Capacity to Empower: Strategies That Work

Written by: Milton Almeida

Using employee empowerment to increase organizational effectiveness is not new. Hoteliers know that empowering and supporting employees is a vital leadership role, since employees who take initiative will satisfy guests, and satisfied guests lead to better bottom-lines. However, increasing workplace empowerment can be a challenge and it can be difficult to create the conditions necessary for it to succeed. Hospitality leaders often struggle with defining empowerment program objectives and desired outcomes. Most programs have limited success and employees become disengaged.

Christine Maassen, senior VP of human resources at Silver Birch Hotels and Resorts, highlights the importance of employees understanding their roles and contributing to the achievement of organizational goals: “Recognizing employees when things go well is essential,” Maassen explains. “We attempt to find the right balance between policies and procedures and giving people the opportunity to be themselves”.

Pat Corbett, president of The Hills Health Ranch, ensures that every employee adopts the organization’s values of harmony, caring, and nurturing. Corbett incorporates these values into job descriptions and uses them in employee interviews.” Employees not only have a responsibility to express our values to guests, but also to each other,” he describes. Employees put their “caring hat” on
as soon as they walk through the door.

What Is Empowerment?

At its most basic level, employee empowerment is the ability of employees to take initiative, solve problems, and make decisions. From a leadership perspective, this approach has several implications:

1. It implies a leveling of the hierarchies present in organizations. Power that is usually held in the hands of managers and leaders is shared with employees.
2. Empowerment requires a supportive culture where leaders and managers have high tolerance for decisions they may not agree with, but are willing to support.
3. Empowerment is an individual act. This is an important piece of the puzzle. While organizational culture and leaders may support employee empowerment, it is the individual who acts (or doesn’t act!) when presented with an opportunity to take the initiative. This last point brings us to the topic of organizational capacity.

Organizational capacities are the elements in an organization that influence the ability of employees to do their jobs. These elements are grouped under a variety of different capitals: social, human, and technological. Think of capital as the availability of a specific type of resource employees can draw upon.

Social Capital – processes that encourage teamwork and commitment.
Human Capital – the combination of the required knowledge, skills, and abilities that allow employees to do their jobs.
Technological Capital – the technology employees use to enact human and social capital.

Social Capital

Empowerment is a cultural phenomenon. Culture is the product of past events, policies, behaviours, individual and collective meanings, symbols, and history. Employees draw on cultural knowledge when taking initiative. There are ways to improve social capital to allow for employee empowerment:

Create a Vision – A vision can provide the necessary momentum to increase empowerment. If a vision or mission statement already exists, dust it off, review it, and evaluate it by asking: Is it still relevant? Is it inspiring? Does it lead to clear organizational outcomes? Do employees believe or trust the vision?
Empowerment Policies – Policies create the systems in which we function. Empowerment polices can be formal (written documents prescribing levels of authority), informal (taken-for-granted practices communicated between
employees), or a mix. All forms have their benefits and disadvantages. Remember, policies should reflect your vision. Since policies create structures, they should serve to build capacity, not hamstring it.
Engage in Dialogue – Words create worlds. Talk about what empowerment means in relation to the organization and your goals. Communicate expectations, policies, and processes. Highlight good uses of empowerment and deal with inappropriate uses constructively to build your culture. Many fear the inappropriate use of empowerment will harm their bottom line. However, more
often than not, the true cost of empowerment is not in its misuse, but in its lack of use.
Feed the Culture – Culture grows and evolves along many lines. One way to feed culture is to share success stories, provide sincere praise, and give constructive feedback. A flourishing employee empowerment culture requires a supportive
organization.

Human Capital

Empowerment is an individual act. Thus, people must have the knowledge, skills, attitudes, and dispositions to build empowerment. Some best practices to increase human capital include:

Evaluate Skill Sets – Evaluate employee proficiency in risk assessment, decision-making ability, and conflict management. In the interview process, explore these skills with potential candidates.
Train – Train employees in policies, processes, and skills. Aim all training at clear organizational objectives and provide clear learning outcomes.
Develop – Ongoing development is key after training. This can be accomplished in many different ways. Feedback mechanisms like logbooks or pre-shift meetings are a couple of effective strategies. Use these opportunities to provide “just in time” learning. Instead of simply communicating responses to events, take the time to evaluate employee decisions against organizational goals and values. Coach employees to improve decision-making by exploring how they arrive at their decisions.
Monitor and Review – Employee surveys and informal meetings are effective in monitoring levels of empowerment. Don’t forget your customers. They can be involved either indirectly (surveys), or directly (focus groups). Use online customer survey systems to probe for examples of employee empowerment. Exercise care when creating your survey questions to ensure they can effectively
evaluate employee empowerment.

Technological Capital

Technology should help employees take initiative, solve problems, and make decisions, but they don’t need to be complex. In fact, some traditional technologies can work well when focused on employee empowerment.

Communication Technology – Communication is at the core of effective empowerment strategies. Technology should provide an effective means to disseminate policies and provide feedback. Evaluate what tools you currently use: logbooks, pre-shift-meetings, and quality assurance processes. Ensure that they don’t simply report problems, but provide information and feedback that
empowers employees.
Social Media – Many hotels currently have a social media plan that focuses on the hotel-customer relationship. A judicious use of social media technology allows employees to share innovations. Set up an employee group on Facebook or a leader-monitored Twitter account.

An environment that empowers employees requires thoughtful and diligent strategies. Hotel leaders must create the social, human, and technological capacity that allows employees to take initiative, solve problems, and make decisions in order to enjoy the benefits of employee empowerment. How does your hotel measure up?