How to Design and Manage an Employee Suggestion Program

Description

Most organizations are looking for ways to cut costs and improve performance. Capturing ideas and suggestions from employees should be a top priority — especially in this economy. Yet many ignore the untapped resource of their employees who know their jobs better than any expert. Getting employees involved not only yields valuable ideas and suggestions, but also engages and improves employee motivation, creating a more productive and satisfying work environment.

Discover how to create employee suggestion systems such as Idea Campaigns, Idea Olympics, Idea-A-Day, Kaizen, STAT VA and Vampire Extermination Expeditions, just to name a few. The results of these programs can increase revenues, cut costs, improve customer satisfaction and have a major impact on job satisfaction and motivation.

Fact #1: Just 41% of employees think their senior management supports new ideas and new ways of doing things.

Fact #2: Just 37% of employees think senior management tries to be visible and accessible to employees.

Fact #3: A whopping 60% of employees think their organization’s employee suggestion program does not exist or is ineffective.

Marsha Myers of Lee Hecht Harrison said, “Managers usually overlook the company’s most valuable asset and source of information – their employees. As the economy slows, creative organizations can find new ways to drive revenue and reduce costs by seeking employee suggestions.”

Peter Drucker said, “One has to assume first, that the individual human being at work knows better than anyone else what makes him or her more productive . . .even in routine work the only true expert is the person who does the job.”

During the past 30 years, I have worked with hundreds of organizations in designing employee suggestion and engagement programs. Years ago, I was the Director of Innovation for the U.S. Army Medical Department where I was responsible for managing the ideas from 72,000 people.

As a Board Member of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, this nation’s highest award for business excellence, I had the opportunity to examine and evaluate how leading organizations use their Employee Suggestion Systems (ESS) to produce results. I trained managers at Yamaha and learned how they drive continuous improvement with their Kaizen process.

During this teleseminar I will explain how to use Employee Suggestion Systems to do the following.

1. Reduce costs
2. Drive continuous improvement
3. Identify problems
4. Improve customer retention and satisfaction
5. Capture new ideas and services that generate revenue

YOU WILL LEARN HOW TO:

• Use employee suggestions to drive results and best ways to implement those ideas
• Engage employees at all levels
• Overcome the obstacles that cause typical suggestion programs to fail
• Apply the key elements of an effective suggestion program
• Utilize the proper way to use rewards and recognition in the suggestion process
• Tap, capture and transform ideas into valuable products and services
• Initiate several different types of suggestion programs to get hundreds of improvement ideas from your workforce
• Increase employee participation in your employee suggestion program
• Increase the number and quality of ideas and suggestions from your employees
• Learn the powerful difference between a suggestion “program” and a suggestion “campaign”
• Incorporate the best ways to track and manage employee suggestions
• Learn about the Bright Idea Campaign