenly apply for and then receive advanced payments of a premium tax credit for which they are not eligible" based on wrong ideas about affordability, she says.
Consumers could easily end up owing thousands of dollars in credit repayments because of those kinds of errors, she says.
In the long run, employers should be reporting on the coverage they expect to offer in the coming year, rather than trying to figure out what kind of coverage they offered in the past year, Trautwein says.
In the meantime, the IRS and HHS have to work together to improve the employer verification process, she says.
3. Employees do not and cannot speak ACA
Trautwein says NAHU members also worry about exchange efforts to depend on information from workers to verify what kind of coverage the workers had.
"Based on our membership's extensive work with employee participants in employer-sponsored group benefit plans, we can say with confidence that the vast majority of employees do not readily understand the various ACA-related labeling nuances of their employer-sponsored health insurance coverage offerings," she says.
"Terms that are now commonplace to health policy professionals, like minimum essential coverage and excepted benefits, are meaningless to mainstream consumers," she says.
NAHU does not see how an exchange will know what kind of coverage a worker really had access to until after employer reporting is reconciled with information from the exchanges and from individual tax returns, which might not happen until more than a year after the consumer received the tax credit subsidies, Trautwein says.
"This weakness on the part of the exchanges could leave consumers potentially liable for thousands of dollars of tax credit repayments, all because of confusing terms and requirements and inadequate eligibility verification mechanisms," she says.
See the Original Article Here.
Source:
Bell, A. (2016, September 30). 3 things NAHA told the IRS about ACA premium tax credits [Web log post]. Retreived from https://www.lifehealthpro.com/2016/09/30/3-things-nahu-told-the-irs-about-aca-premium-tax-c?page_all=1
3 keys to creating an employee-centric wellness plan
Interesting read by Rae Shanahan highlighting how technology can be incorporated into your wellness plan. See the full article below.
Original Post from BenefitsPro.com on July 14, 2016
As smartphones become more entrenched in our daily lives, the wellness technology industry has exploded to more than $8 billion, driven largely by wearable devices and more than 160,000 wellness-relatedmobile apps.
Employers are capitalizing on the tech advances, making workplace wellness programs more digital, social, and connected.
Particularly as more mobile-focused millennials enter the workforce, companies are expanding web-based competitions and incentives for getting physically healthy.
Programs that allow employees to track FitBit data and awarding prizes for workers with the highest monthly step totals are becoming much more common. Even savvier companies are tying wellness to their overall benefits offerings, offering employees the chance to compete for an extra vacation day by reducing their body fat percentage.
While these incentivized programs are developed with the best of intentions to encourage employees toward better health habits, the unintended consequence is backlash from employees who are wary of revealing personal health data — especially on the internet.
Also, those employees who find themselves at the bottom of the online leaderboard may feel discouraged and demoralized, the opposite of an employer’s objective. Moreover, there is a concern that incentivized wellness programs tend to penalize those who don’t participate or are less successful.
Obviously, employers don’t want to disregard employees who don’t feel comfortable sharing sensitive health information. If employees don’t feel comfortable sharing these personal details with their employer, they should still have the opportunity to chase the incentives, and ultimately benefit from the wellness program.
Keeping all employees in mind, there are three keys to creating successful, employee-centric wellness programs that increase engagement while respecting privacy concerns.
Survey
A simple but effective first step is to survey employees on their thoughts and concerns around wellness programs. Providing employees a platform to voice their opinions allows employees to feel heard and for employers to empathize with their workforce while developing wellness programs. This step conveys the care and effort behind creating employee-centric programs that give everyone the opportunity to participate.
Accommodate
According to Businessolver’s Workplace Empathy Monitor, 1 in 3 employees would switch companies for equal pay if the other employer was more empathetic. The research reveals that embedding empathy in the workplace operations, such as wellness programs, is a key factor aspect of building trust and loyalty with employees.
At the end of the day, workplace wellness programs are designed to encourage a healthy lifestyle — not win points or prizes — and it’s important to keep that end goal in mind.
For example, rather than a competition to lower employee body weight or BMI, employers can instead offer employees a free yoga class once a week. This allows employees to participate in a healthy activity while connecting with colleagues, without having to worry about revealing personal and private information.
Being flexible with wellness programs is an empathetic behavior that broadens the circle of those wanting to participate, maintains the end goal of improving health, and ultimately benefits a company in recruiting and retention.
