Tag Archive for: Employee Engagement

Workplace Culture Issues in 2023

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Recently Radio Host David Rancken from KRLD NewsRadio 1080 in Dallas contacted me about doing an interview on Workplace Culture trends in 2023. His questions and my answers follow.

David Rancken:

How’s the job market in your industry right now? This year started out with some of the lowest unemployment numbers in decades, and there seems to be no end in sight to the great resignation of 2022, but there are still a lot of issues dealing with the workspace these days. On today’s “Ask the Expert”, we are talking to Shannon McKain, a workplace culture expert as well as motivational speaker, and she is in the KRLD Zoom Room. Shannon, thank you so much for the time!

Shannon McKain:

David, thank you so much for having me back on KRLD again!

David Rancken:

When you’re giving out your talks, you talk about something called The Great Divide in the workplace. What is that?

Shannon McKain:

I’m so passionate about people having professional lives and personal lives that they absolutely love, and frankly, for most of us, we have to spend a fair amount of our time in the workplace. But unfortunately for the last decade or so, we have been so divided in so many key areas, I feel strongly that we are focusing too much on those divides and not enough on what actually brings us together.

David Rancken:

And the whole thing is this divide that you speak of. It’s not just in the workplace. It’s literally the entire nation is divided in some fashion. What is it about people that makes us so divisive?

Shannon McKain:

Golly, that could be a whole segment in and of itself, but I think particularly today, we are just so riled up because we have so much information at our fingertips, and people are empowered now more than ever to be able to assert their opinions, feelings, or emotions about something. And that’s valid. People should be able to have that opportunity. However, we’re not doing it in constructive ways where we can still continue to be pulled together on issues, especially when it comes to workplace culture.

David Rancken:

What do you see are the biggest workplace culture trends into 2023? As we are really just into the birth of this new year.

Shannon McKain:

We’ve been through so much in the last three years. Because of that, I think today we’re seeing more burnout, fatigue, confusion, anxiety, and more mental health issues than ever before. So I think when you talk about the last three years and all we’ve experienced, essentially we disrupted the apple cart in every particular sense. Humans need stability. We really do need parameters to do our best work in life. So when all of that got disrupted these last three years, it’s leaving us with a lot of confusion coming out of it. We need to focus on creating workplace culture that not only provides structure, but is healthy for employees.

David Rancken:

One thing we had seen for the last couple of years has been given the nickname, the Great Resignation, where people found other jobs in other places, but that’s also getting followed by what they’re calling the Great Regret, where they look back and say, it’s not so great on the other side.

Shannon McKain:

The workplace issues we’re seeing today have really become a PhD level of how do we solve this equation. So yeah, I think employees are definitely saying, we want something different but we aren’t necessarily finding what we need.

David Rancken:

It really isn’t. And they didn’t know what to expect when they went into the great unknown of the new company. And what they did end up losing was any seniority they had at their old place. And they might be finding this company that I just joined, I might be making a little more money, but is that extra money worth it?

Shannon McKain:

Yeah, absolutely. And in the 20+ years that I’ve been really analyzing workplace culture and issues, people think that they are motivated by money, but really at the end of the day, we are motivated by so many other facets.

For example, right now we are seeing younger millennials and particularly Gen Z not being motivated in the traditional senses whatsoever, whereas career trajectory, hierarchy, getting promotions, or the fear of being laid off, aren’t even on
Gen Z’s radar right now. They’re motivated in completely different ways.

David Rancken:

But they haven’t seen what it’s like on the other side when unemployment numbers up upwards of 12, 13, even upwards of 20% in previous decades.

Shannon McKain:

Yeah, absolutely. And I think this next year we are still looking at a lot of uncertainty, especially with a pending recession and the layoffs that we are currently seeing and will potentially see here within the next few months.

David Rancken:

And a lot of people had you talk about layoffs, a lot of people had interest in getting into the tech sector because it seemed like it’s a lot of fun in all the perks that Google and Facebook were providing, and the layoffs are really hitting the tech sector very hard at this point.

