Boise State University’s People Strategy Forms a Foundation for Employee Engagement
Boise State University’s Human Resources Team is the recipient of
CUPA-HR’s 2020 HR Excellence Award.
Sponsored by
Boise State University human resources is upping its employee engagement game with a deliberate focus on creating an inclusive work culture where everyone is valued and where people’s daily work has meaning and leaves them fulfilled. They call the initiative the “People Strategy.”
Five Foundations
The People Strategy is built on five foundations, each one designed to help HR build relationships and engage with employees across the university.
The Vision. “We have a strong vision that everyone in HR understands and believes in,” says Shawn Miller, associate vice president for HR at Boise State. That vision is to build an HR culture that focuses on employee engagement. “We want Boise State employees to know that we are here to serve them, and that we bring a spirit of service to our work. We’re here to help people have their best day at work.”
The Nine Pillars. HR has defined nine pillars which they measure, benchmark against, and hold themselves accountable to. The nine pillars are diversity and inclusion; professional development; pay and benefits; communication; participation; recognition; accountability; workplace wellness and safety; and efficient operations. These areas of focus operationalize employee engagement.
Data-Informed Decisions. Boise State HR has a position dedicated to gathering, evaluating and communicating employee engagement analytics. This data informs the nine pillars and helps the department identify engagement areas in which it is hitting the mark and those where it might be off. “By paying close attention to the people analytics, we are better positioned to positively influence our people strategy and create meaningful employee experiences,” says Miller. In March 2019, HR deployed a 36-question survey geared toward discovering Boise State employees’ level of engagement (with another survey being planned in order to map progress). In conjunction with the survey, HR hosted a listening tour aimed at discovering the elements that drive employee engagement in the workplace.
“We want our employees to know that HR is here to serve them, and that we bring a spirit of service to our work. We’re here to help people have their best day at work.” – Shawn Miller, Associate Vice President for HR at Boise State University
The Employee Experience. “We quickly learned that trying to deliver the aforementioned services based on a traditional organizational chart was not going to be successful,” says Miller. Thus, HR is reorganizing around the experiences that all employees have in the workplace — a welcome experience, a growth experience and a farewell experience. The welcome experience focuses on the employee experience from application through onboarding. The growth experience focuses on the employee experience from hire through farewell and includes projects and policies that touch on employee satisfaction, total rewards and initiatives to assist in employee development, participation and well-being. The farewell experience focuses on employees leaving the university and includes retirement, emeritus and succession planning projects.
People Projects. HR has embedded project managers on each of the three Employee Experience teams. These project managers meet weekly to set goals and create work plans and check in with one another daily to report progress and setbacks and celebrate wins.
Building Better Employee Experiences
Boise State HR believes that everyone deserves to live their best work-life, regardless of role or rank. “This is why we do the work we do and why we approach HR in the manner that we do,” says Miller. “When we started our People Strategy initiative, we knew the work would be daunting, but we’ve been greatly heartened to see that what we thought might be impossible — building an environment and a culture where all individuals are valued, where work is meaningful, and where employees have great experiences — is happening!”
Look for more on Boise State HR’s work related to its People Strategy and employee engagement in the Fall 2020 issue of CUPA-HR’s Higher Ed HR Magazine (out in early September).
About the HR Excellence Award:
CUPA-HR’s HR Excellence Award honors transformative HR work in higher education, recognizing teams or individuals who have provided HR leadership resulting in significant and ongoing organizational change within their institutions. Thanks to support from AIG, the award comes with a $3,000 contribution to the recipient’s institutional endowment or a scholarship fund. Learn more.