Communicate
Of course, the most fun, effective, and empathetic program does no good if employees don’t know about it and aren’t engaged.
So, the most beneficial step employers can take in creating a wellness program is effectively communicating with all employees that the program is open, what is necessary to participate, and keeping feedback channels open.
Make sure employees are completely briefed — maybe develop and share one-pagers for employees to quickly reference. Also, it’s imperative to provide an onsite contact who can be a champion for the program and answer any employee questions or concerns. With this, trust is built between employers and employees, and a wellness program has a stronger chance of succeeding right from the start.
Read original article here: https://www.benefitspro.com/2016/07/14/3-keys-to-creating-an-employee-centric-wellness-pl?ref=hp-in-depth&page_all=1
Source:
Shanahan, R. (2016, July 14). 3 keys to creating an employee-centric wellness plan [Web log post]. Retrieved from https://www.benefitspro.com/2016/07/14/3-keys-to-creating-an-employee-centric-wellness-pl?ref=hp-in-depth&page_all=1
4 Ways to Talk to Employees So They Listen
Original post entrepreneur.com
No one likes to be lectured in the workplace.
As a leader, you need to communicate with your employees to deliver strategic direction, reinforce corporate culture and rally the troops to achieve company goals and objectives. To be effective, you need to deliver these messages in a way that creates energy and enthusiasm, rather than deflating your team.
Here are four tips for talking to employees in a way that energizes them rather than depleting them:
1. Use humor. No matter how big or small your operation may be, there is often tension and emotional distance between the boss and employees. To diffuse that, I regularly use humor, a tactic that makes me more approachable. In my experience, the best kind is self-deprecating humor. When I showed up to meet new employees for the first time at a Midwest location, I started the conversations by poking fun at my pronounced "New Yawk" accent. It got a laugh and made me seem more accessible.
2. Ask open-ended questions. And then be quiet. My favorite question to ask is “Tell me about [insert topic here].” When you ask a new employee about his ideas or a technologist about a new device, you are asking them to do more than give you a pat sentence or two in response. You have the opportunity to access that person’s deep knowledge and passion. Ask a question that opens the conversation wide and then hold still and listen.
3. Bring others into the conversation. A boss-employee conversation may seem casual to the boss but can feel like an interrogation to the employee. To diffuse this situation, I like to bring others into the conversation to even out the experience. I may turn a one-on-one discussion into a larger conversation by inviting people to join us and share their thoughts and experiences. It benefits me, because I get to hear more voices, and it helps put everyone else at ease.
4. Let the little stuff slide. If you are the kind of hands-on person who helped build the business from the ground up, you probably have insight or advice on everything from the capital budget to color of the carpet. But you don’t have to communicate every thought to the staff. If it’s not an important critique, let it go. I visited a flower shop in my company once and noticed the manager was not lining the trashcans with plastic bags. I know from experience that liners make the job easier, but I also know that I don’t need to communicate every idea that comes into my head. It just creates a climate of nitpicking.
Conversations that take place up and down the food chain – between supervisor and staff, people of different departments and the boss and the new employee – are often the source of great new ideas.
As the boss, it’s your job to get those conversations started and keep them going. You have a chance to make that happen (or achieve the opposite) every time you open your mouth.
Know the Secrets of Successful Employee Engagement
Originally posted April 16, 2014 by William Taylor on https://hrdailyadvisor.blr.com
The emotional commitment an employee has toward a company and its main goals is called employee engagement—employees being more focused on helping the company thrive. This emotional binder has nothing to do with financial compensation but with the personal feelings of that employee for the workplace.
Let’s not confuse engagement with happiness. Being happy at work doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re working hard to help that organization succeed.
Engaged employees initiate better business results. Research shows that organizations with engaged workers can easily reach higher profit margins of up to 6%.
Motivated employees often lead to:
- Better customer satisfaction
- Better quality of services
- Enhanced productivity
- Higher profit levels
- Increased shareholder returns
Switching from THE Company to THEIR Company
Ownership is the heart and soul of employee engagement. Your people must feel that they own the company for which they’re working. It’s paramount to treat them like partners and make them feel like CEOs (even if deep down they are employees and nothing more). Once you’ve accomplished that, allow them to make important decisions, share vital information with them, let them take part in important meetings to keep them motivated. Engagement soars when employees feel like leaders.