Shannon McKain:

Yeah, if you jump on LinkedIn on any given day, you see announcement after announcement of another layoff. And frankly, I don’t think that that’s doing anything for our mental health either.

David Rancken:

Let’s talk about LinkedIn for just a second. You brought it up. That gives younger employees a chance to find new work, something that older employees really never had before. In the old days, they had to stick and look through the want ads and on and through networking and everything else. How big of a sea change has LinkedIn been?

Shannon McKain:

I’ve watched LinkedIn from its inception. It’s been another great tool to not only leverage our networks, but also communicate professionally. I wish younger generations would understand that and leverage it to its fullest potential. The way we communicate, write, and put our information out there is being utilized in really great ways on LinkedIn right now.

David Rancken:

What are people missing out in not using LinkedIn?

Shannon McKain:

Constantly reevaluating our profiles, updating them, thinking about how can we promote ourselves. The idea of a personal brand and self-promotion is a very real thing. Gary Vanerchuk talks a lot about day trading our time as currency right now. Everybody’s constantly trying to stay relevant and stay in front of other people. LinkedIn is no different for your personal brand.

You have to continually think about what do I need to add to my brand? What do I need to communicate and put out there professionally? And then also being able to communicate with others and really have a discussion or a dialogue. Contributing to different conversations across the platform or following different hashtags, or again, just keeping people up to date with what you’re doing.

David Rancken:

That’s got to be tough for older workers that don’t necessarily know how to use LinkedIn properly, what steps would you tell someone that is an older person that hasn’t necessarily used it?

Shannon McKain:

I think the first thing you can do is think of Google as your best friend. You can Google and research anything today. So if you have a question about how to get started on LinkedIn, I’m sure that there’s 25 different videos on YouTube or Google to teach you how to do that.

But from a fundamental standpoint, think about how you have your physical real estate, say your home, your apartment, your townhome, wherever i you live, but also think about your digital real estate and being able to put all of your information professionally in one place that everyone can find it. So recruiters can search for you, that you’re using the right keywords and metrics to be able to say, okay, who I want to connect with professionally. And then also just being able to create status updates and just saying, Hey, here’s going on with me week-to-week or day-to-day.

David Rancken:

I guess that’s, it’s basically turning yourself, as you said, into your own brand that has to get the message out there about what it is you are and what it is you do, and how do you get that message out to followers and how do you find those followers?

Shannon McKain:

There’s a fella by the name of Richard Bliss doing a lot of education right now around the proper ways to use LinkedIn and how to optimize getting your information out there and what your reach is. Just with anything else online right now, we’re subjected to the algorithms that the parent companies want us to adhere to. It can be very cumbersome for listeners right now. I don’t want to get too into the weeds on that particularly, but just thinking about professionally, how do you write and articulate a couple of important sentences about what’s going on with you and where you’re at in your career? And then of course, engaging and connecting with folks, it’ll just continue to build a bigger reach.

David Rancken:

We were talking earlier about Gen Z and younger millennials. They don’t seem to have the same attitudes towards a workplace as older workers.

Shannon McKain:

Absolutely not. As a keynote speaker, I talk about all areas of workplace culture and workplace issues. And one of the key areas is different generations and how they are motivated, how they communicate, and what they value. Particularly with Gen Z right now, we’re not seeing them motivated in the traditional ways whatsoever.

Historically, generations were very motivated by terms of seniority, hierarchy, and working their way up the corporate ladder. But Gen Z is just simply not wanting to do that. They see that as a very stressful move, and they’re willing to forego the extra income or the additional perks of getting into middle management or climbing the ladder for what they perceive to be a better work-life balance, maybe perhaps being able to have more flexibility and just staying where they’re at. And they’re also not motivated at all by the fear of being terminated. So when you look at the psychology of this generation, we have to tackle it in a completely different way than we have with any other generation.

David Rancken:

But how does that affect the companies themselves as they’re looking to replace workers and they’re finding out that the workers that they’re hiring don’t care if they’re there or not?

