Change cannot be put on people. The best way to instill change is to do it with them. Create it with them. – Lisa Bodell

Employee engagement was once just a good-to-have goal and used to involve tactics to make the employees "feel an emotional connect" around special occasions and conventional team-building activities.

The COVID-19 pandemic is forcing organizations to throw away playbooks that they had become comfortable with. Employee engagement is now a mission-critical strategy, which can make or break the growth story of the company in both, short and long term.

Before the pandemic, most employees were working in usually the same office building. The projects they worked on and the people they interacted with, would more or less define the culture. Managers and leaders could focus on few, well-defined levers of motivation to improve performance.

In the new normal, everyone is feeling the need to embrace and adapt to hybrid work. From the perspective of the leadership, they need to figure out the optimal employee engagement strategy that serves the needs of employees whose workspaces and schedules can differ widely. Though the challenge is daunting, fast-evolving technology is here to help.

Here are 3 ways to rethink employee engagement that inspires and aligns everyone towards a common goal:

1. Organize regular virtual town halls: Interactive townhalls inspire a sense of community among your employees. A transparent, “all-hands” discussion format enables them to be heard. Virtual town halls can be used to give context to company goals and inspire accountability and ownership.
    
2. Go beyond traditional sales kick offs (SKOs): Imagine a sales kickoff that wasn’t motivation squeezed into a 3-day jaunt, but an evergreen team connection with more impactful training and inspiration. A virtual SKO format allows you to feature outside speakers, and top sales leaders to show that you are investing in their growth.
    
3. Iterate and experiment by learning from data: With every virtual event, you have the ability to derive insights from a sea of data to track employees’ engagement levels. What they looked at, who they spoke to and what led to greater participation. With such insights, you can then personalize future events for greater impact.

Did these ideas pique your interest? Want to explore how to put these ideas into action? Join us at Submerge - a series of deep-dive events featuring the latest trends and actionable advice from experts to deliver immersive virtual experiences.

Submerge: A Virtual Event Series

Increasing employee engagement
in a hybrid world
Nov. 17, 2021 | 11:00 AM PT

Register for free

PS: Hubilo recently raised $125 million in an oversubscribed Series B funding led by Alkeon Capital. Read how it will be deployed to enable events that foster meaningful human connections amongst employees, customers, and the greater community.