How do you maintain employee engagement long-term?
Engaged employees are both happy and motivated people. They feel appreciated by their bosses, they feel valued, and they’re willing to go to extreme lengths to help THEIR Company flourish. However, it’s vital for organizations to make sure the engagement is permanent. Here are some important aspects you might want to look at to make sure your people stay engaged for as long as necessary.
- Consistent expectations—whatever you do make sure your expectations are clear and consistent. Tell your employees exactly what you want from them, but make them feel comfortable and safe in your presence.
- Value their work—employees want to feel that their work is being appreciated; if you must criticize, do it, and do it constructively.
- Leave room for advancement in their career—the goal of every engaged employee is to climb up the ladder; the more some advance in their career, the harder they will work to please their superiors.
Constructive Criticism Keeps Engaged Employees Alert
Feedback is important for engaged employees who want to be sure that their actions are good enough. These people are willing to accept criticism and do everything in their power to turn an observation into a goal. Communication is equally important between managers and motivated workers. As boss, CEO, or supervisor, it’s your job to foster that motivation by asking questions and challenging their potential.
Criticism should be constructive; it should be meant to add value to a company. Engaged people are not afraid to be criticized. On the contrary, they strongly believe that the only way to nurture their potential is to give them challenges that are difficult to achieve.
A Different Type of Reward
We mentioned that employee engagement is not based on financial compensation. While that might be true, motivated employees should be given constant rewards for their hard work. Promotions, free training sessions, better working hours, and paid vacations, are just some incentives companies can offer to their committed people to make them feel esteemed. There are so many things you can offer to satisfy their needs without breaking the bank.
After working hard on a project for over a month you can take them out for a festive dinner. People love to socialize and the best way of making them feel good about themselves is to integrate them in your executive group. Appeal to their social side, have a good time, and interact with them on a human level.
The key word for successful employee engagement is RELATIONSHIP. Nothing matters more for employees than a good working relationship with their superiors and teammates. Satisfaction and engagement are deeply connected in a company. Let’s call it a marriage where two parties enter this “relationship” with extremely high hopes, best intentions, and great aspirations. In time, the relationship can become unbreakable; however, for that to happen—employees and company workers must value each other equally.
Innovative employers abandoning outdated management structure
Originally posted April 8, 2014 on www.ebn.benefitnews.com by Michael Giardina.
The ability for staff to incorporate innovative new ideas that bring changes to dilapidated processes can only be fostered in a workplace that allows for an open communicative culture across organizational lines.
This core theme was offered by leaders of both retail home mortgage lender Quicken Loans, Inc. and W.L. Gore & Associates, a technology-driven company at last week’s annual Great Place to Work conference.
“The fluidity of communication, the openness of the communication, the transparency of the communication is absolutely critical.” says Quicken Loans CEO Bill Emerson. “…We win when our team members feel connected to the company.”
Quicken Loans, based in downtown Detroit, has more than 10,000 “team members.” In its family of companies, this comprises more than 112 businesses that envelope everything from consumer services and biotechnology to financial services and even the National Basketball Association’s Cleveland Cavaliers franchise. Dan Gilbert, Quicken Loans chairman and founder, previously became the majority owner in March 2005.
“You really need everyone to participate,” Emerson explains, while noting that every company should “make sure everyone understands their passion and ability to affect that outcome.”
On a monthly basis, Emerson has a face-to-face meeting with 20 team members. The content of these talks are usually open to whatever that employee feels can add value to the organization.
“It’s so important to be close to the business, and understand what’s going on so you can hear what’s affecting people on a day-to-day basis,” Emerson explains. “Email is the bane of American business,” he adds.
Emerson states that most businesses are currently plagued by the “spreadsheet mentality,” but offers that “innovation, creativity are all things that are going to drive the top line of your business.”
Creativity is something that is fostered at W.L. Gore & Associates. The company first introduced GORE-TEX in 1978, a waterproof but breathable fabric that probably makes up your jacket or boots. It was first founded in the late 1950s by Bill and Vieve Gore in Newark, Del. One of its first round of employees were paid, in part, in portions of Gore stock.
The longstanding sense of employer empowerment and connection to the company still resonates today, says current president and CEO Terri Kelly. She explains that she spends about 40% of her time to make sure the organization and employees are “nurturing that environment that will allow us to be successful.”
