Ready to learn more? Get your copy of The Employee Engagement Handbook.

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In this highlight from our latest webinar, TDM’s Kurt Merriweather breaks down how these two factors shape employee engagement and what leaders can do to create a thriving, high-performing team. Want to learn more? Watch the full webinar here.

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The Boston Consulting Group examined stakeholder perceptions of 1,000 of the world’s largest companies to gain a better understanding of trust in the workplace. This study found that the 100 most trusted companies generated 2.5 times as much value as comparable businesses. The study also discovered that trust is highly dynamic: Fewer than half of the Top 100 companies from any given year were still in the Top 100 the following year. For the Bottom 100, turnover was as high as 70%. Trust and belonging can’t be taken for granted; leaders must measure and manage trust on an ongoing basis.

In today’s dynamic global business environment, with multiple stakeholder groups and rapidly evolving expectations, growing and maintaining trust and belonging can seem challenging. To manage these crucial factors effectively, leaders must measure staff sentiments and track progress over time. While the concepts can seem abstract, employee trust and belonging can be assessed using three methods: surveys, stay interviews, and indirect evidence.

Track and measure employee experience using periodic and pulse surveys. 

Center your employee engagement survey around factors that drive feelings of trust and belonging as well as characteristics of high-trust teams. Consider including the following topics in your survey:

Factors related to the individual

• I think that, in general, most people can be trusted.
• I am confident that my coworkers will fulfill their responsibilities.
• My opinions are heard and valued.

Factors related to the team

• Everyone on the team, including top performers, is held accountable for negative actions/behaviors
• Team achievements are recognized and celebrated.
• Team members rely on each other to accomplish team goals.
• Team members ask for help when they need it. 
• Team members give assistance freely and ask how they can help the rest of the team.

Factors related to management

• Leaders treat all employees fairly and without bias. 
• Employees are given discretion in what they work on and how they accomplish their work.
• Managers work intentionally to build individual relationships with team members.
• Managers facilitate professional growth of employees.
• Leaders show vulnerability by asking their reports for help.
• Managers monitor employees’ work and frequently check their output.

Rather than asking open-ended questions, ask respondents to assign a value to a series of statements that relate to these factors. Sample statements might be “On this team people can rely on each other” or “We have complete confidence in each other’s ability to perform assignments.” For agreement-based statements, we recommend using a five-point Likert scale: strongly agree, agree, neither agree nor disagree, disagree, strongly disagree.

To avoid priming employee responses, do not use the words “trust” and “belonging” in the survey statements. Rather, ask questions that reveal the underlying components, such as measuring trust by gauging confidence that management is communicating transparently. To promote candid feedback, make survey responses anonymous other than identification by team. 

Analyze survey results at the team level.

When analyzing survey responses, recognize that individuals differ in their propensity to trust others. Different life experiences, personality types, cultural backgrounds, education, and other socioeconomic factors influence one’s propensity to trust. For example, the World Values Survey asks: “Generally speaking, would you say that most people can be trusted or that you need to be very careful in dealing with people?” This survey found large differences in responses by country. In Norway and Sweden for example, more than 60% of the survey respondents think that most people can be trusted. At the other end of the spectrum, in Colombia, Brazil, and Peru less than 10% believe this is the case.

This is why it’s important to take a high-level view, rather than being distracted by individual results. When the information is analyzed at the team level, organizations can discern systemic issues and trends related to trust and belonging. This level of insight enables leaders to launch initiatives that will boost inclusion as a whole and improve the entire culture of the organization.

At the team level, recognize that survey results may vary depending on how long particular individuals have worked with each other, the degree to which their work assignments require cooperation to complete, and similar factors.

Explore individual feelings of belonging and trust during stay interviews.

Stay interviews are one-on-one conversations, usually between a manager and their direct reports. They allow employees to express how and why their current role makes them want to stay at the company, how they would like to advance in their career, and what opportunities outside the organization could entice them to leave. Through these conversations, managers can determine whether the employee feels supported and appreciated by their team and if they are invested in the success of the organization. By asking about employees’ individual experiences, leaders can better understand the level of belonging on their team. 

Measure feelings of belonging and trust through indirect evidence.

