Empowering Employees Methods - Essay Example

Empowering Employees Name Institution Date Table of Contents Empowering Employees 1 EMPOWERING EMPLOYEES 19 2 Table of Contents 2 Literature Review 3 Introduction 3 Methods of empowering employees in public and private organizations 4 Policies and procedures 4 Sharing information 5 Developing a vision 6 Training employees 7 Access to resources 9 Winning the employees trust 11 Improving communication 12 Benefits of employee empowerment 12 Implementation 14 Recommendations 15 Conclusion 17 References 17 Literature Review Introduction Empowering employees is the process of allowing the non-managerial workers or staff to contribute ideas towards the management of the organization. It involves employees making their own decisions regarding the operations of an organization. This is aimed at increasing productivity by making the employees feel that they own the organization and they are fully part of the system. It is also an independent practice that aims at making the employees feel that they are part of the organization and thus acts as a motivating factor. According to Murrell and Meredith (2000), the process should not result into punishments and other repucautins due to the contributions made by the employees. It should be a free process so as to create an atmosphere suitable for ideas and contributions to be made. The management should consider each of the proposed decisions or contributions made by the employees seriously so that the process may make an impact. In cases where the management ignores the contributions made then the process will not bring any meaningful changes and the employees will not feel empowered. The paper will discuss in details the methods of empowering employees, the procedure of implementing the empowerment process and also the benefits of employee empowerment. Methods of empowering employees in public and private organizations Policies and procedures A policy involves a set of regulations that guides the decision making process in an organization. It spells out how activities should be carried out and the personnel involved. It also acts as a guideline to the general operations of an organization. According to Hunjra (2010), the established policies should be easily be understood by the employees before the implementation of the employee empowerment process. The procedures on the other hand involve the steps that will be followed when implementing an organization policy which in this case involves employee empowerment. The procedures followed by an organization should be flexible enough for all the employees to adapt. This is based on the fact that some employees take long to understand and embrace a procedure (Murray, Poole & Jones, 2006). The organization must develop policies and procedures that aim at empowering the employees. The work policies should clearly outline the roles each of the employees is supposed to perform and how best it should be done. Workplace policies should also be developed so as to act as a guideline towards implementing the process. The policies and procedures should be in line with the implementation of employee’s empowerment. Petzinger (1997) argues that the policies and procedures in most cases act as the link between the management and the employees. In the organizations visions and mission empowerment of employees should be considered so as to ensure performance towards achieving the organizations objectives. Proper guidelines for the implementation of the empowerment process should be put in place to ensure the empowerment procedures are well understood by the employees. The management should also ensure that the policies regarding the workplace are flexible enough to accommodate the employee empowerment process. Therefore whenever policies for the organization are being developed, it should be all inclusive to ensure full support and success. The type of policies in the organization is important in ensuring employee empowerment process is successful and beneficial to the organization (Murrell and Meredith, 2000). Sharing information Information is power. Whenever the employees have the right information, they will be able to perform well and focus on the objectives of the company. Whenever employees do not have adequate information, they may not be able to act responsibly since they do not understand the real consequences of their actions. Empowering the employees involves ensuring the information is shared among all the employees. The information should include the roles that the employee’s performance affects the company. Details about the progress made by the organization should be availed to the employees at all time. This ensures that the employees know what their contribution to the organization is. This ensures that the employees put more effort since they will be clearly aware of what they are supposed to do in order to develop the company. Feedback is also an important issue regarding information sharing in an organization. This involves setting goals for each employee and then communicating to them the results of their work. This information empowers the employees since incase of positive outcome the employees involved in the work will be motivated by their results. In situations where the employees are not empowered, they feel less appreciated (Hunjra, 2010). The employees are empowered when they have adequate information regarding the organization and their roles. This should be done by ensuring barriers to information is removed. There are supervisors who are unwilling to share any information regarding the performance of the company (Rosalia, 2001). This takes place mainly in public organizations. This in turn makes the employees work with discomfort since they do not know the direction the company is heading. The management should also develop guidelines of how the information will be shared to the employees in order to empower them. However despite information being the basics of empowerment, there should e limitation on the amount of information that should be given to the employees. This is mainly for the purpose of maintaining discipline and ensuring that the errand employees do not use the information for the sake of benefiting themselves or destructing the company’s public image (Murray, Poole & Jones, 2006). Developing a vision In order to empower employees, there must be a vision in place. The organization should have values that have clearly been developed and goals that need to be achieved. Vision enables the employees to know what needs to be done next. This will be a step towards empowerment since the employees will end up coming with independent decisions that are still in line with the vision of the organization. This is important to the organization since it promotes innovations in the organization. Innovations will arise from the fact that the employees will develop new ideas without much supervision while at the same time strives towards achieving the company’s goals and objectives. The supervisors and the managerial department should also ensure that the employees have clearly understood the vision of the company since it will be difficult to empower them when they do not know what to do next or how to do it (Blanchard, Carlos & Randolph, 1996).  