Say, Stay, and Strive: How to Ensure Employees are Champions for Your Business

Companies always need to think about employee engagement and retention. 

But in the post-pandemic workplace, it’s more important than ever. 

The shift to remote work dramatically changed the career landscape. With the option to work from anywhere, employees have more options than any other time in history. 

And what’s more, personal concerns over health and shifting priorities due to the pandemic mean more workers are evaluating their career goals. 

This all led to what was dubbed the Great Resignation, or what others have called The Great Reshuffle. 

And the result is that employees are demanding more from their employers. 

So, businesses need to take note and start evaluating how attractive their company is to current and prospective employees. 

One way to frame this situation is with the Say, Stay, Strive concept. Here’s what it’s all about and six steps you can take to achieve alignment and ensure your employees become champions of your business. 

Say, Stay, and Strive: 3 Key Questions to Ask

As employers aim to retain employees longer, you need to be mindful of three ideas: 

1. Say: What do employees say about working for your company? Are they champions for your business?
2. Stay: Are employees staying in your organization? 
3. Strive: Is your team giving the best they have or skimming by? This isn’t just about their output levels. It’s a direct reflection of their engagement at work, which is arguably more important. 

And all three points are vital. 

If you just have employees sticking around long-term, but they’re not doing their best or speak poorly of your organization, they’re not the best team members for your business, and your business isn’t doing everything possible to keep them engaged and fulfilled by their work.

Or, on the other side, you may have a high-performing employee who champions your organization. But if they end up sticking around for just a year before moving on to new opportunities, you’re back to square one trying to hire again. 

Ultimately, you want your team members to stay with you for a longer period of time, do their best work, and become vocal ambassadors for your business. 

This comes down to a few key things: 

• Employee engagement: Are they engaged in their daily tasks and responsibilities?
• Employee motivation: Are they eager to do their best and strive for excellence? 
• Employee satisfaction: Are they happy with their compensation package and the overall workplace? 

When a company is able to hit these three elements, you’ll reap the benefits of hard-working, engaged employees who stick around for the long haul. 

And, more than that, they’ll become champions for your business—ensuring positive word-of-mouth promotion to those they interact with. 

6 Ways to Ensure Employees are Champions for Your Business

Employee engagement and retention is a huge topic and, as such, there are a thousand ways to approach it. 

So, it can be helpful to center the conversation around alignment. To turn your employees into champions of your business, you want them to be aligned with their work, their future, and the company. 

Here are 6 key ways to achieve it. 

Aligned With Work

1. Autonomy: At any level and in any position, employees want—and need—autonomy. This is what gives them ownership of their work and helps them feel deeply aligned with what they’re working on each day. 
2. Workplace environment: Another way to feel aligned with work is to be focused, productive, and on-task. One key part of this is the workplace environment. Flexible workspaces are a great option for employees who find remote work distracting and difficult. A private office in a coworking space or open coworking membership both give you access to a productive environment and supportive professional community. 

Aligned With Future Opportunities

3. Opportunities for advancement: If an employee doesn’t see themselves at your company in the future, they won’t stick around. There should be opportunities for advancement at any level, whether that’s training for a new role or upskilling (with a salary increase!) through professional development. Consider having regular meetings with your team members to build a career development plan so they know you’re looking out for their future at the company. 
4. Appropriate level of challenge: Not all future opportunities will be a new role or title. Some employees can “advance” by learning new skills and being appropriately challenged. Increased knowledge and growth help people feel like they’re moving forward and contributing, but a lack of an appropriate challenge makes people feel “stuck” and may then look for new opportunities. 

Aligned With The Company

5. Clear goals and values: If you want your employees to enthusiastically champion your company to other people, they have to be aligned with your goals and values. Company goals and values should be documented and clearly communicated to all team members. Alignment in this area means employees are both inspired to work hard and advocate for your mission to others.  
6. Company culture: We could talk about a lot of things under this category, but company culture is ultimately about a sense of belonging. Company culture is fostered by things like bonding over social events, investing in professional development, or carefully selecting a workplace. And while it’s possible to build remote company culture, in-person is the most impactful. Consider booking a meeting room or flex space to host your remote team for important events and meetings. 

Prioritizing things that help employees align with their work, future, and the company means they’re more likely to Say, Stay, and Strive. 

Tap into a professional network that can help create better employee engagement and satisfaction on your team. Book a tour of The Post.