Investigate to what extent lack of trust and belonging are contributing to low-performing aspects of your organization. Specifically, consider analyzing the causes of employee absenteeism, low productivity, under-performing teams, and resignations.

Are rates of absenteeism rising or falling? Is absenteeism more prevalent on certain teams? Are the causes of absences stress-related? If so, to what extent is that stress tied to the workplace vs. personal concerns? At employee exit interviews, include questions related to trust and belonging. Ask current and exiting employees for suggestions to enhance trust and belonging in your company culture.

These bits of information can be pieced together, into a broad impression of employee sentiment. On their own, these factors are inconclusive, but when they are combined with your survey results and individual interviews, they will help you identify challenges and work toward higher levels of employee trust, belonging, and engagement.

Make measuring trust and belonging a strategic priority.

Individuals who feel they belong have a strong connection with their work and colleagues; they gain satisfaction from being real contributors; they develop professionally by making the most of opportunities to learn. According to Great Place To Work, belonging in the workplace is “an employee’s sense that their uniqueness is accepted and even treasured by their organization and colleagues.” Team members with a sense of belonging feel confident, comfortable, secure, and able to contribute their best work. Employees in high-trust organizations are more productive, have more energy at work, collaborate better with their colleagues, and stay with their employers longer than people working at low-trust companies. They also suffer less chronic stress and are happier with their lives. 

Trust and belonging increase employee engagement. They should therefore be seen as tangible and critical assets of every organization. Given the quantifiable value they deliver, measuring and cultivating these assets should be considered a strategic priority.

Trust and belonging are essential components of The Employee Engagement Growth Model – a framework that enables organizations and leaders to boost the effectiveness of teams while inspiring enthusiastic, motivated, and committed employees to do their best work. Contact us today to learn more.

Amber Keister is a Content Strategist at The Diversity Movement. She has spent more than 20 years as a journalist for publications throughout the South. Connect with her on Linkedin.

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The secret to sustainable business success is deceptively simple: engaged employees. Thriving companies balance individual fulfillment and organizational excellence—simultaneously meeting the needs of the workforce and the marketplace. Yet many businesses struggle to keep their employees motivated, because no single initiative works with every individual. To solve this challenge, we have developed a holistic model to empower leaders and help them create welcoming, inclusive, and supportive workplaces. When employees are valued for who they are, they are happier, healthier, and more productive, enabling their companies to win in the marketplace.   

Defined as the involvement and enthusiasm of employees in their work and workplace, employee engagement is tightly linked to financial performance, customer satisfaction, and innovation (Source: Drucker Institute). High-performing teams align the goals and objectives of the organization with personal priorities, enabling team members to find meaning and purpose in work, further fueling employee engagement. This alignment of personal and professional values is especially important for members of the Gen Z and millennial generations.  

The Employee Engagement Growth Model

The Employee Engagement Growth Model (EEGM) gives executives and leadership teams the tools to achieve financial and business goals while also meeting the expectations of individual employees. Through the following six key leadership strategies, organizations can fulfill Individual Needs (well-being, belonging, trust and professional developmentmeaningful work) and realize Team Outcomes (communiccollaboration, productivity, innovation and retention). These “win-win” strategies establish a firm foundation that underpins employee engagement, team performance, and sustainable organizational success.   

Communication

Miscommunication is expensive and pervasive, costing U.S. companies more than $12,000 per employee every year, mostly in lost productivity. Clear, persuasive communication is a proven method to boost productivity, reduce errors, and maximize success. By leveraging inclusive language, cultural awareness, active listening, and practical writing skills, organizations can improve communication from the C-suite to the frontline.   

Psychological & Physical Safety

Freedom to experiment and test new ideas without fear of retaliation or criticism is the cornerstone of psychological safety. Without it, individuals won’t share innovative ideas or challenge assumptions, risking falling behind industry leaders and developing average ideas. Likewise, ensuring accessibility and physical safety for all employees demonstrates empathy for each individual and appreciation for their unique contributions. In a respectful and supportive environment, everyone can do their best work.  

