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Meet the 2024 Top Inspiring Workplaces Judges: Jale Aktuğ Aydoğmuş

IW: We’re delighted to be joined by one of our judges for the Top Inspiring Workplaces 2024: Jale Aktuğ Aydoğmuş . Firstly, What does an Inspiring Workplace mean to you?

According to Gallup’s State of the Global Workplace 2023 report, 43% of engaged employees are watching for or actively seeking a new job. So, we must admit that employee engagement is dead. It means, attracting new talents to our organizations is a never-ending process. So, we have to focus on becoming an inspiring workplace through offering a great employee experience; embracing a strong and inclusive company culture; and preparing our employees for their future careers. This three-pillar approach will help you become an outstanding inspiring workplace among employees and potential candidates.

Here is what I mean by this 3 pillared approach:

Offering a great employee experience: Companies must create a great employee experience, even human experience where employees adapt easily to the company and their role, have personalized experiences throughout their employee life cycle. Processes and procedures need to be structured with a human focus favouring a great employee experience.

Strong and inclusive company culture: Companies must give employees equal opportunity to perform their job well considering all aspects of well-being (social, career, mental, occupational and physical). Companies also need to have a strong culture of collaboration where employees don’t struggle within a silos.

Getting employees ready for the future: In this fast-evolving era, we shouldn’t consider employees as a workforce for just completing the tasks in their job definition. We must give them the flexibility to innovate within their jobs; get them involved in various projects/roles; and offer them learning opportunities not just for their current role but also for emerging skills, their hobbies etc. We must get them prepared for a new role/career in their career journey.

IW: You’re a judge for the Top Inspiring Workplaces 2024. What do you hope to see in the entries?

It is very important to develop approaches, processes and practices that will support organizations in becoming an inspiring workplace. However sometimes organizations focus more on designing, implementing the process, practices and communication; but they can forget evaluating the results & the effects. It is very important to evaluate the results and calculate the return on investment. Without seeing the results, it is impossible to understand if it is worthy of reward or not.

IW: Following on from that, What are three areas of focus for organizations looking to improve the people experience?

While talking about employee experience, lots of organizations put emphasis on employee events/communications, special day occasions, and physical & mental well-being practices. However, the topics that have more impact on employee experience are;

Investing in manager development programs for a better approach toward employees
Designing and offering great experiences for moments of truth in the employee lifecycle
Evaluating experience in all important touch points, analysing the results regularly and having a Kaizen approach, always changing for the better

IW: Leadership plays a huge role in everything we’ve just spoken about. What do you think is the most important quality in a leader?

Having a vision (why), communicating it effectively and giving autonomy to the team in defining how and what to do.

IW: What’s the best advice you were ever given? Who was it from?

“You should watch more science-fiction movies” was the best and the most extraordinary advice ever given to me. It was from my manager that I worked for many years and who sadly passed away from a heart attack at a young age. RIP Hakan Alp.

Star Trek in the 1960s introduced us to tablet computers, telepresence, mobile phones, universal translators and more. In just a couple of decennaries, they became an important part of our lives. Considering that the advancement of technology is faster than ever, some elements in science fiction movies shot in the last couple of years will also become an integral part of our lives in the near future. They tell us how future will look and give us the opportunity to think about the world, business world, ourselves and our careers in the future.

IW: What’s your advice on how best to engage remote teams?

Connection, adaptation and development are three main subjects for creating a sense of belonging among remote teams.

Adaptation:

Developing a personalized, detailed orientation program for that newcomers learn about the company culture, their job description, the people they will work with and the tools they will use

Connection:

Creating social interaction opportunities between employees
Taking use of personalization for a better sense of belonging
Organizing regular meetings with management teams so that employees understand the vision, objectives of the company and to make them see how they contribute to these
Ensuring visibility among employees
Coming together with all company or team once every 3/6 months (if possible)
Offering training for managers about not just remote team management but also on coach style leadership approach for a better connection between employees and managers

Development

Offering short term rotation or project assignment opportunities
Offering training programs for their development

These actions must be backed by evaluating employee experience, analysing results and making improvements regularly to ensure that our practices meet employees’ needs and expectations.

IW: 4-Day week – Yes or No?

Four days a week can be good or bad for a company depending on its culture and leaders’ approaches on it.

If a company works 4 days a week with the same number of employees, having a management team waiting for the same results within the same deadlines, then it will cause overtime and it will lead to burnout in a short period of time.

Leaders must answer these questions before deciding to work 4 days a week:

What will be our expectations about employees’ work hours and productivity?
Will there be a need for an increase in the number of employees? If so, how many? Are we ok with it?
Is 4 days a week applicable to all positions? If not, which positions will be included?
How will we communicate it? (For the ones both included and excluded)
What actions do we need to take for an embracement at the managerial level and to prevent wrong practices?
How will we implement it?
What actions do we need to take to preserve and strengthen the company culture?

IW: To say we’ve seen a lot of change in the past three years would be an understatement. We want you to get your crystal ball out and predict what will be the top priorities for people choosing an employer over the next 5 years?

Learning and development opportunities: The definition of career changed a lot. It is now more multi-dimensional with various opportunities. Employees do not want to spend their whole career in the same company or in the same profession/department. Companies must prepare their employees for their second career by offering training and development opportunities on subjects not just related to their job but also various disciplines, competencies or hobbies. Such companies will be more attractive to younger generations.

Gig economy: Considering the importance of learning and development opportunities for younger generations and the rise of turnover; companies should redefine the working model. A gig economy within the company, allowing employees to work on a project basis and also create job rotation and assignment opportunities can be very attractive for candidates.

Wellbeing: Organizations often consider wellbeing from a physical and mental perspective. However physical and mental wellbeing doesn’t help us get to the root of the problems that occur because of our company culture and work processes. Younger candidates want to work at companies where they develop themselves, and feel valued and included. It can be achieved through a holistic wellbeing approach. Companies need to reinvent wellbeing; from social, occupational and career perspectives.

A Fun ones to end! Favourite film, album, best song to get you motivated at work, and best place you’ve ever visited and your biggest inspiration:

Favourite film: Midnight in Paris by Woody Allen
Favourite Album: I can name other albums each time you ask me that question; but for the last months, I can say that S3NS by Ibrahim Maalouf is my favourite.
Best song to get you motivated at work
1. I wanna hold your hand by Beatles
2. I thought about you by Nine Spark Riots
Best place you have ever visited: New York
Your biggest inspiration: Listening to podcasts or reading about various disciplines or successful people in various disciplines and trying to link them to my area of expertise