The vision that empowers employees is usually fair enough and is driven by freedom and commitments as the main factors. Empowerment will be difficult to be achieved without a vision in place. The vision should also be flexible enough to accommodate empowerment of all the employees. When the factor is still new to the employees efforts should be made to ensure that they adapt the new idea. This is because most employees may not be used to the idea empowerment and thus may find it difficult to adapt to the vision. Vision as a tool for empowerment has been able to spearhead great discoveries in the human history. This was only possible after a vision by the then United States of America president had a vision of man landing in the moon. A vision will enable the management to allocate adequate resources to the employees in order for them to develop the organization. This empowerment tool has worked for many organizations successfully while organizations without vision have not been able to achieve employee’s empowerment fully. Training employees This is the most important part of empowering employees in order for them to make good decisions and also work as a team. An organization should invest in training opportunities for its employees so as to ensure new ideas are well adopted by the employees. It may prove difficult for employees to start making new decisions or become empowered without having adequate knowledge. Training of employees always ensures that the employees are able to learn new ideas and modern technological advancement and managerial techniques. Training opportunities ensures that the employees become competent in their areas of specialization and working as a team. Competency will enable the employees to be more equipped with knowledge together with the skills they have acquired while working. This makes the employees more confident in carrying out their duties and thus achieving the main goal which is empowerment. In order for this process to be fully successful it requires the employees to be adequately trained on issues regarding leadership, technical skills and management issues. This will enable the employees to know how to work with their leaders and thus appreciate empowerment process (Fox, 1998). The training process might e costly to an organization but its benefits are much more compared to the cost. The cost will increase since the organization will have to fully sponsor the training program for each employee. The organization will also need to reschedule its operations and ensure the business continues to operate even when he employees are undergoing the training program. This may include hiring of part time workers. However the cost should not act as barriers to empowerment and an organization may set aside funds annually for the purpose of empowerment through training. The training will however need to be done in stages. This will ensure that the employees get to know all the procedures that need to be done. The training sessions should also be done in groups so as to encourage interactions and discussions among the employees (Fox, 1998). This will enable those who are fast learners help the others through explaining to them freely. This will also promote team work which is essential for empowerment apart from the group training and team work; the employees should also be taught interpersonal problems solving skills. This will empower the individuals by enabling them to make independent wise decisions based on the situations they may individually find themselves. Training is also important to enable the employees achieve the vision of the company. This is usually important since the training prepares them on how to deal with decision making processes and how to become innovative. Without training the employees may not be fully empowered despite understanding the vision of the organization. Training also empowers the employees with skills on how to achieve and improve their knowledge when it comes to practically making judgments. It also acts as a refresher course and the employees are equipped with skills and knowledge that is in line with the modern business environment. This also makes the employees develop a spirit of hard work since they will be considering the investments made on them during the training process and thus enable them appreciate the organizations efforts towards their betterment in terms of skills and knowledge. Any organization that embraces training of employees as a method of empowerment will always achieve good results in terms of profitability, discipline and development. Access to resources Empowerment process will not be complete without the employees being able to access the resources fully. This is because the employees may be in a position to make good decisions but they require funds for implementation. The supervisors should adequately be trained on the issues of employee empowerment because in most cases they act as the barrier to access of resources. Most organizations are usually reluctant to share information regarding finances to the employees who end up making plans and decisions that ends up being rejected in turn due to lack of resources. If the information was given to them, then it would be easier for them to come up with alternative plans. When such plans are rejected, the employees are demoralized and feel as if they are not taken serious. However when they have the correct financial information, they will easily understand the situation. The employees should therefore be given chance to know the financial situation and also access to resourceful persons in the organizations. Resources should be availed to them so as to enable them carry out their duties without much stress and strain regarding availability of resources. Whenever the employees get full funding for their proposals they will develop a feeling of being trusted by the organization and the management and thus enabling them to perform their duties better. This will not only be beneficial to the organization but to the employees involved since they will feel empowered (Rosalia, 2001). Most organizations however, do not trust the employees to the extent of allowing them to fully access the available resources. The main reason being the employees may end up abusing the resources through wastage and other activities that are not planned. The remedy for this is offering the employees with proper training regarding the resource use so as to avoid wastage. Consequences of wastage