Forum for People Performance Management and Measurement Promotes 'Employee Enrichment' Concept in New White Paper

Research Stresses a People-First Strategy

NAPERVILLE, Ill., April 14 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Forum for People Performance Management and Measurement is promoting a new "employee enrichment" business strategy as the key to success in today's emerging economy and changing employee demographics.

In its new white paper, A New Age – Putting People First, the Forum points out that recent research paves the way for business leaders to "abandon the idea of using people to make an organization perform better" and replace it with a strategic people-first approach that "emphasizes the quality of people's lives."

"What the latest research tells us is that the greatest value organizations can provide employees is to move beyond the basics of compensation and benefits in order to focus on personal growth," says Beth Schelske, Forum president and vice president at ITAGroup, Inc. "This approach both recognizes and accommodates employee concerns about the physical, psychological and social aspects of their lives in ways that span beyond the workplace."

Jennifer Rosenzweig, Forum director of research, notes that this new approach has an implicit expectation that encouraging the collective personal growth of individual employees in fact contributes to an organization's overall growth and performance.

"Marketplace and financial performance are not abandoned," says Rosenzweig. "Instead, they are just re-conceptualized as outcomes of people in the workplace."

Using an enrichment focus means that responsibility for the welfare of people becomes central to an organization's culture and helps to address the multilevel motivational factors inherent in the changing demographics and environment of today's global workforce.

The Forum also acknowledges that "as the ability to attract, retain and motivate high-performers becomes increasingly important in an emerging post-recession economy, further work is needed to develop a more people-centered approach to leadership."  

A copy of the complete white paper is available at: www.performanceforum.org  

The Forum for People Performance Management and Measurement (www.performanceforum.org) is a research center within the Medill Integrated Marketing Communications graduate program at Northwestern University. A central objective of the Forum is to develop and disseminate knowledge about communications, motivation and management so that businesses can better design, implement and manage Employee Engagement initiatives inside and outside the organization.

SOURCE Forum for People Performance Management and Measurement