Why a Culture of Passion Outperforms Employee Engagement

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Sonya shelton

CEO & Founder

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Many companies are trying to figure out how to build or maintain their culture in an era of hybrid and virtual workplaces. They’re asking: “How do we keep our teams engaged?” 

Especially in today’s environment, team engagement is just not enough. 

Why focus on passion instead of engagement? 

As Gary Hamel stated in his book The Future of Management, passion contributes more towards value creation than any other human capability. 

According to the Intégro Leadership Institute, 78% of engaged employees are passionate about the work they do each day, but only 44% are passionate about both their job and the organization. 

This “Passion Deficit” reveals the hidden emotional disconnect between typical employee engagement measurements and passion. When your people enjoy their work, they are engaged. But when they are emotionally connected with the organization, they are passionate. 

Passion = Performance 

Today’s organizations need to move past engagement and instead focus on how passionate their people are about the organization itself. 

Passionate teams are focused, engaged, and committed to consistent high performance. Why? Because they know they are creating value. 

As a result, they feel a strong emotional connection to the organization, a sense of pride and commitment, and deliver exceptional value to internal and external customers. 

The Passion Pyramid 

Building a passionate team comes from focusing on 5 key areas: 

  • Fostering an environment of trust and respect 
  • Creating opportunities to learn and grow 
  • Communicating in a way that people feel included and emotionally connected 
  • Aligning the team with Purpose, Vision, and Values to show they do meaningful work 
  • Building a high-performance, winning team 
Why a Culture of Passion Outperforms Employee Engagement

How passionate is your team? 

To create a passionate team, you need to have an environment (in person, virtual, or hybrid) where employees love to work every day. But first, you need to know what environment you have today. 

At ELC, we offer the Employee Passion Survey™, which is part of our Trust Inside Assessments™. This assessment measures the levels of passion and trust for your organization and its leadership. Then, we can partner with you to create custom-built actions to create a culture of trust, accountability, passion, and high performance. 

To learn more, click here to set up a free consultation with us. 

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