Rhonda just received the news that she got the job! She’s excited but also sad and a bit frustrated. As she walks down the hall to let her team know, she thinks, “I wanted to stay here for the people; I never wanted to leave my team. I just haven’t felt connected to my role and the company since the new president joined the organization.”
This is just one example of why retention remains a pain point for leaders. In recent surveys, 93% of organizations reported being concerned about employee retention, and only 29% of senior leaders reported feeling very confident in their ability to address questions related to retaining talent. Here, the problem was in Rhonda’s sense of connection. However, it wasn’t a connection to her team she was lacking.
Research shows that good things happen when people feel connected. Positive connection to others can lead to a variety of beneficial health outcomes, such as greater physical well-being and improved overall mental health. There’s lots of research that demonstrates the importance of social connection, but have you ever thought more deeply about how connected you feel to your role, leader, or organization?
In our exploration to better understand connections found in the workplace, we’ve realized there are, in fact, more than just the obvious social connections. Even though these are really important (we certainly live longer with them), there are other types of connections that also matter.
At a time when leaders are worried about retention, understanding the different types of workplace connections can lead to intentional decisions that are more likely to achieve the desired outcomes..
So, what are those connections? We’ve uncovered four types: Colleague, Leader, Employer, and Role. The dimensions define our CLEAR Connections model.
- Colleague connection reflects the workplace community and the relationships people share with their colleagues. This is the more commonly studied social connection at work and includes how colleagues support each other, both professionally and personally. Our research indicates that colleague connection also includes how people’s work depends on others and their opportunities to collaborate. When thinking about colleague connection in this more nuanced way, task interdependence becomes an important factor, and well-managed task interdependence can have a powerful impact on team performance.
- Leader connection is about the relationships people hold with their supervisors and leaders. It includes how well leaders and their reports communicate, whether people have control over how their work gets done, and people’s access to key opportunities and assignments that can help them advance. One important aspect of leader connection is anchored in social exchange theory and reciprocity. The idea is that regardless of the quality of the relationship (i.e., you like your leader as a person), the relationship also has to feel important and valuable to you as an employee (e.g., it gives you access to opportunities).
- Employer connection is how connected people feel to the organization they’re working for. It’s about the alignment of people’s personal values and purpose to an organization’s mission and goals, how useful people feel their contributions are, and their confidence in the organization’s financial stability. Ultimately, people are investing their time and energy into an organization and helping its leaders pursue their goals. People want to know their investment is being put to good use, and they want to feel a connection with the organization’s purpose. When they do, they are more engaged and committed to the organization.
- Role connection is how an individual relates to their workplace role, responsibilities, and tasks. It includes how well they understand what they are and aren’t responsible for, what’s expected of them, and the ways they can grow and develop in the position they hold. This is closely related to role clarity. When employees have more of it, they experience more intrinsic motivation and feel greater involvement at work, which leads to greater innovation.
While connection is often thought of as one-dimensional, almost solely focused on the social and interpersonal aspects, our research revealed that workplace connections are multidimensional and interrelated. Each type provides unique value to understanding how an individual may connect at the workplace, varying with the individual and also at different times within their career.
This perspective allows for a more nuanced understanding and intentional intervention — meaning different types of connections need to be nurtured in different ways. This is important because if organizations can’t accurately identify which connections are lacking, they can misapply solutions. The irony is the misapplication of well-intentioned solutions — and the associated investment of resources — may actually amplify one connection but completely undermine another. For example, an organization could implement a return-to-office policy to bring everyone back together physically, amplifying colleague connections, but role and company connections may plummet.
There’s limited research specifically defining these different types of connections, and even less on strategies to foster and measure them. However, the existing research on social connection in the workplace shows promise for impacting team outcomes, such as higher rates of innovation. And related research on topics such as social communication and empathy demonstrates the potential to powerfully influence work outcomes. NLI is on the case to find out more, so stay tuned.