Shannon McKain:

So the biggest component for management and employers is to first understand to achieve excellent workplace culture, they have to understand the psychology of employees. Then they can address how to meet employees needs. For example, right now we’re seeing that the number one motivating factor, across the board, in every area of employment is that employees just simply want to feel safe. They want to feel psychologically safe; they want to feel like they can speak up or contribute without the fear of being reprimanded. And they want to understand that their employer trusts them, especially when we’re still working in a hybrid environment and don’t really want to work the traditional nine-to-five anymore.

And so employees want their employers to be able to trust them that they’re going to get the work done and they’re being productive, even if it’s not at the right place or the right time, nine to five, if that makes sense.

David Rancken:

Yeah, it does make sense. And you talk about other issues because we, we’ve seen it in school districts, we’ve seen it in other offices. A lot of companies are looking to stand out among possible job applicants, and one of those involves something like a four-day workweek. Is that going to become more normal in the near future?

Shannon McKain:

It’s a very interesting climate that we’re looking at right now. The four-day work week that we’re seeing, as you had mentioned in education and also in corporate America. That’s kind of a two-part thing that we’re seeing right now. One in part because of labor shortages and education in schools across America, we’re just simply not seeing teachers wanting to come to work and teach. And so that’s been a really huge issue. We’re seeing that in terms of labor shortages, but then we’re also seeing it in terms of the demand of the psychological needs of workers today.

What people don’t remember or understand or maybe have forgotten that the five-day workplace hasn’t always been that way. In fact, it didn’t actually get implemented in corporate America until 1926 when Ford Motor Company actually adopted that particular work schedule.

Prior to 1926, we were looking at labor as very strenuous and hard labor types of careers and jobs, and the expectation was that workers had to work six to seven days a week, even 10, 12, 14+ hours a day. And then in 1926, Ford Motor Company said, I don’t think that this is where the future of work needs to go. And they implemented this five-day work week, nine to five, and everybody gasped and said, oh my gosh, this is crazy. But it worked and productivity went through the roof. We did that for a century, and now we’re seeing the apple cart gets turned upside down again. I think it’ll be really interesting to see what happens in these next couple of years with the four-day work week.

David Rancken:

Do you see companies looking towards older workers to take on some of these jobs that the Gen Z and millennials might not. Or are older workers kind of being left out in this great surge of hiring?

Shannon McKain:

I think older generations are certainly at a crossroads right now trying to understand their place in navigating all of this. I think in general; employees are being asked to do all different kinds of tasks that are putting them outside of their comfort zones. Older generations need to ask themselves what they have to do in order to continue their career until they can successfully retire.

David Rancken:

One of the phrases that came out, and this will probably be the last question we talk about, is the phrase that came out in the last year was the phrase quiet quitting, where people decided, I’m going to do my job to the best of my ability. I’m not taking on anything extra. Is that still the case? Or companies saying, okay, just do your job and we’ll hang on to you?

Shannon McKain:

We have all these fancy terms that we’re coming up with these days. I think if you really look at the evolution of the workplace in general, you’re always going to have those workers that want to continue to push and do everything to impress their managers. And then you’re also going to have the workers that are going to say, this is what I was hired to do, so, therefore, I’m going to get that done and then go home.

So from a “Quiet Quitting” standpoint, companies are just trying to do whatever they can right now to make things be successful. At the end of the day, I think we all need to ask ourselves, what are we doing to meet in the middle to be able to make our workplace culture more productive and successful?

David Rancken:

Shannon McKain is a workplace culture expert and motivational speaker. You can find her at www.shannonmckain.com on today’s ask the expert. Shannon, thank you.

Shannon McKain:

Thank you so much, David, and I hope this helps your listeners today!

About The Author

Shannon McKain is a motivational keynote speaker and a business consultant based in Dallas, TX. She has worked in almost all 50 states with audiences ranging from corporate executives to student leaders.

Looking for a keynote speaker or consultant who can speak on these issues with expertise? Let’s chat!

The Great Resignation

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Recently Radio Host David Rancken from KRLD NewsRadio 1080 in Dallas contacted me about doing an interview on The Great Resignation. His questions and my answers follow.

The Great Resignation Conversation

David Rancken:

Hey, Shannon. First off, we have to define The Great Resignation. That name has been getting thrown around a lot lately. What is it?