of resources should also be spelt out. Without training even if the employees are given full access to resources, they will not be able to know how to utilize them and thus the empowerment process will not work. The management should also note that for the employees to be empowered they should be fully equipped with resources which not only includes funding but also ability to seek services from experts and other members of the public. This should be put into consideration. If the management does not avail resources, then the employees will not be empowered and their performances will not be of quality which will end up affecting the whole company. Resource access is therefore an important factor in ensuring that the employees are empowered and thus increasing productivity and success of the organization (Aeppel, 1997). Winning the employees trust The employees will only feel empowered when they are trusted by the management. It will be difficult for the organization to achieve any progress in empowering the employees if they feel that they are not trusted. This will only increase suspicions and the whole process will end up collapsing. The trust build on employees will translate into support to the organization and thus creating good working relations between the employees and the staff. If the employees do not support any process in the organization, then the results will not be good. The management can therefore win the trust of the employees by appreciating the efforts they make towards achieving the vision of the company. This can be done by rewarding the employees whenever they make an improvement, achievement or innovation. This will not only empower the employees but also ensure that they become motivated and thus performing their duties even better. Competition for better results will also arise among the employees and thus more trust will develop between the management and the employees. This will in turn transform to empowerment of employees leading to better results for the company and the benefits to employees and the clients (Vanita, 2003). Social and emotional support is important in the empowerment process. These factors will however depend on the level of trust between the employees and the managers. For a manager to be fully empowered, the employees must offer social support which ensures that the process in progress is able to proceed smoothly. This type of support may include a conducive environment suitable for changes. On the other hand the employees will require emotional support in order for them to feel that they are empowered. Emotional support involves recognizing the efforts made by the employees in ensuring that the organization achieves its vision. This can only be made possible if there is enough trust and understanding between the management and the employees. Building trust improves the working relations between the employees and the management and thus ensures that the employees are fully empowered (Blanchard & Bowles, 1998). Improving communication This is the most important link between the employees and the management. Communication enables the employees understand what is going n in the organization and what they are supposed to do. The methods that are used to communicate issues to the employees will determine how best they will be empowered. This also gives the employees an opportunity to present heir grievances to the management without any fear and thus creating the chances of improving the services offered. The organization should develop a mechanism that enables free flow of information and a means of communication that does not undermine the workers. The employees should be fee whenever they are using the communication channel available. In some organizations it is difficult for the employes to communicate work related issues directly to the senior managers. They are forced to present their issues to their supervisors who may not pass on the right message or may end up ignoring them. This creates a feeling of not being part of the company. However, in organizations where the employees can freely share their concerns directly to the senior managers, there is a sense of empowerment which leads to improvements in the results posted by the organization (Vanita, 2003). Benefits of employee empowerment Employee empowerment ensures that the employees are more satisfied with their work and thus increase productivity in Abu Dhabi and hence. When the employees are independent and are left to make their own decisions they feel satisfied with the job which in turn makes it interesting. This satisfaction enables the employee to be more aggressive in developing ideas that ensures the growth of the company. The company will thus end up making huge profits and develop its market share. Templar (2010) notes that cases of indiscipline among the employees will not arise easily. This is because the employees end up engaging in unethical behaviors when they are not satisfied with their work. This greatly contributes to indiscipline. This mainly occurs where the employees are not satisfied with their work and they are not empowered. Empowerment of employees also ensures that the employees knows what is required of them and thus it will be difficult for them to engage in such unethical behaviors instead they will strive at ensuring that the company’s profile and image is improved (Huq, 2010). The profit margins for the company will also increase boosting the economy of Abu Dhabi which is an important pillar of vision 2030. This is attributed to the innovative ideas that empowered employees will come up with. Such ideas may lead to efficiency or improvements in the company that will translate to more customers and thus profitability. The clients who in this case are the customers will benefit greatly from the empowerment of the employees. This is because the empowered employees are always keen to ensure that their clients are satisfied. The employees who are empowered are always ready to listen to the customers and make improvements based on the customer’s feedback. Satisfied customers will always go back to the company since they are sure of getting quality services and better services. This may also lead to attraction of other customers due to satisfaction. The empowered employees are also aggressive in terms of increasing the client base by attracting new customers. This is mainly because they understand the need to grow with the organization since they are also the beneficiaries. Empowerment involves improving communication, training and explaining to the employees the vision of the company. This equips the employees with al the knowledge on operations of the organization and what they are supposed to achieve with minimum supervision. The trust invested on them by the organization also ensures that they are responsible in whatever they do (Thorlakson & Murray, 