Empowerment may not be on everyone’s list of organizational priorities today. And for some, it may seem like some fluffy ideal with no real business value. But it should be on every company’s list of organizational priorities if they want to retain their top talent and stay competitive as the market recovers.

In this three-part blog series, I will examine the state of employee empowerment in today’s workplace and how empowerment can benefit a company’s bottom line. I’ll also discuss how companies can leverage their learning, performance and talent management strategies to foster an empowered workforce.

Today’s Worker: Feeling Overworked, Undervalued and Disengaged

Organizations that have not only survived but thrived during the recession focus intently on the execution, productivity and performance of the business. But homing in on traditional business results has also escalated the demands of the workforce. Staff cuts, tighter budgets and increasingly difficult workloads have created an environment in which employees are feeling overworked, undervalued and disengaged. While a focus on business results may have served organizations well in the short term, it won’t be enough to keep them ahead of the competition moving forward.

According to a 2010 study by Towers Watson, a majority of employers believe that talent retention will be more difficult in 2011. All employees – especially top performers – will need a deeper reason to stay when the economy recovers and it again becomes an “employee market.” They will need to feel they are appreciated for their contributions, have the resources to do their jobs to the best of their abilities, and have clearly defined opportunities to develop and advance within the organization. In short, they must be empowered beyond being asked to meet performance goals.

Survival over the past couple years required many organizations to take extraordinary measures to control costs, and research shows that employee engagement and morale has suffered as a result. According to a survey conducted by Kelton Research, employers are not empowering their people with the right training, performance feedback or insight into business objectives.

Conducted in March 2010, the study revealed the following surprising insights from the previous six months:

• 68 percent of employed Americans said they hadn’t received useful feedback from their supervisors.
• 82 percent had not established career goals with their supervisors.
• 53 percent didn’t feel they had a clear understanding of how their role contributed to company objectives.
• 25 percent had been given new duties or responsibilities at work that were outside of their primary skill set.

Empowering employees also has taken on even more importance as companies face the challenge of motivating and retaining a younger generation of workers, for whom mobility is the name of the game. Even before the recession hit, fewer than half of all Gen Y workers planned to stay one to five years at their current jobs, and only 22 percent expected to stay six years or more.

So why does having an empowered workforce matter for an organization? Empowered employees are engaged employees. They are more loyal and motivated, leading to better retention, improved performance and higher productivity. This type of workforce is better aligned with an organization’s business objectives, allowing those companies to be smarter and more innovative and agile in an ever-shifting business landscape.

To read more about why employee empowerment is crucial to a company’s success in the new economy, download a copy of the white paper, “The Empowered Workforce,” through this link: http://bit.ly/g5MUnI

Charles Coy is director of product marketing and a corporate social networking expert for Cornerstone OnDemand, a leading global provider of a comprehensive learning and talent management solution delivered as software-as-a-service (SaaS). The company enables organizations to meet the challenges they face in empowering their people and maximizing the productivity of their human capital. www.CornerstoneOnDemand.com

Empowerment may not be on everyone’s list of organizational priorities today. And for some, it may seem like some fluffy ideal with no real business value. But it should be on every company’s list of organizational priorities if they want to retain their top talent and stay competitive as the market recovers.

In this three-part blog series, I will examine the state of employee empowerment in today’s workplace and how empowerment can benefit a company’s bottom line. I’ll also discuss how companies can leverage their learning, performance and talent management strategies to foster an empowered workforce.

Today’s Worker: Feeling Overworked, Undervalued and Disengaged

Organizations that have not only survived but thrived during the recession focus intently on the execution, productivity and performance of the business. But homing in on traditional business results has also escalated the demands of the workforce. Staff cuts, tighter budgets and increasingly difficult workloads have created an environment in which employees are feeling overworked, undervalued and disengaged. While a focus on business results may have served organizations well in the short term, it won’t be enough to keep them ahead of the competition moving forward.

According to a 2010 study by Towers Watson, a majority of employers believe that talent retention will be more difficult in 2011. All employees – especially top performers – will need a deeper reason to stay when the economy recovers and it again becomes an “employee market.” They will need to feel they are appreciated for their contributions, have the resources to do their jobs to the best of their abilities, and have clearly defined opportunities to develop and advance within the organization. In short, they must be empowered beyond being asked to meet performance goals.

Survival over the past couple years required many organizations to take extraordinary measures to control costs, and research shows that employee engagement and morale has suffered as a result. According to a survey conducted by Kelton Research, employers are not empowering their people with the right training, performance feedback or insight into business objectives.

Conducted in March 2010, the study revealed the following surprising insights from the previous six months:

• 68 percent of employed Americans said they hadn’t received useful feedback from their supervisors.
• 82 percent had not established career goals with their supervisors.
• 53 percent didn’t feel they had a clear understanding of how their role contributed to company objectives.
• 25 percent had been given new duties or responsibilities at work that were outside of their primary skill set.

Empowering employees also has taken on even more importance as companies face the challenge of motivating and retaining a younger generation of workers, for whom mobility is the name of the game. Even before the recession hit, fewer than half of all Gen Y workers planned to stay one to five years at their current jobs, and only 22 percent expected to stay six years or more.

So why does having an empowered workforce matter for an organization? Empowered employees are engaged employees. They are more loyal and motivated, leading to better retention, improved performance and higher productivity. This type of workforce is better aligned with an organization’s business objectives, allowing those companies to be smarter and more innovative and agile in an ever-shifting business landscape.

To read more about why employee empowerment is crucial to a company’s success in the new economy, download a copy of the white paper, “The Empowered Workforce,” through this link: http://bit.ly/g5MUnI

Charles Coy is director of product marketing and a corporate social networking expert for Cornerstone OnDemand, a leading global provider of a comprehensive learning and talent management solution delivered as software-as-a-service (SaaS). The company enables organizations to meet the challenges they face in empowering their people and maximizing the productivity of their human capital. www.CornerstoneOnDemand.com