There is no denying that employee engagement is absolutely essential when it comes to motivating employees. Why is it important? Because a robust employee engagement program creates a healthy working environment which not only boosts productivity at work but also has a significant impact on your business’ profits.

Workforce recognition is the modern-way of growing your business. That is why many successful brands implement the best employee engagement software in their employee engagement efforts.

However, some managers fail to understand that employee engagement does not come with an off switch and must be conducted every day, even if it means bringing a new employee engagement platform into its technology stack.

Much like exercising regularly contributes to your wellness, engaged employees add value to your business and ensure that it continues to thrive.

According to a recent study, 80% of employees in the United States are stressed due to the company’s lack of effective communication.

That is quite alarming, right? There is more; the research also stated that 63% of the stressed employees consider quitting their jobs because of miscommunication between the teams.

Employee Engagement and Employee Recognition Platform

Also known as worker engagement programs, these tools make a mark for automating employee engagement processes.

So, how can an employee engagement program benefit your organization? The answer to this question is a subjective one.

Apart from non-tangible benefits like improving mindfulness, getting recommendations, and aligning the workforce towards a common goal, there are other ways for employee engagement tracking to help your company.

• Bridges the gap between employees and management by opening feedback channels over a centralized platform
• Helps employees and employers understand each other’s concerns and finds a way to achieve satisfaction levels
• Keeps all the teams aligned towards a common goal and manages the entire communication process effectively
• Creates a community within the organization and makes the employees feel connected with the company
• Allows you to shine a spotlight on hardworking employees, manages incentive programs, shares employee-related communication with all, helps in organizing team outings, and more
• Eliminates guesswork by producing actionable data. It also helps in tackling any performance issues well in advance

Note: Employee engagement tools can be instrumental in automating a wide range of processes; it is in no way a substitute for human resources and is only as good as the people operating it.

Qualities of the Best Employee Engagement Software

When an objectively designed employee recognition tool is onboarded in your technology stack, it can prove to be a real game-changer for your company. But what are the essential qualities that this tool should have?

The answer to this question is in the following points:

Employee Engagement:

Good engagement software has enough capabilities like an in-built messaging platform to help your teams stay well-connected at all times.

It fosters seamless collaboration between staff members and improves every department’s efficiency in the process.

It also streamlines business operations by improving the problem-solving process in the organization.

Employee Retention:

Building a strong team is tough, but what is even more challenging is retaining them. For any business venture, keeping the core team together is a challenge.

A right employee engagement solution allows you to better understand your team, empathize with them, and find ways to improve their work experience.

By opening up a communication channel for direct employee feedback, you give value to their opinions. You can intrinsically get to know everything about your employees’ needs and use their ideas to improve business processes wherever possible.

Productive Teams:

It is safe to say that an engaged team is several times more effective than a group without a purpose. Let the employees know how much their contributions mean to the organization and define the scope of the value they can add to boost productivity.

When employees start taking pride in what they do, they develop a feeling of belonging in the company, leading to increased output as their tenure progresses.

A Voice:

When you enable a platform that gives the employees a chance to share their views through surveys and notifications anonymously, you provide them with a voice without anyone feeling intimidated in any manner.

Better Onboarding:

Many companies struggle when they welcome new employees and have to explain about the workflows in the organization.

It is equally monotonous and overwhelming for both the employee and the employer. Having an engagement tool allows you to transition the entire onboarding process online, and the new joiners can catch up with all the information as they get settled in their new role.

In addition to data availability over a centralized platform, you can also enable questions over the tool to get real-time feedback from employees and managers.

Top Features of an Employee Engagement Software

Yes, the search to find the perfect employee engagement tool for 2021 can be difficult, but that doesn’t mean you have to be utterly clueless about it.

Here are some of the top features that your employee engagement software must have:

Evaluating Performance:

A solution that can successfully evaluate your employees’ performance will be a great help for your organization. With the right tool, you will be able to monitor employee contribution to the business.

Some standard evaluation criteria include the sales quotas, the overall conversion rates, average call times, and customer satisfaction levels calculated using a range of reporting tools.

Engagement and Training: 

Regular technical and soft skills training play a crucial role in keeping the employees engaged in an organization.

When you deal with intricate products and follow strict workflows, it is essential to have a tool that can automate employee engagement and training programs.

You can transmit all the information on a centralized platform, and the employees receive a notification. They can enroll online without chasing any department leads and further evaluate their progress by implementing their work training.

Good software also helps you segment the learning content so that there is no confusion at any point in time.

Feedback Mechanism:

This is perhaps a significant feature of any great employee engagement tool—conducting surveys and feedback autonomously.

It gives you a clear idea about your employees’ expectations and allows you to set organizational goals for the future.

Push Notifications:

The feedback is fine, but it won’t make sense if any updates never reach the intended audience.

To ensure that everything functions seamlessly, relay the feedback to the team members across different departments quickly.

It should assist you in swift decision-making and ensure that it takes all actions immediately, and the team members receive notifications about them in real-time.

Technology Integrations:

For seamless employee engagement, the software you choose must have the capability to integrate with other tools in your technology stack.

Why? Because it allows the engagement tool to extract data from other platforms to track all employees’ progress and widen the knowledge scope.

Reward and Recognition: 

Meticulous employee recognition capabilities are at the heart of an excellent engagement tool. This core capability is crucial as it helps you identify team members who have performed exceptionally well and reward them accordingly.

You can also leverage this capability to highlight the top performers and seek candidates eligible for the promotion.

Getting a Personalized Employee Engagement Solution

Now imagine having an end-to-end solution that is powered by artificial intelligence at your disposal. Feels good?

Now imagine that the tool has a proven track record with over 10 million users and 22 integrated AI-modules. That’s NextBee’s Spotlight for you.

Integrate a developed solution focusing on delivering a feature-rich tool that can drive quickly drive employee engagement.

It provides you with the support you need to improve your employees’ performance, increase their satisfaction, and boost retention rates to generate a much positive ROI. With this solution, you can:

• Expedite onboarding process by 40%
• Increase peer coordination by 33%
• Improve productivity by 12%
• Boost referral activity by 25%

Ready to Launch Your Employee Engagement Program?

Before you move forward, here are a few things that you should consider when launching your employee engagement program.

Start with the why. Have a clear idea about why you want to implement this program in your organization. Be clear about what you are trying to achieve by implementing the tool in your processes.

Ensure you have well-defined criteria about who will be eligible to participate in the program, whether the program is for full-time employees only or are you including interns, channels partners, and others. Be clear about the eligibility criteria.

Keep achievable targets and promise real rewards when one achieves the said targets. It would be best if you also decided on what you will be giving out to the employees.

Will it be a certificate, trophy, monetary reward, non-monetary perks, a day off, or more. Finalize everything and determine your budget in advance.

All in all, a gift should be meaningful and not just vanity. Even titles like the employee of the month, the star performer of the week, or a pin mean much more than a free movie ticket over the weekend.

Finally, once you have all the details in hand, announce the awards through your engagement platform. You can also announce them over a meeting, but since you already have a tool that can share the message with everyone in seconds, why not leverage that to get everyone excited.

Conclusion

Clearly, employee engagement software is a must-have in a modern-day organization. When you engage your employees well, they go out of their way to ensure that the company does not suffer.

Let’s kickstart your employee engagement program using an AI-powered tool with robust capabilities and strong analytics. To know more about NextBee’s Spotlight platform, get in touch with our team over a free consultation today.