Opportunity Systems

Opportunity systems create the conditions for fairness, respect for all viewpoints, and shared success. These practices strengthen cross-cultural interactions, deepen understanding among colleagues, and honor individual identities and lived experiences — using them to expand perspectives, solve problems, and drive innovation. When organizations embed opportunity systems that promote respect and balanced access to growth, they strengthen workplace culture and generate higher performance. The Diversity Movement’s assessment, coaching, and training solutions help leaders cultivate inclusive workplaces where all employees thrive. 

Relationship-Building

Strong interpersonal relationships are built over time, growing with every informal conversation and shared experience. Connections deepen when promises are kept and expectations are fulfilled. Leaders can jumpstart the process by creating a culture of feedback that includes frequent recognition and thoughtful professional guidance. When employees trust their leaders and each other, teams can efficiently respond to any situation or crisis.   

Inclusive Leadership

The complexity of today’s world calls for a people-centered leadership model that promotes team belonging while achieving financial and business outcomes. Inclusive leadership strategies strengthen teams throughout the organization—within departments and across functions. This “whole team” approach to leadership development is more effective than focusing on individual growth, because a single leader can’t out-perform a cohesive executive team.   

Career Navigation

Employees want managers who are active partners on their career journey. Ongoing coaching, feedback, and stretch assignments demonstrate that leaders care about their team members’ long-term growth. Mentorship programs enable organizations to promote collaboration and relationships across teams and departments. In top organizations, executives also act as sponsors, expanding the leadership pipeline through advocacy and access to professional development.  

Why Employee Engagement Now?

Over 75% of people in the global workplace are disengaged and experience high degrees of stress/anxiety due to workplace uncertainty and personal challenges. It is reported that 50% of the global population will experience a mental health issue at some point in their lives and this is likely to occur while working. (Source: Harvard Medical School).    

On any given day, 36% of workers experience symptoms related to depression and anxiety. (Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics). According to the American Psychological Association, unresolved depression leads to a loss in the U.S. economy of $210.5 billion annually due to absenteeism, reduced productivity, requests for extended leaves of absence, and medical expenses for treatment. In fact, depressed employees miss an average of 31.4 days of work per year. (Source: Data from American Psychological Association)  

Anxiety and chronic stress can also prevent employees from fully “showing up” to work. Sources of stress are continuing to multiply. Employees are experiencing unprecedented challenges and stressors including unfamiliar hybrid/remote work environments, poor relationships with managers, integrating work/life responsibilities (caring for aging family members, taking care of children), and collaborating across multigenerational teams. More than a third (34%) of employees aged 18-29 and 28% of employees aged 30-49 say they have considered quitting because of work’s impact on their mental health (Source: NAMI)  

While many leaders acknowledge that we live in a Volatile Uncertain Complex Ambiguous (VUCA) world, they are often slow to act, because they cannot quantify the impact of poor employee engagement on the organization. And because the market for talent is shifting in favor of employers, short-sighted employers do not believe that they need to invest in strategies to improve employee engagement. Forrester has predicted that organizations will pull back on employee experience, leading to what they call an employee experience winter and declining employee well-being.   

For leaders to better understand the link between employee engagement and bottom-line outcomes, it’s important to have a framework to collect appropriate data. Disengaged workers slow overall productivity, but leaders want to know by how much and what can be done about it. A data-based approach to employee engagement gives leaders the tools they need to create change, balancing people and profits for sustainable growth. Here is our measurement framework to do just that.  

A Holistic Approach to Measuring Employee Engagement  

Most approaches to measuring employee engagement are limited to tracking employee experience using company surveys and pulse surveys. While understanding employee sentiment is helpful, this is disconnected from one of the most important measures of employee value – productivity. The lack of employee engagement leads to higher absenteeism and lost productivity (presenteeism). By counting missed working time due to challenges with well-being (e.g., distress from depression and anxiety) and lower productivity (e.g., presenteeism) due to issues with well-being, belonging, trust and limited career development opportunities, we can calculate lost productive time to determine ROI.   