Shannon McKain:

Thank you so much for having me on your show. The Great Resignation is a term coined at the beginning of the pandemic by a professor at Texas A&M. He predicted that this fallout was going to happen. The Great Resignation is simply saying that employees are quitting their jobs left and right.

David Rancken:

There is something to be said for the dynamic shifting some. It has gone from employers have all the control, to now the employees having a little bit more than they would have prior to the pandemic.

Shannon McKain:

Absolutely. It’s important to note that The Great Resignation is talking about employees voluntarily leaving their jobs. It’s not about unemployment or employees that are being let go. So, yes, in a sense, it all comes back to supply and demand. If employees aren’t willing to work under the restrictions or terms and conditions that an employer has, then they’re not going to work for them right now. So that’s the name of the game.

David Rancken:

So why would an employee decide to leave one company to go to another? Is there any guarantee that the other company’s going to be any better?

Shannon McKain:

I don’t know that there’s necessarily a guarantee, but it’s certainly an interesting shift that we’re seeing right now. And I think you just have to look at behaviors and psychology. This even goes prior to the pandemic and The Great Resignation. If you think about generationally, we’ve seen the most recent generations not as loyal as previous generations were to maybe one or two employers. And so, maybe this grass is greener mentality or just the advancement of technology and the opportunities that we have today that weren’t there 40, 50, 60 years ago that you have access to so many more types of jobs and types of employment. And so, therefore, employees can say, “Hey, we want to name the terms.”

David Rancken:

Previous generations would have seen on their resumes if they had multi jobs and multiple companies over a short period of time. They would be considered less hirable.

Shannon McKain:

Correct. Or considered what we would call job hoppers and somebody that wouldn’t stay with us. So therefore, we don’t really want to hire them. But, again, that mentality is shifting today with shifts like The Great Resignation.

David Rancken:

So what industries get hit at the hardest by The Great Resignation?

Shannon McKain:

We’re still looking at that data, but if you look at an overall whole of the information, we’re really seeing that food and service industry-related, also healthcare, and retail types of positions. Those are the three industries that we’re seeing have been hit the hardest over the last year, year and a half by shifts like The Great Resignation.

David Rancken:

If you’re on some kind of a career path, you know you want to be at a certain point at a certain period of your time. If you decide you’re going to leave at one company and then go to a different company, aren’t you starting out at the bottom, and doesn’t that hurt your path?

Shannon McKain:

It’s an interesting question you raise. But what I’m seeing right now with a lot of the employers that my team recruits for, and also looking at the trends and the data and analytics, is that because companies need employees so badly right now, companies are willing to offer new incentives or different types of incentives than we’ve seen before. So it’s not just like, “Oh, you’re now the new low man on the totem pole again, but now maybe we will raise other benefits that you maybe already had, and we’ll get in a raise to keep you, or to get you to come over to us.

David Rancken:

You bring it up that companies are now looking to hire people. Does that mean they have to lower their standards in the kinds of people that they’re going to take on because they need to fill quotas of just bodies?

Shannon McKain:

So that’s another interesting question. With the employers and the CEOs of companies that my team works with, they are not willing to settle just to put a body in a seat. In one sense, it creates a different stress on the current employees because there is a workload that still needs to be accomplished. However, I understand and respect the employers that I’m working with, that they say no: we don’t want to change our workplace culture solely to just go grab candidate A or candidate B. If they don’t fit, they don’t fit. And we’re willing to hold out until we find the right fit.

David Rancken:

How tough is it then for companies, employees that are already there? They’ve given their years. They’ve given their blood, sweat and tears to the particular job they have, to see their company going out and looking to recruit as much as possible. What’s in it for the people to stay where they are?

