Employees will always want more money, but an increase in pay doesn’t solve the real issues that affect morale and therefore productivity. According to shift workers, failure to identify relevant employee issues is the number one reason managers aren’t
positively affecting long-term labor improvements. If you don’t ask the right questions, you’ll end up holding unproductive employee meetings that don’t address the real issues, or even increasing pay, praying that it will improve morale.
Identifying the relevant issues is a good start, but how big are the issues you are facing? Benchmarking is a great way to measure your unique environment against a national industry average and provides focus and priority for developing solutions. However, solutions must be based on operational strategies. Transforming business goals into a vision that employees will understand and embrace allow companies to achieve cost savings while improving morale.
The 2007 Core Practice Partners Benchmark Database consists of more than 100,000 shift worker responses from over 150 companies. The anonymous data collection process ensures employees give honest feedback on morale and labor scheduling topics such as: management effectiveness, overtime preferences, current schedule satisfaction, the importance of predictability and how life outside work is directly impacted by their work environment. Results can be sorted by industry, geographic location, company, and the transitional issues each client
faced at the time of the survey.
The database allows for a detailed look at how corporate behavior translates into employee morale and provides a roadmap for productivity improvements. Management teams can now effectively address the relevant issues and create a more productive, satisfied workforce.
Case Study : Food Manufacturing Shift Workers With Morale Issues Threaten To Unionize and Productivity Is Down.
A food manufacturer in the Midwest was struggling. Several key management roles had not been filled in the last year and the team was spread thin. Employees were threatening a union drive and productivity was down. The manufacturer needed to investigate what could be done quickly. Within several weeks, a study was completed to better understand the business and all of the employees were surveyed so management could clearly understand the issues.
Comparing established benchmarks to client-specific data raised significant red flags. Many of the responses rated worse than the database averages. Quantifying each issue using benchmarks as a measuring stick provided the critical perspective required to begin creating solutions that could solve the current crisis.
Contact Core Practice Partners for the results of the survey (free)
Even when paid fairly, it is human nature to still want more pay and benefits. However, employees understand the local economies and pay rates a lot better than commonly thought. 77% of the employees at this company stated they felt the current pay and benefits were good. With 77% being so close to the benchmark of 81%, why, the management team wondered, would they want to unionize? But that was the key point. Management didn’t understand that in almost all cases today, employee morale is not tied to pay and benefits. Trying to solve morale issues with a pay increase only delays the inevitable distractions associated with turnover, low morale and unionization. These are expensive problems to have.
By asking the right questions management discovered that 72% of the employees said things were getting worse (with relation to their lives at work). 72% is far worse the 40% benchmark, so we looked at more detailed responses to discover why.
47% of the employees surveyed were working more than 11 hours of overtime each week. At that point we added the 11 hours of overtime to their base labor schedule to see the effects on days off, weekend work and predictability. We continued our probing and found that 56% said they were working more overtime than they wanted. At many facilities employees want overtime and when scheduled the right way, the desire to work 10 to 15 hours of overtime is not uncommon. Was overtime being deployed in the right way at this facility? 62% of the employees said that their schedule wasn’t predictable in allowing them to know when they would work and when they would have time off. Overtime is a great way to meet the flexibility needs of the business, while providing employees with extra hours they desire, but it must be scheduled in the right way. If employees have no predictability with their current schedule, they won’t have the ability to plan anything personal for the weekend. No amount of pay could make up for lost time with family, and paying them more money is a way to distract them short term, but doesn’t
address the schedule problem.
To solve the predictability and pay off issues above, schedule options were reviewed which first met the needs of the business and then factored in the preferences of the employees. Working longer shifts enabled the workforce to meet the business needs for flexibility, while giving employees more total days off with built-in predictable five day weekends once every three weeks. By combining business needs with employee preferences these schedules became desirable. Some employees bid into those departments requiring weekend work just to get the predictable 5-day weekend breaks. In this example, we see how innovative scheduling techniques that combine the business realities with employee feedback allow real improvements in employee lifestyles. Productivity increased without extra cost to the company. In fact, labor cost decreased with fewer shift changeovers based on utilizing longer shifts.