Two Factors to Enhance Employee Engagement and Productivity

1. Organizational support to meet individual employee needs (Individual effectiveness)    
2. Leadership strategies that enable team members and employees to have their needs met (Workplace effectiveness)

Using industry EAP data and Workplace Option’s Unified Case Management System (UCMS) data, we estimate that every dollar spent on treating an employee in distress and providing organizational and managerial support through the EEGM leads to a 3-5x return on investment. (Source: Attridge and Dickens)  

By linking employee engagement and productivity, organizations gain a clearer picture of the strengths and challenges of the entire workforce. A data-driven approach allows leaders to target specific obstacles and manage them with greater precision and efficiency. Personalized well-being strategies that address individual needs through organizational support also foster feelings of belonging and trust throughout the workforce. When people feel cared for, they are more engaged at work and more productive. Future-focused leaders understand that improving the employee experience is the key to long-term, sustainable success. 

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This lack of engagement remains despite various initiatives promised to increase morale: programs such as leadership retreats, team-building activities, pizza lunches, and happy hours. This leaves leadership dumbfounded, wondering “Why aren’t my current efforts working?”

In order to improve engagement, organizations must first accurately measure employee morale. Organization leaders can only improve if they know where they currently stand and where the challenges are. Initiatives must be data-driven and strategic. There are many ways to measure engagement, but the widely used employee survey is worth digging into.

Many companies already conduct annual employee engagement surveys. In fact, according to the New York Times, nearly 80% of companies conduct job engagement surveys. The problem is, most companies aren’t doing it right. The bulk of engagement surveys aren’t anonymous, aren’t trusted to be anonymous, or aren’t asking the right questions. Or, even worse, the survey is good but nothing is done with the data. What you do with the survey results is equally as important as collecting the information in the first place.

Employee Engagement Survey Questions

Many employee surveys are built with the intention of finding out if employees are engaged, but not how or why. They ask vague questions about belonging and commitment without digging into what aspects of the workplace culture make folks feel that way. For instance, we commonly see questions such as “I would recommend [company name] as a great place to work” or “I feel motivated to do my best work at [company name].” While these can measure general sentiment, they don’t get at why people feel that way. If people do recommend the company, is it because of the culture, the pay structure, healthcare benefits, or the type of work that’s being done? If people are unmotivated, is it due to poor leadership, a lack of clear priorities, or a disruptive office environment? 

To reveal a clearer picture of employee sentiment, we recommend moving away from vague questions to more specific statements that measure six key aspects of employee engagement – effective communication; career navigation; physical and psychological safety; inclusive leadership; diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI); and relationship-building.

Sample Employee Engagement Survey

Questions to measure effective communication

• My supervisor shares updates with me that affect me and my team.
• My job expectations are clearly communicated.
• I understand how I help the organization achieve its goals. 
• My input is heard and valued.

Questions to measure career navigation

• I know what my career path is and how to advance at [organization].
• In performance reviews, my supervisor is fair and tries to reduce their bias.

Questions to measure psychological safety

• I can voice a different opinion without fear.
• Taking risks and learning from mistakes are seen as growth opportunities. 

Questions to measure inclusive leadership

• My supervisor provides a space where everyone is encouraged to speak up and be heard.
• Supervisors help employees reach their full potential.

Questions to measure DEIA

• I rarely feel like I am the “only one.”
• I feel like I belong at [organization].

Questions to measure relationship-building

• My supervisor cares about me as a person.
• Coworkers take the initiative to help members of their team when the need arises.

The above questions represent just a fraction of the total questions you should include in your employee engagement survey. The survey should be holistic and include space for open-ended responses. For agreement-based statements like those above, we recommend using a five-point likert scale: strongly agree, agree, neither agree nor disagree, disagree, strongly disagree.

Analyzing Survey Results

Once your survey data is collected, it’s time to look at trends. Specifically, which aspect of employee engagement is the weakest? Did you receive any suggestions on how to improve it? Does engagement vary by certain demographic groups, departments, or tenures? If so, what’s causing these discrepancies? For instance, if new hires seem less engaged than folks who have been at the organization for at least one year, maybe it’s time to reevaluate your onboarding program. Or, if women employees rate career navigation poorly, you should investigate if bias is seeping into the promotion process. 

Sufficiently analyzing results is important, but following through is key. Employees want to know that their input matters and that their feedback is not only heard, but acted upon. This action builds trust between employees and leadership as employees understand their feedback is valued and not a waste of time. 