Shannon McKain:

Yeah. Well, I think in the circumstances that I’ve seen over the last year is that in most circumstances, it’s because the company is expanding. So these are new roles they’re looking to fill. It’s not necessarily because they’ve let somebody go or that they’re looking to let people go. So from that perspective, the psychology is great. Th current employees understand that, “Hey, things are going great here. We’re looking to add more team members to the table.” And I think it all comes back to, again, communication and psychology. If you’re communicating to your current staff, “Hey, this is what we’re trying to achieve here. And if you’ll just bear with us, it might take us a few more months to find the right person. But if you’ll just bear with us.” Then I think it just alludes itself to saying, “Hey, we all understand, and are in agreement about what we’re trying to achieve.”

David Rancken:

Is it a good thing to change companies every so often just to learn a different way of doing something that it could be better for you?

Shannon McKain:

Well, I’m a millennial and I probably come from the mindset that, yes, absolutely. I don’t think it hurts anything to maybe switch it up every three, four, maybe five years. From a recruiting standpoint, it’s an unofficial line where we say, if somebody’s with a company at about seven years, seven years is that marker of saying, we don’t think that that person’s really going to leave, or at least they’re not going to leave as readily as somebody who’s only been there a couple of years. So, from my standpoint, the advantages and the gain of maybe changing it up a little bit is not only monetarily, but as to your point that you can learn new skills and you can learn new perspectives.

David Rancken:

So what happens when an employee says, “That’s it. I’m done. I’m going to another company.” And then they find out that company is worse. Will they go walking back to the old place with their tail between their legs, and will that old place take them back?

Shannon McKain:

Well, again, I can’t speak for others, but what I’ve seen over the last year is that companies know what the market looks like right now. And they know that it’s so much harder right now to be able to find somebody if they have to replace someone. So they’re doing anything and everything they can to keep their current employees. Just to give you a couple of examples, I’ve never seen so many companies so aggressive with increasing pay. Now, this gets into a double-edged sword here because, at the end of the day, human beings are not motivated by money. They’re really not. There are so many other motivating factors that go into why somebody gets up every day, performs the job that they do, goes in and selects the type of work that they want to do and or who they want to work for.

We have a misconception that people are going to be satisfied with an increase in pay. I’ll get to that in a second, but it is happening. And I think employees are “chasing the shiny object syndrome” right now because we are seeing such an inflation in people’s pay and salaries. So again, it’s a double-edged sword. People are getting thrown money at them left and right to either stay or to be recruited to another company. And then, ultimately, at the end of the day, I think we all need to asking ourselves, really, what’s going to make us most happy, most productive, and want to be able to give 110% in our careers?

David Rancken:

Are employees getting smarter about what to ask for from a company?

Shannon McKain:

I think as a culture, we are all getting smarter about what we want out of our lives. The American way or the Western way is that you live to work. You are supposed to work 60, 70, 80 hours a week and not say anything about it. And I think that we’re just getting smarter as humans saying, “Hey, that’s not realistic anymore.”

David Rancken:

Is it the whole concept because the phrase work-life balance has become so popular in the last couple years, especially during the pandemic?

Shannon McKain:

Yes.

David Rancken:

We worry more about making sure we have a balance in our lives.

Shannon McKain:

Yeah, absolutely. #WorkLife balance. Look, at the end of the day, human beings are complex individuals. We have so many different interests. We have so many different pieces of our lives that pull us in different directions. And so, really trying to find that balance and what works. I think also too, the one size fits all mentality, it’s just not applicable anymore. Again, humans are complex creatures, and we need to really understand those intrinsic values and motivations.

David Rancken:

One last question. How long does The Great Resignation last?

Shannon McKain:

Oh, my goodness gracious. I think we were really surprised with the data that just came out from November. We kept seeing this trend of increasing resignations from month, to month, to month, and then it dipped in October. And we thought maybe this is the end of it. But then November, we just saw a record high of 4.5 million resignations. Golly. I think we’ve still got a few months ahead of us here.

David Rancken:

. A follow-up to that one. In another survey you found, almost 30% of people are willing to leave their jobs even if they don’t have another job lined up. They must be really confident they’re going to find something quick.

Shannon McKain:

The psychology behind that, I personally don’t understand. I personally would never put myself in a situation like that. But I guess if the rhetoric that you’re hearing on a daily basis is that there’s all these openings, then maybe yeah. Maybe it is affecting people’s thought process and how they handle that.