Improving schedules is only one part of any solution. If employees feel an “us vs. them” attitude about management, they will be less incented to work towards the company goals. 71% of employees stated that they felt they were part of their crew or team. Is this number good or bad? Is there any correlation between perception and communication, and what about employee feelings towards the company as a whole? Combining specific data points and using benchmarks unlocked hidden issues and gave the management team a complete picture.
Traditionally, supervisors are the lifeline of information for shift workers and are considered part of their team. They are perceived to have a better relationship with employees and because they work the same schedule, they may be the only management figure employees see on a regular basis. They wondered why they were working nights and weekends while senior managers worked Monday through Friday, 9 to 5. The assumption was that no one in the office cared about them and the work they did (except their immediate supervisors who work with them on every shift). The management team thought this was “not a big deal” as they were working at least 55 hours every week and were often there late at night and on weekends. Managers regularly stated that “the workers on the floor just don’t understand.” The truth was that managers weren’t visible to shift workers and working long hours in their offices provided little consolation to the shop floor employees. Only 26% of the shift workers felt the management team cared about the employees (74% said the management team did not care). Although 39% is the benchmark (still very low), this number was critical in getting to the answer. Combining this low 26% with the only 19% who believed the management team communicated well with employees brought some clarity to the root issues causing unrest and union talks. No increase in pay was going to solve this costly distraction from productivity improvement initiatives.
52% of employees surveyed said they did not feel like they were a part of the company. Poor communication separates office staff from shift workers. Management teams typically don’t communicate well with employees, often fearing the worst and therefore not asking employees for feedback. Employees may feel removed from the goals of the organization and that can destroy morale and productivity. The scheduled monthly update meetings did not address employee concerns, although employees liked sitting down for a half hour, eating doughnuts, drinking coffee, and getting paid for it. Further analysis at this client revealed that employees didn’t want senior managers onsite every night and weekend. However they did feel that if senior managers showed up occasionally on the off shifts to answer questions, employees would feel more apart of the company.
Before the employee study, management had considered ideas to boost morale including adding a new break room and repainting the existing ones. This further illustrates the importance of asking the right questions. 74% of employees felt that working conditions were good at this facility. Although below our benchmark if 80%, 74% is within the acceptable range to be considered normal. This information ruled out the possibility that the cause of widespread unrest was based on working conditions. You can’t effectively listen to employees without asking the right questions. The leadership team wasn’t listening to employees and almost spent money in an area that wasn’t a problem.
The answer included several initiatives, some of which were implemented immediately and others that were gradually introduced. Senior managers utilized a new communication strategy and began working non traditional shifts once every 4 weeks. With these new ideas in place the employees felt they were finally heard and the vote to unionize didn’t pass. It didn’t even come close. Although pay increases and other paid benefits could have postponed the inevitable union vote, the only thing that could have ended the drive for good was something that didn’t cost anything. By understanding the root cause, the management team was able to provide a focused solution and no, it wasn’t about the money.
The deterioration of employee morale is a slippery slope. Productivity is the first area to suffer, but it certainly isn’t the only area impacted. Turnover, training costs, product quality, and attendance issues are also heavily hit. This client realized over $1.6 million in cost saving and profit making opportunities during this process, with $675,000 directly related to morale and productivity improvements.
When you cost out the impact from each area, the answer is clear: Management teams must spend more time working with employees to communicate, educate, and show that they care. It sounds simple, but communicating can be tough. Business realities aren’t always good news. Having the courage to share variability in customer demand can mean asking employees to be flexible. But when the right schedules for each employee group are coupled with an effective communication plan, this flexibility can dramatically reduce labor costs and improve a company’s profitability, while increasing employee morale. For this client, the reality was that clear communication about company direction, schedule changes, and clarity on potential
issues made employees more productive and saved the client money. Most importantly, they learned that throwing money at labor challenges doesn’t create solutions, but delays and distracts employees from being productive members of their teams.
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It’s Not About The Money
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