It’s critical to share key results with the organization as well as what you’re going to do in response. For instance, don’t just report that cross-departmental communication is inadequate, but explain that moving forward, there will be quarterly town hall meetings where liaisons from each department will share any pertinent updates. Showing action in response to surveys is one of the best ways to keep employees engaged. 

And don’t just survey folks once a year. Make sure to conduct pulse surveys throughout the year to capture ongoing sentiment and any changes that occur in response to new programs or policies. Pulse surveys should be shorter than annual surveys, but still measure across the six aspects of employee engagement.

Analyzing the data to identify trends and discrepancies allows companies to implement meaningful changes. Transparent communication about survey results and the steps being taken in response demonstrates to employees that their feedback matters. Conducting regular pulse surveys helps maintain engagement by continuously monitoring employee sentiment and adapting to new challenges. By accurately measuring employee morale and acting on survey data, organizations can cultivate a more engaged, productive, and innovative workforce.

Looking for personalized help developing and deploying an employee engagement survey for your organization? We can help.

Kaela Sosa is co-founder and Manager, Curriculum and Programming at The Diversity Movement. Her expertise includes psychology, gender identity and sexual orientation and racial identities. Kaela has written and spoken about a range of topics: active allyship, the inclusive talent lifecycle, disability etiquette, LGBTQ+ inclusion and inclusive language. At The Diversity Movement, she leads the development and execution of learning programs, including digital learning, online courses, certificate programs and certification opportunities. Connect with or follow Kaela on Linkedin to learn more.

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What is employee engagement?

“Employee engagement is defined as the level of enthusiasm and dedication an employee feels toward their job” explains Melanie Sanders, Senior Consultant at The Diversity Movement. “It’s determined and demonstrated by how employees feel and think and act as well as their emotional connection to their team.” In the day-to-day, this translates into employees who are focused and reliable, meet or exceed expectations, communicate effectively, seek out new opportunities, and are easy to work with. 

Aside from being great colleagues, highly engaged employees generate 18% more in sales, are 14% more productive, and are 4.6 times more likely to feel empowered to perform their best work. Companies with engaged employees also have 41% lower absenteeism rates.

How to measure employee engagement

Given the business benefits of employee engagement, leaders should track metrics to ensure employee morale remains high year-over-year. These measurements should be multifaceted and holistic, so leaders can gauge not only levels of engagement but drivers of engagement and disengagement. One-on-one interviews and company-wide surveys should be complemented with observations of the direct outcomes of employee engagement.

One-on-one interviews

There are several sources of individual or small-group feedback leaders should assess: focus groups, stay interviews, and exit interviews. In focus groups, you can conduct “listening sessions,” defined as informal interviews with five-10 employees present. During listening sessions, open-ended questions are asked to solicit authentic feedback from employees. To ensure employees feel safe to share their honest input, it’s best that supervisors and HR are not present and sessions are conducted by a third-party consultant. To gauge engagement in a listening session, the facilitator can ask questions such as “How interested are you in your work at [organization]?” or “Can you describe your relationship with your direct supervisor?”

Stay interviews are semi-structured conversations, usually between a manager and each of their direct reports. They allow employees to express how and why their current role makes them want to stay at the company, how they would like to advance in their career, and what opportunities outside the organization could entice them to leave. These conversations are driven by the employee and provide insight into their individual experience at the organization. If the employee has a trusting relationship with their manager, these interviews can help leaders determine what might cause employees to engage or disengage.

Similar to stay interviews, exit interviews provide insight into an employee’s experience. However, these are done within an employee’s last few days at the organization. While exit interviews can be conducted with those who are terminated and those who resign, the latter will give leaders a better idea as to what is driving folks out. These interviews provide invaluable insight into changes the organization can make to better retain top talent. 

Surveys

Company-wide surveys collect massive amounts of data on employee engagement. The results are also easily quantifiable, and progress can be tracked year-over-year. However, there are key considerations leaders should keep in mind before deploying a survey.

First, be sure to check and double check the questions on the survey. You want to make sure you aren’t asking leading questions or introducing bias into the survey. Keep language clear and unambiguous, with a single focus per question. Be sure that ranking scales are consistent throughout, so errors aren’t made. And, remember, assessing responses to open-ended questions is time-consuming and challenging, especially with large workforces, so use these sparingly.