“If we get that right, that’s what engages our associates, that in turn allows them to do great things, and innovate all these wonderful products that we have,” she says.
When first joining the organization, which currently has more than 10,000 employees in 45 plants around the world, Kelly remembers the Gore family inviting its new crop of engineers to their home for a pool party. She contends that this mentality – one that is conducive to openness and family culture – is still driving the company today.
“This is not a new phenomenon for Gore, it’s something we have been shaping for over 55 years,” she explains. “We are very much relationship-based organization; trust is really important, teamwork is incredibly important and so again, the philosophy here is how do we create a network environment that is not based on hierarchy but the associates go to the folks that they need.”
It even holds the same values and trepidation that its founder held regarding rigid employee guidelines, which is similar the same core concepts at fashion retailer Nordstrom.
“Bill Gore also did not like policy manuals – I think he despised policy manuals,” Kelly explains. “I think he had for good reason because he really understood that you could never write down every circumstance or situation for an associate to make a decision.”
The elimination of bureaucratic lines and management reporting is something that sets apart the company that harbors a team-based, flat organizational culture. Adding to this open approach is employee compensation.
“Every associate is evaluated by their peers, and the question we ask is, ‘who is making the greatest impact to the enterprise success?’” she says. “We think this is very powerful, and it’s a lot of work to accomplish. The message it sends is that it’s based on performance, not on title, or positions or seniority … it’s based on your impact to the organization.
“Those that are making the greatest contribution are also making the greatest compensation,” Gore adds.
10 characteristics of effective leaders
Originally posted on https://www.propertycasualty360.com
In any business, effective leadership is critical for an agency’s success. As the insurance market evolves, insurance leaders need to be visionary and adaptable. The prevalence of small businesses in the industry, however, requires a different approach to the traditional leadership model.
Although there are exceptions to the rule, as some agencies have sophisticated business models, many small agencies lack structure.
“Ours is a small business industry, which typically signifies a business with little structure,” said Tom Barrett, president of the Midwest and Southeast regions of SIAA, Inc. “These agencies do not have detailed marketing and business plans, do not follow sales processes, have not created business budgets and take orders rather than selling products. Most have an inventory of nine coverage lines to sell, yet they only offer three. These agencies provide what the customer asked for rather than selling additional value.”
With the shifting market, however, strong leadership is critical for navigating the changes within the industry. No matter what size the business may be, an effective leader can guide the agency toward success, profitability, and higher employee morale.
“Rates are increasing, carrier and agency appointment qualifications are tightening and carriers are requiring minimum performance standards. You will see a real need to have someone leading your organization,” Barrett said.
1. Leadership requires effort. Being in a leadership role does not necessarily make someone a leader. Leadership is earned. Where management may control and direct people, leadership requires motivation and coaching. Leaders must have a clear understanding of the goals for the future of the agency, but also knowing how the agency can achieve them. They also must develop plans and budgets that follow a relatable sales process, creating a road map for their agency for guidance. At the same time, however, the leadership role is not autonomous. Good leaders need to seek the skills, knowledge, effort and resources needed to accomplish the agency’s goals.
2. Leadership requires followers. Leadership cannot be an assumed role; rather, it is earned through proper selection of key positions in the agency. While criteria exist for determining competent CSRs, these criteria do not necessarily match the traits and characteristics of top producers in the industry. Strong leaders need to know how to choose the best personnel for their agency, orchestrating the mission and the process. If there is a level of mutual respect between employees and the leadership, they will trust the leader’s decisions. The opposite, however, is also true.
3. Leadership is being a maestro. Understanding how employees’ unique traits contribute to the work environment and job description are important for leaders to coach and motivate their employees. Employees need to fit within the framework of cooperation between leadership and team members. As a maestro, the leader needs to learn and understand individual employees’ unique skills and work habits to encourage productivity, effectively manage conflicts and foster growth and improvement among employees.
4. Leadership demands accountability. Leaders must create benchmarks for employee performance, instilling employees with satisfaction and company loyalty. At the same time, setting annual goals and objectives help employees constantly provide feedback, which creates an environment of accountability for all agency employees and develops a strong, collaborative environment.
5. Leadership creates culture. Leaders focus on total enterprise value. Strong leaders must strive to create an environment where all employees strive to leave the customer or prospect in a better place than where they were found. Establishing a positive customer experience, in turn, leads to a unique and memorable contact with the agency. Agencies benefit from the subsequent loyalty, long-term relationships with customers, cross-sales opportunities, referrals and increased income and equity for the agency.
