What is collaborator commitment about?

How can your company avoid seeing its collaborators make a run for another company and what can the firm do, to make them happy? Work on collaborator commitment of course!  

Collaborator commitment means when the interests and goals of a collaborator are in tune with those of the company, where you work. With all the information and opinions revolving around collaborator commitment, the topic has a mysterious side. Let’s get down to it in more detail.  

What does collaborator commitment mean?

We’ve all heard about collaborator commitment and it’s important, we know that. But why? And what does it really mean? 

First of all, let’s define what collaborator commitment DOESN’T MEAN. Contrary to what one often thinks, collaborator commitment isn’t the same thing as happiness at work. Believe it or not, but a collaborator can very well be happy at work, while not feeling committed. 

All committed collaborators are happy at work, but all happy collaborators aren’t necessarily satisfied. So, what’s the difference? The response lies in the performance of a collaborator. It’s not only about the happiness or the satisfaction which matters, but how these emotions are directly related to the collaborator’s performances and productivity. 

According to Emma Bridger, the American author, who wrote the book « Employee engagement: a practical introduction »:

“Collaborator engagement is the degree of personal commitment of collaborators, in the success of the company”.  

This definition is a clear-cut reflection of the performance aspect, in terms of collaborator engagement, but also the emotional component. Committed collaborators will be capable of making this “little additional effort” and hanging out for a little bit longer at the office if need be, as they sense a strong emotional tie with the company. It’s not about love but almost!  

They identify the task, the goals and the values of the company, therefore they want the latter to be successful! When the company comes across success, they have the feeling of having succeeded themselves. We’ve just seen that the two important concepts of collaborator commitment is performance and emotional connection with the company. The committed collaborators: 

• Have well-defined roles and not a job description of buzzwords, which in the end don’t really mean anything

• Understand their contribution to the company, what they provide, apart from the fact of bringing bagels every Monday morning.

• Feel connected with other collaborators and the entire ecosystem 

The benefits of collaborator commitment

Well, this should now seem quite obvious to you that collaborator commitment translates into several advantages, but what are they exactly? Here are 5 tangible benefits of collaborator commitment: 

• More productive collaborators, super motivated to work and work well

• A better retention rate of collaborators (and mathematically a rather low staff turnover): employees don’t try to make a run for another company at all costs, as they wouldn’t feel this committed to the latter. 

• A sense of health and well-being (when one feels good in one’s mind, one feels good in their shoes)

• A decrease in costs related to absenteeism: disengaged employees are employees who are absent more often and all this adds up to a lot of dough, for the company

• For the company, results are much more interesting: you’re going to knock down the competition!  

Let’s focus on this last point: much more interesting results

A better collaborator commitment=more bucks for the company

The way how you make collaborator commitment work in the company, makes an impact on all the collaborators. And all the collaborators make an impact on the results of the company. The idea was represented by a group of Harvard researchers, during the 90’s. 

The values of the company, working spaces, professional/personal life balance, a feeling of belonging: all this plays a role in collaborator commitment. In turn, collaborator commitment allows retaining employees for a longer period of time and makes them more productive. Happy and productive collaborators are collaborators who take care of the company’s clients. And the clients who take notice of this care, are clients who become faithful. Fidelity is advantageous for the company. Indeed, we can say that better collaborator commitment leads to more dough for the company. 

Costs of collaborator withdrawal

If collaborator commitment has a lot to provide the company with, collaborator withdrawal can also cost a fortune! Lack of recognition at work, poorly defined roles, bogus managements…several factors can explain this withdrawal.