Second, make sure you have several touch points throughout the year, rather than just an annual survey. “You have to measure across a lot of different encounters, so you don’t get false positives,” says Donald Thompson, CEO of The Diversity Movement. “You don’t want someone who’s having a bad day, and that’s the only time you’re asking for their feedback. A couple of times a year, you need to be deliberate about getting employee feedback, so that you’re getting the full sense of how people are feeling across a lot of different circumstances or situations.”

Finally, make sure that you are tracking progress year-over-year. Annual engagement is critical, but so is the difference in engagement between measurements. If engagement is increasing, are there certain initiatives this can be contributed to? Or, if engagement is decreasing, what trends do you see in the data? Are certain departments less engaged than others? Was there a large company reorganization around the same time as the decline? Use the deltas in the data to figure out what is or is not working at your company.

Outcomes of employee engagement

There are several direct outcomes of employee engagement that can also be used as a gauge: turnover, retention, absenteeism, and utilization of company benefits and resources. Because employee engagement leads to reduced absenteeism and increased retention, it’s safe to correlate these measures with employee morale. You can also look at less direct benefits such as productivity, collaboration, and innovation. When these results are high, employee engagement is likely high as well. While these outcomes are correlational, when paired with interviews and surveys, they can be strong indicators of engagement.

Understanding and measuring employee engagement is vital for any organization aiming to optimize performance and retain top talent. Employee engagement, characterized by enthusiasm, dedication, and emotional connection to work, is correlated with several key business drivers. Leaders must adopt a multifaceted approach to gauge attitudes about work. By continuously assessing and addressing the drivers of engagement and disengagement, organizations can foster a motivated, empowered, and effective workforce, driving business success and sustainability.

To learn more about conducting listening sessions, read our article Listening Sessions: A Critical Part of Your DEI Audit. And for more details on conducting valid surveys, read Fighting Survey Fatigue: How to Get the DEI Information You Need.  

Kaela Sosa is co-founder and Manager, Curriculum and Programming at The Diversity Movement. Her expertise includes psychology, gender identity and sexual orientation and racial identities. Kaela has written and spoken about a range of topics: active allyship, the inclusive talent lifecycle, disability etiquette, LGBTQ+ inclusion and inclusive language. At The Diversity Movement, she leads the development and execution of learning programs, including digital learning, online courses, certificate programs and certification opportunities. Connect with or follow Kaela on Linkedin to learn more.

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The gap between what executives think about themselves and what their teams think is not a new issue. In the 1950s, Esso Research and Engineering (now known as Exxon Mobil) adapted a feedback system used in World War II so that managers could be rated by their managers, colleagues and subordinates. 360-degree assessments are now mainstream and are estimated to be in use by 90% of Fortune 1000 companies.

The challenge with 360 reviews is that they were conceived during an era where most leadership models were built to optimize mass production. Organizational hierarchy was established to create efficiency in work where physical goods were created at scale. The world has changed and the assessments that examine leadership abilities need to evolve as well.   

Using 360 Reviews to Assess Leaders

No single leader has the foresight to lead in today’s complex environment without trusted data from team members. 360-degree reviews focus on individual growth and ignore how the executive team approaches challenges as a unit. But, by assessing the strengths and challenges of the whole leadership team, the group can elevate their performance by improving collaboration, creativity, and relationship building. This synergy is vital to sustainable success, because even the best leader can’t outperform a high-functioning team.

360 assessments highlight individual strengths and weaknesses, and companies report higher retention among leaders who participate in 360 reviews. However, the assessment tool does have limitations. Because feedback comes from a variety of sources, it may be less useful because it may not consider the specific challenges or complexities a senior leader faces in their role, especially among a team of peers. Receiving feedback from multiple sources without context can also create frustration, since the feedback may not be actionable. 

