Transcript: So, Julie and I are learning so much from our team lately. They’re teaching us so much about the context of information they need to be successful in their work, and it’s wild. The perspectives that owners of a firm have and that the team has is totally different. The team’s trying to do their work to fulfill the mission and the value of the organization, and the owners of the firm are, you know, they’re doing that high level, strategic thing. So, there’s a lot of things at the high level, strategic activities that the owners are doing.

Some of that information and context is helpful for the team, for them to do … fulfill the purpose. So, we’re creating the mission and value. The team is fulfilling it with the clients. They’re on the front line. Our team lately has been letting us know there’s information that’s not bridging those two things that would help us do our work better. It’s so cool to have a team that cares so much that they would even say, “Hey, if you’ll do this, it’ll help us serve better. We want to do that,” is so cool. It made me think about team engagement, employee engagement, and how important that is.

My partner and I study a lot of consulting literature. We do a lot of consulting, so it’s a lot of fun to read about it and read about how humans change. I read this in a consulting guide not long ago. It says if you want to increase your potential for a successful change effort, which typically consulting is always some kind of change effort with a company, so that’s what we’re doing, some global, communal change in a whole company, and if you want to increase the potential for that successful change, factor in and measure employee engagement issues along with whatever your other organizational goals might be.

So, basically they’re saying whatever change you’re trying to do, keep a pulse on employee engagement. That is the signal and the key that you know you’re on the right track. When the employees and the team are continually staying engaged through the process of change, that’s when you know things are working well. And it’s true. We’re finding our team, they’re engaging themselves. They’re coming to Julie and I going, “Hey. This information would help us lead and care for the clients better,” and it’s so cool. They’re engaged. That’s a beautiful measurement of data to us that they are truly engaged and they want to do their best work.

So, we want to give them what they need to remain engaged, because we want our organization to always be changing too. But when we’re consulting with other people, we have to keep in mind as consultants, how do we help the change happen in the company, but we need to be checking in with that team periodically and go, “How do you think it’s going? Are you still engaged?” That’s a sign that the change is being successful. So, just wanted to talk about the importance of employee engagement, team engagement through processes of change. Don’t forget that when you’re trying to make changes in your creative services company. Thanks. We’ll see you.