Walking the Talk. A key ingredient in driving employee loyalty.

So, what does Walking the Talk mean and why is it important to employees? We often hear about employee engagement, productivity, retention and other standard human resource vernacular but are we measuring what is really important to employees?

With the changing employment landscape, employees are now defining their careers differently and with that comes major challenges for employers looking to attract and retain talent and staff up where shortages are now becoming more obvious as the boomer hits retirement age. Employees have more employment options then ever before and are no longer seeking the security of a full time, conventional employee role. With employees in the driver’s seat, employee retention and attraction are at the top of Employer lists of challenges to address into 2010.

So what does it take to keep employees in the game? Market Yourself Smarter conducted its second annual Walk the Talk Survey, organically polling employees across Canada on whether they feel their Employer walks the talk.

Last year’s 2006 survey ranked the Top 10 Eastern and Western Canadian Employers who Walk the Talk and unveiled that employees defined Walking the Talk as being honourable, authentic, transparent, supportive and open to new ideas (2006 award recipients . This year’s employee definition was extended to include listening and respect as key attributes.

The process:

-Employees anonymously completed a five minute online survey – www.marketyourselfsmarter.com
-Employees also had the option nominate their employer directly through an online nomination form
-To qualify for an award, employers required a minimum of 10 completed employee surveys, needed to be headquartered in Canada and have a minimum of 50 full time employees
-Survey question format included a combination of numeric ranking and qualitative, text-based answers
-Survey responses were 51 % positive, 37 % negative and 12 % neutral

The 2007 Walk the Talk survey will award three companies in Eastern and Western Canada that where voted in by their employees based on a common Walk the Talk theme. These six companies have exhibited excellence in one or more Walk the Talk areas and will be recognized with these awards to be released and announced at the upcoming Walk the Talk Employee Perspective Forum on Oct. 18th in Toronto and Nov. 1st in Vancouver. Details available at www.marketyourselfsmarter.com . The 2007 Walk the Talk report will be released later in November with highlights available for download at www.marketyourselfsmarter.com .