TDM LeaderView Examines the Whole Team

The Diversity Movement’s inclusive leadership development solution, TDM LeaderView, focuses on the whole team’s development, not merely its individual members. Created by business leaders in consultation with PhDs in Organizational Psychology, LeaderView’s peer assessment approach is built on TDM’s ACT (assess, coach, train) model. The mix of skill evaluation, analytics, consultation, and coaching creates a framework to promote personal and collective growth. Unlike traditional 360s, LeaderView focuses on the senior leadership team and how they work together. This can be used along with other individual assessments to provide a more well-rounded picture of team performance.

During the LeaderView engagement, participants evaluate themselves, their colleagues, and the entire team. Data is sourced from people who are directly familiar with organizational goals and challenges, the demands of leading a team, and how the team functions as a unit. The power of TDM LeaderView is that it enables teams to assess group dynamics and gives them insightful data so they can build the core competencies needed to navigate change, develop a culture of collaboration, and enhance productivity. 

Instead of focusing on how each individual is performing in isolation, LeaderView answers the team’s most important questions:

• Are we communicating and collaborating effectively as a leadership team?
• How do we operate as a group across locations, cultures, and time zones?
• How do we connect as individuals in ways that make the team stronger and more efficient?
• How can we create an inclusive environment where people feel empowered to share their ideas, opinions, and perspectives? 
• How do we define and demonstrate trust as a team?
• What barriers exist that hinder connection, collaboration, and performance across the team? 
• What are our team strengths and areas of opportunity?
• What perspectives are we missing in our team?

Some executives have told us that the successes they had hoped for with traditional 360-degree review programs never fully materialized. For leaders who have had poor experiences with these assessments in the past, TDM LeaderView’s focus on team behaviors and team performance is a welcome change. 

Focusing on Team Growth and Development

LeaderView examines team strengths and gaps across seven core competencies that are part of The Diversity Movement’s inclusive leadership development framework: Communication, Collaboration, Capability, Growth Mindset, Cultural Intelligence, Reliability, and Self-Awareness.  Each person is evaluated in each of these areas, but the team is also analyzed according to the competencies.

Results are shared with individuals during one-on-one sessions with trained leadership coaches. Participants receive personalized feedback, guidance on what areas to focus on, and actionable strategies to strengthen weak areas.

Every team is unique, so inclusive leadership training is individualized for each team and their specific requirements. Every team receives customized learning resources that help participants practice communication and improve their inclusive leadership skills. Following the one-on-one coaching sessions, facilitated workshops with the entire team continue the learning and growth by exploring how each team member can help their colleagues improve.

“The ability to grow as a leader through self-assessment and peer feedback is the key to progress with LeaderView,” explains Andy DeRoin, Product Manager at The Diversity Movement and part of the team that created the tool. “No one person embodies every leadership facet, so each team member should work in harmony to establish proficiency. Strengths reinforce strengths, thus weaving a tapestry of trust and expertise. The data and learnings from the assessment are reinforced through daily practice that amplifies communication, collaboration, trust, and efficiency.”

Promoting a Culture of Feedback and Trust

Incorporating leadership assessments in an inclusive leadership development program can be a valuable tool for senior leaders and boards of directors. And when those assessments focus on the holistic experience of the executive leadership team, transformational growth is possible.

In today’s volatile global economy, executive leadership teams are increasingly focused on sustainable growth, which relies on “networked leadership teams [to] steer the organization,” according to a report on the future of leadership from McKinsey. However, a persistent challenge for executives is to create an environment where better teamwork is organic. “Companies seeking to thrive now still need leaders who are accountable for their individual roles,” the report states, “but leadership itself resides in the teams of leaders acting in service to the organization.”

Making time for regular, periodic assessments for everyone signals a commitment to build an inclusive culture shaped by open feedback and continuous improvement. When leaders actively seek feedback and demonstrate a willingness to improve, they can build higher degrees of trust and engagement among one another. By assessing team dynamics to strengthen team functioning, leaders can create a culture of continuous learning and growth, enabling the organization to be more innovative, productive and profitable.

Join the ranks of forward-thinking organizations that are enhancing their inclusive leadership skills to build stronger executive and managerial teams. Contact us today to learn how TDM LeaderView can transform your team and allow your organization to thrive.

Kurt Merriweather, CDE, is an accomplished product strategist and business executive. He is co-founder and Vice President of Innovation at The Diversity Movement. Connect with him on Linkedin.

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