What does empowerment really mean? Wiley Workplace Intelligence has looked at this and come up with some useful findings:
-Empowerment used to simply mean that someone had the skills, and the permission, to act autonomously at work. Often the result of long-term relationships and trust-building, empowerment developed over time.
-Today, empowerment in the workplace looks very different than it did before the pandemic. There is a surprisingly simple tool managers can use to foster it: clarity. Nearly half of employees (48%) ranked clarity as the most important factor in their sense of empowerment. This finding reveals that uncertainty, not only a lack of authority, can be a major barrier to action. Even the most capable and motivated employees may hesitate to take initiative if they’re unclear about expectations, goals, or decision-making boundaries.
-Quality of relationships outweighs tenure in fostering empowerment
-Hybrid environments have necessitated more intentional communication, which may be accelerating trust-building and strengthening relationships faster than in traditional settings.
-Remote Work Boosts Empowerment. Flexibility and autonomy, hallmarks of remote work, shape how empowered individuals feel in their roles. and feel trusted by their organizations.
-42% of employees report feeling empowered but don’t act on it. These individuals, what we call “latent leaders,” possess the mindset and potential to lead, innovate, and drive change, yet remain on the sidelines. This gap suggests that empowerment alone isn’t enough; without the right conditions and encouragement, even confident employees may hesitate to step forward.
Wiley’s suite of professional solutions provides a structure and common language to help empower entire organizations with the skills needed to get to the next level. From building better teams with The Five Behaviors® and improving understanding to create engaged, collaborative, and adaptive cultures with Everything DiSC® on Catalyst™ or helping you make confident hiring decisions with PXT Select®, Wiley has innovative solutions that help make the workplace a better place.
DM me for more specifics!!
Use Catalyst™ on demand to build engagement, collaboration and fun!
Would you or your colleagues benefit from having an on-demand platform that helps you work with each other at any time and on any device?
Everything DiSC® on Catalyst™ is a personal development learning experience that equips you with the social and emotional know-how for more effective interactions at work—no matter who or where you are.
By combining the proven DiSC® model with flexible facilitation and a powerful learning platform, Everything DiSC® on Catalyst™ helps you:
• Better understand yourself
• Appreciate and value differences in perspective and approach
• Readily and consistently adapt to the unique needs of each person or situation you encounter
The result is lasting impact. When you use Everything DiSC® on Catalyst™ , the hard work of long-lasting behavior change is possible…even fun. When your organization uses Everything DiSC® on Catalyst™ , you will have a more engaged, collaborative, and adaptive culture that drives results.
If you use this, you will take one assessment one time and if you are interested in further content, you don't have to answer more questions. And until 12.31.25, you can upgrade all existing DiSC learners in your organization to Catalyst AT NO ADDITIONAL COST!
Check out this video to see more and email me at karen@karengeiger.com to bring Catalyst to your organization!
Counteract social media by building authentic relationships
Social media, while supposedly intending connection between, can increase feelings of loneliness (Needle, 2024, https://lnkd.in/e_RffUFm) and block interaction if only used passively. We can build more authentic connectivity by using tools designed for that and causing people to reflect on their own thoughts and reactions as well as respond to others' thoughts and reactions, so we build meaningful community.
If we leave our connectivity to social media's openness to disinformation and shared opinions without responses, we are at risk of destroying rather than building community.
I challenge you to choose someone you work with who you only see on social media, ask them if they are willing to do this, then dm me and each of you take an Everything DiSC Workplace profile then discuss the prompted questions to build a relationships away from social media.
Keeping Relationships at the Center in the Digital Age
We are now in the Digital Age, or what is called the Fourth Industrial Revolution, which presents us with a growing demand for responsibility and accountability among leaders, as well as systems, technology and entrepreneurial leadership, adaptive leadership and a need for leaders to shape societies. A recent Accenture white paper recommends three questions we must consider as we enable our workers in this Age:
Is the changing nature of work in production continuously being anticipated? With skills now having a half-life of 5 years, leaders must make proactive decisions about their workforce today.
Is the ability to attract and engage the best talent by tailoring development initiatives for workers improving? Global executives think only one-fourth of their workforce is ready to work with intelligent machines. Organizations increased spending on intelligent technology by over 60% five years ago, yet only 3% planned to significantly increase the investment in training the following year.
Is the broader enablement environment and ecosystem being reshaped for the workforce? 67% of people want business leaders to take the lead on policy change, instead of waiting for government.
Transformational leadership behaviors that support people at the center include
inspiring with empathy and vision
innovating with purpose
advocating humanity, trust and transparency
collaborating across the ecosystem
orchestrating for agility and growth
embracing social responsibility.
Agility is the Key for the Digital Age
The pace of change has dramatically increased and all of us need to change more quickly and be open to new ways of thinking. Everything DiSC Agile EQ is a tool that can help you build that capacity in your workforce. Contact me for more info!
