Maree's Blog

Leaders: What's your purpose?

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17 November 2017

I recently blogged about the concerning fact that engagement scores in organisations are trending down, even though each year engagement results are workshopped to create plans for the following year to lift these scores. Yet the downtrend continues.

One way to lift engagement is for leaders to provide a clear sense of direction. A lack of direction or purpose for the team is often stated as a reason for this disengagement. It may sound strange to say there are a lot of people in companies who don’t have a clear understanding of what they are expected to do, or if they do, why they do it.

It’s like getting off a plane at the Tullamarine (Melbourne) airport, collecting your bags and queuing for a taxi. When you get into the taxi they say, ‘where to?’.

Imagine if you say, ‘I don’t want to go the Geelong, I don’t want to go to St Kilda, and I don’t want to go to Dandenong’. Where is the driver supposed to take you?

As leaders, we must create a sense of purpose and a sense of direction for those we lead. Even if you think the direction and purpose is clear, if feedback says otherwise, best to act on that. I have a belief that we cannot over-communicate.

Use of stories and metaphors to build a strong understanding about the purpose of your team and its strategic direction – helping to identify where has it come from and where is it going.

Everyone needs to understand the direction they are heading in so they can plan how to get there.

If you would like to talk about your team engagement scores and ways to build engagement in your team please feel free to contact me.

Maree
Ph: 0419106343
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www.mareeburgess.com
LinkedIn: https://au.linkedin.com/in/mareeburgess

Creating Calm Culture through Conversation, Maree Burgess helps leaders; teams; and individuals communicate more effectively and thrive through change. As a people, project and change expert, she is obsessed with helping others collaborate, work and play well together.

She is an author of “The XX Project: Giving women the skills and confidence to step up in corporate”. You can order your copy here.