Editor’s note: Beth Pearson is co-founder and HR lead at B2B research company Circle Research, London.
Research is a people business. Our raw materials are the opinions of respondents. Our product is the insight extracted from these raw materials by clever folk. An agency or client-side researcher can only make a difference if they’re skilled at building relationships with key stakeholders. This all means that attracting, developing and motivating top talent is critical to our industry’s future. What’s the secret?
We recently conducted a survey of more than 800 white collar employees from a variety of industries to find out.
At face value the answer was obvious. One fifth named remuneration (18 percent) or their work/life balance (17 percent) as the single most important sources of happiness at work. But as researchers we all know that the obvious answer isn’t always the true answer. So to uncover the true drivers of happiness we ran a regression analysis between overall satisfaction at work and 23 workplace attributes. The results were revealing. Base salary and work/life balance actually have only a moderate correlation with job satisfaction. They matter along with a handful of other factors related to working conditions but are really just the basics. Outstanding employers seem to add three secret ingredients: They inspire through their leadership; invigorate by providing people with enjoyable, stimulating roles; and they make people feel valued individually while at the same time creating a sense that they’re part of something bigger – part of a tribe which shares a common identity and has bought employees into the same vision.
That rings true with my own experience.
I lead HR at Circle Research and when talking with peers in similar roles elsewhere over the years I’ve noticed a pattern. When agencies are good at retaining and motivating talent, there seem to share six common features:
- They have a clear vision. Human beings have a need to belong and feel a purpose in their life. As most people spend the majority of their waking hours in the office, the workplace forms an important role in fulfilling these ambitions. So as an employer if you communicate a clear vision in an inspiring way, then you’ll tap into these powerful fundamental human needs.
- They are inclusive. If you want people to buy into a vision and feel part of it, then you need to involve them. At the very least that means providing regular updates on company strategy, financial performance and progress toward key goals. But why not take it a step further and invite everyone to give their own input on the company strategy? Not only does this foster a sense of ownership, you might find that opening it up to a wider team brings a fresh perspective.
- They are results-focused. If you’re serious about rallying people around a vision, then you need to make it clear that they’ll be judged on their contribution to reaching it – the results they actually achieve. This also means that you can be flexible in your working practices and let people work where they want, when they want (after all, as long as they achieve the results, does it matter how?). This freedom is a big motivator – it lets people better manage their life and shows you trust them.
- They are meritocracies. Being results-focused goes hand-in-hand with being a meritocracy. If the result is what matters then reward shouldn’t come simply because of time served or skill in navigating internal politics. Rather, once someone has the skills needed for the next job role, promotion should come immediately and automatically.
- They provide career direction. Most people are ambitious and if an employer is vague about how they can help fulfill this ambition, one of two things usually happens. Either they’ll give up and let their ambition fizzle out, or they’ll find another employer who nurtures their ambition. So clearly detail the career roadmap in your company, including the skills and behaviors needed to progress from one stage to the next, and use this as the basis for performance appraisals.
- They engineer stimulating jobs. Let’s be frank. Doing the same thing day in, day out gets boring, especially for the intellectually curious types attracted to a career in research. So if you create boring jobs, expect your people to be demoralized. But if you build variety in their role and ensure that they’re constantly being pushed just outside of their comfort zone, you’ll engage and grow them.
So ask yourself this – truthfully, do people in your company have a reason to be excited about coming into work?