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10 tips for getting ideas from your employees
By Jenny
C. McCune • Bankrate.com
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you, who knows your company best and can offer the most worthwhile
ideas for improvements? Your employees.
But just try to drag those ideas out of them.
They're too busy. Or afraid of getting shot down. Or maybe they're
discouraged by the dust on the suggestion box.
"Suggestion boxes can just be a lame way of
trying to take the fear out of making suggestions by making suggestions
anonymous," says Arky Ciancutti, founder of the Learning
Center.net, a San Anselmo, Calif., research and consulting firm
that focuses on employer-employee relationships.
Soliciting advice from your employees doesn't
have to be an exercise in futility, though. Here are 10 ways to
get good feedback from workers that intimately know your business
-- and how to improve it.
- Get the suggestions
rolling in by asking for help: "That is the single most-important
communication that a leader can make," says Ciancutti, author
of Built
on Trust: Gaining Competitive Advantage in Any Organization.
Asking for assistance gives your workers the green light to make
recommendations.
- Focus on where your
company needs suggestions: Concentrate on one topic or
area to help your employees come up with specific ideas instead
of generalities, says Paul Davis, president of the Scanlon Leadership
Network in East Lansing, Mich., a nonprofit network of businesses
sharing ways to improve operations. Home in on a theme of the
week or of the month -- cost-saving
ideas, ways to improve safety, how to improve customer satisfaction,
etc. "Pick what matters most to your company," Davis says. A small-business
owner also may want to limit suggestions to those that can be
implemented quickly and with little investment. A recommendation
for a new product may be good, but not necessarily something that
your company wants to tackle immediately.
- Give employees the information they need
so they can make good suggestions: Workers
who are knowledgeable about operations will give better, more
informed suggestions. Many of the Scanlon Leadership Network's
members have embraced open-book
management or other ways to give employees a clear understanding
of how the business works. "Otherwise, the ideas you'll get will
be cosmetic ones: We need a better fan or We want a new water
cooler," Davis says.
- Have employees do the
math: It's not enough to suggest improvements. Employees
should also be required to demonstrate why the idea is a good
one. As part of the suggestion process, employees should be required
to document how the suggestion will improve operations: How much
money will be saved? How much revenue will be generated? How much
time will be shaved off the manufacturing process?
- Ask for suggestions
and how they can be implemented: Companies can be great
at soliciting feedback, but if they do nothing with the suggestions,
they're not benefiting, Davis says. There are several ways to
ensure implementation: Make it part of the suggestion process,
that employees must not only make suggestions on how to cut costs,
but will give a hand in implementing them. "Also, cut out as much
of the paperwork as you can," he says. "Empower people to solve
the problem."
- Keep a deadline for
suggestions: A limited-time offer for suggestions will
spur your employees to act, says John Putzier, president of FirstStep
Inc. in Prospect, Pa., and author of Get
Weird! 101 Innovative Ways to Make Your Company a Great Place
to Work. It also will motivate them to be choosy about
their recommendations. They'll pick the best ideas and won't waste
time trying to write up everything that they can think of. In
other words, a deadline will focus your employees on thinking
of quality of suggestion rather than quantity.
- Hold several rounds
of suggestions each year (rather than have an ongoing recommendation
system): The idea is similar to keeping employees to a deadline.
By holding several suggestion periods instead of an ongoing, perpetual
one, you'll keep employees from getting fatigued.
- Reward employees for
good ideas: If your company can afford it, it's best to
reward employees for suggestions that are implemented. You'll
get more suggestions and better-quality suggestions if employees
know that there's compensation for good ideas. What form and how
this compensation takes place can vary. FirstStep's Putzier recommends
a "Green stamp" approach when employees rack up points for good
ideas. These reward points can be redeemed for prizes at a local
store or from a mail-order catalog. A member company at the Scanlon
Leadership Network that Paul Davis heads up holds a raffle for
all employees who have submitted ideas. The randomly chosen winner
gets a grand prize, such as a Caribbean cruise. "The idea is to
make the process fun," Davis says.
- Be open to suggestions:
There's nothing worse than a boss who asks for suggestions
from employees and then trashes them. "You need to set the stage,"
Ciancutti says. "Listen carefully." Ciancutti also says to be
precise: read back what you think the employee's idea is and make
sure you understand it. Tell the employee when you'll get back
to him or her and if you don't know, tell them when you'll get
back to them with a date on which you expect to have an answer
for them.
- Make suggestions a
team effort: "Having individuals make suggestions can set
up a competition," Ciancutti says. "A team makes it more cooperative
and can help embellish and bring an idea to fruition more so than
an individual employee."
Follow these tips and your company will be overflowing
with ideas on how to improve.
Jenny C. McCune is a contributing
editor based in Montana
-- Posted: May 4, 2001
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