“What’s it really like working here…?” A familiar scene: the board is reviewing the results of its annual ‘Employee Engagement’ survey. The trend towards greater measurability in HR is clearly evident as the report is filled with statistics. “Employee satisfaction showed year-on-year growth of 2.8 per cent” the head of HR proudly reports.

The CEO looks up surprised, and asks why. “It’s based on a wide range of metrics" HR continues "but there was an increase in work-life balance and recognition. Progress would have been even greater if not for a fall in satisfaction with middle-management”.

The CEO is suddenly even more interested. “Why was there a decrease in satisfaction with middle management?” he asks. But HR is unable to answer, because they only have what the statistics tell them ... and numbers are but part of the story…*

Taking the Employee Perspective™ - powered by SenseMaker® - turns traditional engagement engagement on its head. Drawing on the pioneering work of Dave Snowden (introduced in HBR, Nov 2007) it reveals what’s really happening in the organisation and why.

Employee engagement isn't a target, but a key input that guides leaders to respond to emerging opportunities and threats before they are too late, or too costly, to act upon.

Taking the Employee Perspective™ Revitalising Employee Engagement*

Introducing SenseMaker®

First deployed by the Singapore Government in its Risk Assessment and Horizon Scanning programme, to detect weak signal emerging threats and opportunities. SenseMaker today is being deployed globally by businesses and other organisations to make sense of complex challenges.

With an online and app-based environment SenseMaker lets key people share those experiences that matter most. And a patented ‘self-tagging’ technology lets those who know the context best, define their meaning - reducing reliance on expert interpretations or black box algorithms.

SenseMaker puts humans firmly at the beginning and end of a process that produces ground-break ing employee and customer research. Crucially, it also helps turn raw data into pragmat ic act ion and suppor ts continuous monitoring of the impact of decisions in real time.

Related Interventions: Powering Innovation

Shaping Safety Culture Managing Risk

Cultural Due Diligence

“The people closest to the work know the work best” Jack Welch

“Conversations are the tool for making sense of a complex world”

*Source: More than Numbers: Revitalising Employee Engagement through Narrative-based Research. Cognitive Edge, 2010

Contact: www.narrativeinsights.com Materials © Narrative Insights. SenseMaker® is © Cognitive Edge.

SenseMaker® deploys apps (and online sites) to support the mass capture of anonymous experiences ‘from the front line.’ Key groups share freely and naturally what they consider important to be heard - revealing what’s really happening.

A patented ‘self-tagging’ methodology lets those who shared the experience (and know the context best) add

layers of hard (quantitative) data to their responses.

SenseMaker creates a ‘Rosetta Stone’ for improved understanding between respondents and leaders. This provides the evidence leaders need to nudge the system forward through pragmatic, verifiable, action.

SenseMaker is a powerful research and decision-support tool and - run continuously - monitors the impact of key decisions in real-time.

2007-2015 © Cognitive Edge Pte Ltd. Confidential. US Pat. 8,031,201

Absence of trust

Excess of trust

Absence of management

Excess of management

Ideal state

Contact: www.narrativeinsights.com Materials © Narrative Insights. SenseMaker® is © Cognitive Edge.