1996). Empowerment of the employees does not only benefit the non-managerial staff but also the management staff. This is because empowerment leads to the success of the organization. This success is therefore attributed to the managerial staff for purpose of initiating sucessful methods of production. The managers of such companies may also end up wining business awards for their efforts in ensuring the development of their organization. Some managerial staff may fear that empowerment will reduce their powers over the employees. This may be partly true for most supervisors. However the benefits it has on the company is far much better than the supervisors retaining full authorities over the employees and subjecting them to tough rules and regulations. Any groups of people who are empowered are always responsible in whatever they do. This is because they will always strive at doing the right thing and will always be responsible. This fact also applies in the business world and therefore empowerment is beneficial to the organization, the managerial staff and the rest of the employees (Templar, 2010). Implementation Empowerment implementation is a difficult task in Abu Dhabi and it may even take years before the result are fully realised. This is because unlike other business strategies and reforms, it require support and willingness of both me management and the employees. The process cannot be forced on the employees and it depends entirely on their goodwill to adapt to the process. Without goodwill the process will definately not work (Long, 2005). It also involves risk taking since the manager risk losing a lot if the venture does not succeed. It also comes with cost implications which makes most companies fail to adopt the process. However due to the benefits that comes with it once the whole process has been adopted it is worth trying it out. The best approach to take when implementing the process is by doing it step by step. This can be done by first assigning the employees with easy tasks and gauge their performance based on the results of the exercise. Based on these performance improvement measures can be suggested to ensure near perfection or total perfection. This should not be done hurriedly but adequate time should be allocated. The next step may then include carrying out the next level of the implementation.. The procedure should then be carried out based on the success of the previous level until the entire process is completed and good results registered. The management should also ensure that they involve experts in the process for technical advice during each step (Long, 2005). Recommendations This process is quite suitable for organizations that deal directly with its clients both in the public and private sector. The procedure for this process is complicated and may lead to loses for an organization if it is not done in a proper way. Before the management seeks to implement this process it should carry out extensive awareness to its employees so that they are physiologically prepared and have clearly understood the purpose of process. The process has many benefits once it has fully been adapted and will ensure the organization fully realizes its potential and develop. The managers must therefore ensure tat the process is carried out step by step without pressurizing the employees. All should be removed before implementing the process. The process should also be carried out at all the departments of the organization at the same time to ensure uniformity and success of the process. The manager must choose a department or personnel to coordinate the process to ensure that it runs smoothly and is accounted for. This process is important for both private and public organizations. In the case of public sectors or government departments, the leaders or managers should first be trained adequately on the usefulness of the process. This is mainly because the managers in the public sector tend to hold much powers over the employees. This will be necessary since the introduction of employee empowerment will mean that they have to loose some powers although this will not affect their positions. This training is a must since it will equip them with the necessary knowledge on how to deal with the empowered employees. During the implementation of the process, the managers should keenly monitor it to ensure success. They should ensure that they receive feedbacks from the employees concerning the process. This can be done through the introduction of a suggestion box where the employee can express their views concerning the process. The management should analyze those views and act on them. The organization can also consider introducing monthly newsletters with contributions from all the departments. Conclusion According to the paper, the empowerment process is aimed at ensuring that the employees feel that they are part of the company and hence exploit their full potential without much supervision. The process also makes the employees become accountable for their actions and thus promoting responsible working behaviors. According to the paper the process may also present challenges to organizations due to the demanding nature it has. It is also a process that requires patience and hard work since it takes a lot of time for it to be fully beneficial to the organization. According to the paper the reasons for this process is in line with the current business practices and is being adopted allover the world despites it nature of being risky. The risk involved during the implementation process is mainly loss of revenue and time. According to the paper, this may occur during the training process since some operations will have to be stopped or part time employees be hired. This challenge is also the main reason as to why many organizations have not implemented the process. Some managerial staff are also afraid of implementing the process since they feel that they will loose powers. This is however not true according to the paper. Organizations that have adopted the process successfully have benefited greatly from it. References Murrell, K. L. & Meredith, M. (2000). Empowering employees. Ney Jersey: McGraw-Hill Professional. Templar, R.(2010). The rules of work: A definitive code for personal success. Second Edition. Pearson Fox, J. (1998). Employee Empowerment:An Apprenticeship Model. Brain Training game. Retrievd December 26, 2011 from Hunjra, A. (2010). Impact of Employee Empowerment on Job: Satisfaction: An Empirical Analysis of Pakistani. http://works.bepress.com/ahmed_hunjra/8/ Long, T. (2005). 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(1997).  Missing the boss:  Not all workers find idea of  empowerment as neat as it sounds.  The Wall Street Journal, pp. 1, 10 Blanchard, K., Carlos, J.P. & Randolph, A. (1996).  Empowerment Takes More Than a Minute.  San Francisco:  Berrett-Koehler Read More