6. Leadership requires honesty and humility. Openly displaying honesty and integrity when communicating with any member of the team is always important, but especially in leadership roles when your employees — and even friends, neighbors, and community members — are watching you. Leaders must always be open and honest with their team members on all occasions.
7. Leadership means you. Employees, family, friends and the community continually watch you, making it imperative for leaders to develop strong standards that touch every facet of his or her life. The direction, culture, reputation, work ethic and professionalism of the agency begin with the leader’s behavior, and the accomplishments of the business begin with a leader’s personal actions, whether they are at the office or at home. Leaders understand that their actions drive the reputation of their company.
8. Leadership requires conditioning and endurance. Being in a leadership role should not be a burden. It is a privilege. Although being a leader comes with an incredible amount of responsibilities, effective leaders understand that they set the pace for the rest of the agency. In order to expect strong earnings, productivity, long work hours and company loyalty, strong leaders lead by example. Being mindful of the work ethic that you promote to your team, as they often mirror the acts of the leader, can impact the way that they treat clients and prospects, but also other team members.
9. Leadership is power. Leadership is more than sheer force. It is influential, and leaders must persuade people to act toward their goals.
10. Leadership is the most reliable predictor. Hay Group reports that there are 75 key components to employee satisfaction, and the most important is communicating three areas to the team: understanding the overall business strategy, helping employees understand how they can contribute and sharing information about progress. For the success of the company and team satisfaction, trust and confidence in leadership is key.
Training, Benefits Can Bring Millennials Around
Source: United Benefit Advisors
Maybe it's an age thing.
An annual survey by the Center for Professional Excellence notes that the perceived professionalism of entry-level (and thus usually younger) workers by their managers has slipped during the past five years, with about 45 percent of those polled saying their employees' work ethic has worsened, according to a report by Workforcemagazine. Respondents cited a "too-casual" view of work (87 percent), workers not being self-starters (72 percent) and "a lack of ownership in one's work" (69 percent).
The survey reflects an emerging trend that poses a tough challenge to HR professionals: how to encourage "millennials" -- today's youngest workers -- to adapt and succeed within a company's business culture.
The first step, according to Joel Gross of Coalition Technologies, is to train young workers from the start on what is to be expected in their jobs. Aaron McDaniel, an author and millennial himself, agrees.
"We haven't necessarily been taught how to be successful in a working environment," McDaniel told Workforce.
Creating a strong line of communication about expectations is only part of the equation when trying to elevate the performance of millennials. As with most employees, compensation can serve as a strong motivator for millennials, as well.
After seeing wages stagnate during the recent economic recession, today's young workers say they prefer guaranteed salary increases over benefits -- a shift from employees who came before them -- according to a recent study by the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE). In prior studies, medical insurance benefits topped the list for young workers as the most important form of compensation, according to Edwin Koc, a director at NACE.
"We've basically asked the same question since 2007 and far and away, employer-paid medical insurance was the No. 1 benefit that they were seeking," Koc said in a FOX Business report. "[Now] they want to be assured that their starting salary is not going to be what they have for the next five years, but that they can actually move up a little bit."
While salary is always a major factor in compensation discussions, employers should be diligent about educating workers about the value of other employer-sponsored benefits, experts say. This includes the importance of health coverage (even for young and seemingly healthy workers), retirement plan options and even tuition reimbursement, if the company offers it.
Employers also should be open-minded if millennials make suggestions about new benefits that would work for them, said Tracy McCarthy, chief HR officer at SilkRoad.
"I appreciate when employees ask this and I take it as an opportunity to help less-seasoned employees understand business financial concepts and how benefits play into the equation," McCarthy told FOX Business. "Most employees expect and appreciate transparency."
Leadership and Employee Engagement
By: Peter Freska
I recently climbed Mount Everest! Well, in actuality it was a simulation put together in partnership with Harvard Business School Publishing that I completed with a team. As the outline reads:
“You and four other team members will attempt to summit Mount Everest in this collaborative multi-player simulation. There are five camps or checkpoints along the route to the Summit (top) of Mt. Everest. At each camp, team members analyze information on weather, health conditions, supplies, goals, or hiking speed, and determine how much of that information to communicate to their teammates.”
