I have been reading about a lot of companies who have put the focus on their people to assure their needs are being met during the COVID-19 pandemic. As a business practice, will putting employees needs first have them become more productive, engaged with the company and boost profits?

When we think of people, we first think of our employees. Of course, their needs must be met in order for them to perform well and to feel motivated. But employees are not the only people associated with the company and whose needs should be met.

We must think holistically when it comes to people and consider the needs of all stakeholders. This means employees, customers, suppliers, and shareholders.

A good exercise to do with managers is to list the needs of employees that must be met for them to perform their work well and be productive. Then discuss the list and determine how well their needs are being met by management.  You can also form focus groups made up of managers and employees and conduct the same exercise.

A more holistic approach would be do the same for the other stakeholders including customers, suppliers, and shareholders. I suggest involving employees in these discussions as this would raise their awareness of how what they do daily affects everyone concerned.

By doing this exercise you will identify gaps in meeting the key needs of stakeholders and you can then prioritize items to work on to improve and narrow the gaps.

To hold these discussion groups you can use my group problem-solving techniques such as brainstorming and force field analysis.

When working with teams of employees on team training, I have often discovered that employees lack the understanding of how a business works and what goes into making profits. Providing employees a perspective on meeting the needs of all stakeholders might change their view of the impact their performance has on everyone.

It is important to take a balanced approach to meeting the requirements of people so that all needs are being met.