Choosing a winning consultancy: 5 ways highly engaged employees impact success
Organizations consider many factors when it comes to choosing which consultancy to partner with—from industry experience and technology expertise to price and global footprint. But what about employee engagement? Gallup research shows that engaged employees deliver increased profitability and productivity. So, should leaders be looking beyond logos to the relationship between a consultancy and its employees?
We believe employee engagement is critical to consulting work that drives value. It’s why we put people at the heart of our mission of building a world that works better for everyone.
Our Kin empower us to be a true high-performance consultancy, and we’re proud to have recently achieved Great Place to Work certification in every eligible country in which we operate. This achievement is not only a reflection of our strong employee culture—it demonstrates our commitment to delivering exceptional service and results for our clients.
Here we examine each of the factors that define a Great Place to Work, and the ways highly engaged employees shape our clients’ success.
1. Credibility
Credibility is essential in enabling our employees to feel secure and supported and in building client trust. In a recent client experience survey, our clients told us that the credibility of our consultants is what keeps them satisfied with Kin + Carta as a vendor—with capabilities and expertise ranked as the highest point of pride. This deep credibility and knowledge is how we hit the ground running when we partner with our clients. Across a breadth of industries, our consultants are passionate about the work they do and the impact they make.
We work on some really interesting projects — including yield prediction, drones, and e-Commerce. Not only have I loved working with projects in our ag client portfolio, teams across the firm do, too. It’s because there are really exciting projects and they’re solving real-world challenges.
2. Respect
When employees feel respected and supported by management and their peers, they bring their best selves to work. We use a working style called the Kin + Carta Way that encourages employees to “leverage our collective expertise and different points of view to effectively advise our clients and influence change”. Our shared engagement and delivery values and commitment to 7-star client experiences gives our Kin the confidence to work in the “stretch zone”, constantly expanding their skills and experience. The trust we place in our people is reflected in the quality and speed of work we deliver; for example, we rolled out a new eCommerce solution for ASICS across 15 markets in just 24 months.
We counted very much on Kin + Carta’s experience for the governance of complex projects with significant politics to ensure the success of this one. I was thrilled to be working with a team that puts research and conceptual exploration at the heart of its professional practice.
3. Fairness
Equality, impartiality, and justice should be non-negotiable inside any organization. And these are values that we actively embed in our practices and culture at Kin + Carta. Our consultants learn proactive stakeholder management to create fair and supportive environments for everyone we work with, from colleagues to clients and partners. Respondents in our recent client experience survey highlighted this flexibility and agility. Our inclusive way of working is how we have been able to navigate and successfully deliver complex projects, such as globalizing a personalized pricing model for a leading coffee chain.
Our team demonstrated great ability and flexibility to incorporate data and analytical thinking with impactful business insights despite nuanced data, cultural, and political challenges unique to each market.
4. Pride
When consultants feel a sense of pride over what they do, they produce exceptional work. The Kin + Carta Way and our commitment to 7-star client experiences mean we are always looking for ways to exceed client expectations. Our consultants are trusted advisors, helping our clients deliver the right solutions, in the right way. This ethos is demonstrated in our long relationship with Santander. Our team has empowered the UK bank to evolve its legacy mobile banking channel from project-based releases to a transformed product operating model.
Kin + Carta has been a key digital partner to Santander for over five years now. What makes the team stand out from our other partners is the consistency of their work and the emphasis they put on building a lasting, resilient relationship. It’s why we’ve been able to transform a mature product so quickly and set ourselves up for creating industry-leading digital experiences for years to come.
5. Camaraderie
A strong sense of community is essential to employee engagement. And creating friendly, welcoming spaces where we can explore big ideas is a key part of our client work too. Our clients told us in a recent experience survey that they see us as a strong digital partner, and we’re committed to developing strong, productive relationships while always being open to new ways of thinking and working.
If you're willing to dive in, you're afforded a lot of opportunities to try new things at Kin + Carta. We're not a company that tells you what to do or what your path should be. We let you figure it out for yourself, and if you're willing to, come up with what that path is and follow it where it may lead.
Choosing a winning consultancy means looking beyond the surface to consider culture, values and, crucially, employee engagement. Our focus on employee engagement and wellbeing has a positive influence on every part of our performance and delivery and means that we can help our enterprise clients meet and exceed their goals. You can learn more about how we prioritized employee engagement to achieve Great Place to Work certification in eight countries here.
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