Now, it is not likely that most of us will ever climb Mount Everest - but that is one of the compelling pieces to this simulation. How many of us will be put into a situation where the decisions of those around us could have life or death consequences? Or more importantly, how many of us might be put in a leadership position with life or death consequences. From squad leader to general, our military leaders understand this position and so does someone that has led a Mount Everest summit. But what about the rest of us? How do we learn to be great leaders? What are the qualities of a great leader?
There are so many questions and so many people with answers. Several years ago I attended a luncheon with keynote speaker, the late-great General Norman Schwarzkopf (Ret.). He explained that with all his military career achievements, he cannot pinpoint the one characteristic that makes a great leader. However, he did say that, “When in charge, take charge.”
In today’s work environment, we have unprecedented opportunity that comes with responsibility. We grew up with our parents and grandparents telling us that we need to carve out our piece of the world. What they didn’t tell us is that we need to know when to change course. Peter Drucker wrote in his article, Managing Oneself (Harvard Business Review, Best of HBR 1999), that, “Success in the knowledge economy comes to those who know themselves – their strengths, their values and how best they perform.” Drucker also outlined the following questions to be answered of oneself:
1. “What are my strengths?”
2. “How do I work?”
3. “What are my values?”
4. “Where do I belong?”
5. “What can I contribute?”
So, what does all of this have to do with employee benefits? PPACA, HIPAA, ERISA and a host of other acronyms flood the over stimulated world we live in. But what are the things that really matter? Credibility of a leader starts with being honest, forward-looking, inspiring, competent, and intelligent (Credibility, Kouzes and Posner, 2011). These are the things that matter. And unless these characteristics are established at the leadership level, employees will not be engaged. My partner, Holly Parsons, wrote in a previous blog that many employees do not feel connected and a recent study found that “only 29% of employees are fully engaged.” How does this affect productivity? To be direct, lack of engagement ruins productivity. This holds true with employee benefits. If they do not see the value, then there is no benefit. If the leadership team views benefits as a necessary evil, or as purely an expense – well, then I would refer them back to the five questions that Peter Drucker asked. I would also direct them to Kouzes and Posner’s book, Credibility. It starts at the top, and in today’s world it also starts with each of us – for leadership is a lifelong process.
As for my Mount Everest experience, it was great! We learned about ourselves, our communication styles and team dynamics. And yes, my Team was the only team that made it to the summit - all together as a “real team.”
Communication Techniques in the Workplace
by Leigh Richards, Demand Media
Source: https://smallbusiness.chron.com
Communication skills are critical in all walks of life, but communicating effectively in the workplace is critical to professional success. Whether interacting with colleagues, subordinates, managers, customers or vendors, the ability to communicate effectively using a variety of tools is essential. Building strong communication skills requires a focus on effective interactions and the ability to listen so you understand and focus on meeting the needs of others. In addition, in today's technology-driven world, effective communicators stay up to date on the tools available to them.
Step 1
Determine your communication objective. Every communication has a purpose, and identifying that purpose is the first step in effective communication. Whether you want to inform, influence, persuade or sell, having an end goal in mind can help you communicate effectively.
Step 2
Analyze your audience. The more you know about your audience, the better job you will do in communicating with it. For instance, if you want your boss to give you approval to attend a conference and you know he's concerned about staying up to date on key industry trends, that's a point you can bring up in your interactions. If you know your boss is most concerned about the bottom line, consider how your attendance at the program could help increase sales or improve efficiencies that might cut costs.
Step 3
Select communication tools—or a mixture of tools. Your purpose and audience will help you determine the best communication tool, or combination of tools, to use. When communicating one on one, some people prefer email, some the phone and some in-person discussions. Choosing the wrong method can hinder your ability to be effective. Consider also the timing of your communications. Approaching the boss right after a tense sales meeting is probably not the best time.
Step 4
Create key messages. People often try to convey too much in a single communication. Decide what your most important points are, given your audience and your objectives. A good rule of thumb is to use no more than three to five main points. These points should become your focus as you craft your message.
Step 5
Listen and learn. Effective communication is often two-way, offering communicators the opportunity to listen and learn, but only if they take advantage of that opportunity. Every opportunity for interaction offers the chance to learn and improve. Finding out areas where you have been misunderstood, or where objectives have not been met, can help you be more effective when engaging with others.