5 top tips for great temporary worker engagement
April 23, 2019Categorised in: Employee Engagement, News, Recruitment
Employee engagement has been a buzzword for a while now, but not many recruitment agencies have tapped into temporary worker engagement as a way of attracting and retaining talent. That’s why we had a chat with David Tovey, director of First Base Employment. David has written books about principles in business, ethics in business and how companies engage staff.
“I’ve worked with businesses all over the word, and one of the most interesting things is that wherever you happen to be, whether it’s the US, the Middle East, Australia or the UK, the same principles apply in the way that we engage our people, and particularly the way we engage with our temporary staff”, says David.
Here are his 5 top tips on engaging temporary workers:
1 - Culture, culture, culture.
Top of the list for David, has got to be the culture of your organisation. “Do you have a culture where you value your temporary staff? Do they feel just as valued as your full time staff? The best organisations don’t treat them differently.”
2 - Get to know your workers
Number two: communication. “Are you keeping your temporary staff just as informed as the rest of the organisation? Do you get to know those people? Get to know them really well.”
3 - Induction
The communication has to start from day one. Permanent staff get an induction, and so should temporary staff. “During that process you might well find out people have skills that you can use elsewhere in the business. And you can also explain the pathway to full time employment. Last year, Amazon in the US took on as full time employees over 7k of their temporary workers.”
4 - Attitude of gratitude
Feeling appreciated is key for temporary workers to be engaged. “How many times do your managers thank the people that work for you? A genuine ‘thank you’ makes a huge difference to help people feel valued.”
5 - Benefits for everyone
Make sure also that they’re part of the benefits package that you offer to everybody. “If you do that in-house, then make sure that you share those benefits with your temporary workers. If you work as an agency, make sure that they are professional, make sure that they are ethical, and make sure that they are providing benefits and perks to temporary staff on your behalf.”