David Rancken:

People looking more at jobs versus career. I mean, looking to do, I’m going to do something like this right now, five years from now, maybe doing something different.

Shannon McKain:

I don’t know if the trajectory is still the same as it was 20, 30, 40 plus years ago. We were conditioned to believe that you go to primary school, then college, and then you enter the workforce at the bottom and then you work your way up to management, middle management. And again, I just don’t know if that’s the mindset people have anymore. Again, going back to the idea that we really are honing in on this idea of work-life balance, and mental health, and really trying to take care of ourselves physically, mentally, and emotionally, that a job is a job, and it pays the bills, and it’s not the same as building a career.

The Great Resignation conversation

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Shannon McKain is a motivational keynote speaker and a business consultant based in Dallas. She has worked in nearly all 50 states with audiences ranging from corporate executives to student leaders. Looking for a keynote speaker or consultant who can speak on these issues with expertise? Let’s chat!

Fake Job Posts: Have You Been Hacked?

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Employers, have you ever used a job board to recruit top talent? If so, keep reading about cyber criminals hacking job boards.

You might not be aware that cybercriminals are scamming companies and job seekers via job boards. These nefarious individuals are savvy in their approach, creating vulnerabilities from several angles. I’ve put together some safety tips and tricks for employers to know while creating job board listings.

Hackers are logging into your job board accounts and creating listings under your company profile.

Perhaps you created an account with a job board years ago and haven’t logged in since. Or maybe you are using an easy password so that multiple people inside your company can log in. Regardless, it’s important to note that you must keep all of your online accounts secure. Otherwise, they are vulnerable to hackers stealing your company data, posing as you, and stealing applicants’ information. Here are some tips to mitigate this issue:

  1. Make sure to monitor all of your accounts, whether you are actively using them or not. Do a periodic checkup of all of your accounts and make sure you know exactly who has access to them. Perhaps you need to change user permissions or access.
  2. Update your passwords. Make it a habit. While it’s frustrating to keep remembering new passwords, it will also safeguard you from unwanted drama. By periodically changing your login information, you can proactively get ahead of hackers.
  3. Always check your credit cards for bogus charges. Hackers are using the data in your account to create new job listings to attract candidates. These extra charges will show up on your credit card statements alerting you that your company profile on a job board might’ve been hacked.

Hackers are creating fake profiles on job boards posing as your company.

Seems like a lot of work, right? But, it’s the latest way hackers are trying to scam folks. Perhaps your job board accounts are secure. But, what you might not realize is that online scammers are creating fake profiles that appear as your company. While this may not directly impact your business, it can create confusion within your community, reduce confidence in your organization, and hurt potential employees.

  1. Take a few minutes today to cross-reference and check that everything on your job board listed is active and credible. This is a super easy step that can be done periodically and quickly.
  2. Do a quick google search and make sure nothing false or shady appears. Try searching different keywords and phrases to see what comes up. This is also great practice for brand awareness too!

If you DO have an active job opening, take these precautions while interacting with potential employees.

Hackers are incredibly savvy in gaining insights, data, and knowledge into your organization. They go at it from every angle.  Additionally, something as simple as a link on a resume can take down your entire computer system. Here are some best practices to mitigate any company-wide damage.

  1. Always double-check the email address you are receiving information from. Hackers can pose as individuals applying to your company, but if the email address seems fishy, it could very well be.
  2. Avoid receiving or opening word documents from any applicant. Encourage applicants to send you PDF copies of their materials. This will cut down on any unwanted malware or clickbait.
  3. Do not click any links that candidates send you without 100% confidence.

Have other tips or advice? Feel free to leave us a comment below. While we are busy helping organizations create world-class teams, we also stay on top of the latest news and data impacting our clients.

Fake job posts: have your company job postings been hacked by cyber criminals hacking job boards

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Shannon McKain is a motivational keynote speaker and a business consultant based in Dallas. She has worked in nearly all 50 states with audiences ranging from corporate executives to student leaders. Looking for a keynote speaker or consultant who can speak on these issues with expertise? Let’s chat!