Working
with Others
Employees who gain
basic skills perform better as members of a team or in
supervisory roles:
Working With Others
Percentage of Employers Reporting Benefits
(n=55)
Better Team Performance
Eighty-two cent of employers
saw better team performance among WEP graduates, an important
aspect of improving the capacity of employees to work
successfully with others in the organization that employs them.
The scale of change was significant: many employers measured
really substantial improvements in team performance of 75 per
cent or better.
Some WEP courses improved
employees’ team performance by focusing their curriculum on
interpersonal skills development. Interpersonal skills courses
can have a lasting and significant impact on employees who learn
lessons and gain skills that they can immediately apply at work.
For example, one employer saw his employees immediately apply
the conflict resolution techniques taught in their interpersonal
skills course during a grievance meeting held soon after they
completed the course.
In one unionized
manufacturing plant, a common team problem before the training
was that employees failed to notify their team leaders when they
identified a problem because they were afraid that they would
look stupid. WEP training gave them the insight and confidence
to spot problems and bring them to the attention of their team
leader.
In a sense, everyone who
works for the organization that employs them can be viewed as
part of the team. When employees gain a greater interest in the
organization-team they tend to feel like more of a partner and
therefore they are more committed to teamwork.
"The
training helps employees feel more like business partners in
the organization."
-
Business Analyst,
Large Eastern Medical Center
The importance of building
the capacity of employees to work with others in teams is
enormous. WEP-based improvements may come from improving their
literacy skills so that employees speak and write better English
and can communicate more effectively. They may also come from
changing employees’ attitudes to other individuals and groups
in the workplace by creating opportunities for personal
interaction between employers, employees and union
representatives as they undergo training. However the change
occurs, the benefits to the employer are significant.
When team performance
improves, employees take more initiative, individuals rely more
on one another for help, tensions are reduced, and people are
able to trust each other for their personal safety. They tend to
work more effectively because they can solve problems quickly,
and help one another incrementally improve how they do their
work. As their teamwork skills improve and they become more
positive about working with others, employees become
increasingly comfortable about sharing their expertise. Often,
employers are unaware that this expertise even exists because it
relates to the particular processes and techniques involved in
doing a specific job in a specific workplace setting that are
only understood in full detail by the employees themselves. Yet
the results can be profound, yielding measurable improvements in
performance.
Another important aspect of
better teamwork is the enhanced capacity of employees’ to
perform each others’ jobs and to take on new jobs, either by
exchange or by job rotation, as the need arises. This can keep
employees’ fresher and more interested in their work because
the dulling effect of long-term repetition of work is reduced or
eliminated. It can also increase the capacity of the team to
take on new work and get it done within a tight time limit
because it enables large numbers of people to work together and
focus their effort on solving a problem or stepping up
production in a given area.
"It
has improved team performance. When we started the jobs were
individual people doing separate jobs. For example, one
person put the handles on the lab cases and another put the
sides on. Now we have employees rotating through jobs."
-
Vice-President,
Large Mid-Western Instruments Manufacturing Company
Improved Effectiveness of
Supervisory Staff
Supervisors who take part in
WEPs are subsequently more effective on the job, according to
nearly 70 per cent of employers. One reason for this often
unexpected benefit is that supervisors gain better reading,
writing, speaking and listening skills which makes them more
effective in communicating with employees. Supervisors who learn
to listen closely to their staff and read their memos, reports
and email carefully are more successful because they understand
what their employees are saying; when they add speaking and
writing skills they can give them clear direction and help them
to solve workplace problems.
Supervisors also gain in
effectiveness when they become more adept at taking a team
approach in working with others. This is tied to their attitude
to staff - sharing the experience of training tends to build
mutual respect among supervisors and employees which in turn
promotes better teamwork. Finally, supervisors become more
effective because some of the on-the-job training is taken off
their shoulders, leaving them more time to focus on supervising
production of products and services. As one employer put it,
"They spend less time teaching employees the basics and can
get back to a [core] supervisory role."
Higher skilled employees make
their supervisors more effective. When employees graduate from
WEPs with greater problem solving skills and the ability to work
with looser direction, their supervisors gain in effectiveness
because they are left with more time to focus on their core
supervisory responsibilities. As employee empowerment and
ownership take hold supervisory staff become even more
effective.
ESL training is an important
strategy for improving supervisors’ effectiveness. Having a
common language of communication means they can communicate
instructions better and obtain more feedback from employees, who
are more likely to express their opinions and ideas than they
did before. After ESL, supervisors are less likely to find
themselves running to find an interpreter to communicate with
their staff. This improves the effectiveness of both supervisors
and employees because their ability to communicate their needs
in English make them better able to resolve situations more
quickly and effectively.
ESL can also teach managers
and supervisors how to train better. They learn how to take
complicated concepts and break them down so they are easier to
understand. When intercultural and diversity training classes
are associated with ESL the benefits are increased. Supervisors
who are made more aware of the needs of employees and more
sensitive to cultural diversity became attuned to how to make
their employees perform effectively.
These changes can lead to
bottom-line results. For example, one manufacturing company has
been able to reduce the number of supervisors it needs per shift
from one per 18 production assembly staff to one per 28
production assembly staff, largely thanks to the impact of its
WEP. Calculated as a percentage of total revenue, the cost of
supervisory staff has gone fallen from 0.1% to 0.03%.
Another manufacturing
workplace which pre-WEP had 37-40 employees and four foremen,
now has 55 employees and three foremen. The impact on
performance and capacity is enormous: the employer feels his
company wouldn’t have obtained ISO 9002 certification without
the WEP courses.
"Now
the guys figure out most things for themselves. Even 5 or 6
years ago they saw that as the supervisor’s job. The math
has almost completely shifted from front office to the shop
floor."
-
Operations Manager,
Small Central-U.S. Metal Fabrication Company
Supervisors are happier as a
result. They like to know that they can depend on their
employees to move one another along.
Improved
Understanding of the Culture of the Group/Organization
Ultimately, one of the
greatest benefits of WEPs is that employees gain a much better
understanding of the culture of their workplace or their work
group within the workplace. This makes them feel more connected
and less isolated which, in turn, enhances their capacity to
work effectively with others.
An important dimension of
understanding the organization’s culture is that employees
gain an appreciation of its values and strategies for success.
In many cases, employers have found that their employees did not
grasp why change was being embraced so readily by management and
did not fully understand how important they, as employees, would
be in bringing about successful change. Often this was because
the employees’ English language skills were inadequate to
comprehend changes such as technological innovation, corporate
mergers and new production processes. After participating in
WEPs these same employees were better able to understand the
significance of change and what it would mean for them. Above
all, they gained crucial insights into their role.
More generally, WEPs give
employees an increased understanding of what is going on and why
it is happening. They help employees to see how their jobs fit
into the workplace and how they contribute to success – and
how their fellow employees contribute. As a result, some
employers have noticed a greater acceptance on part of
American-born employees of their ESL-trained, foreign-born
colleagues. In other words, WEPs help bring down cultural
barriers which leads to more co-operation in the workplace.
For
problems or questions regarding this web site contact campbell@conferenceboard.ca.
Last updated: February 18, 2001 . |