For the seventh time, the award-winning newspaper Sun Sentinel has named FHE Health a “Top Workplace.” The annual honor goes to employers with especially high levels of employee satisfaction and engagement. This year FHE Health was one of only 126 businesses and organizations in South Florida to receive the prestigious designation. (We invite you to visit our website to learn more about the company and explore open positions. FHE is always looking for top talent to join its team of dedicated professionals.)
What, specifically, makes FHE a consistently “top workplace”? For answers to this question, we turned to expert Barbara Dunkiel, Director of HR at FHE. “It starts by hiring and retaining the best people, providing training and career development, offering challenging and meaningful work, and valuing and rewarding employee contributions,” Dunkiel said.
What Makes a 7th “Top Workplace” Award Such an Honor?
“Every year Sun Sentinel partners with the third party Energage to conduct a survey of more than two million employees nationwide,” Dunkiel said. “This is not an informal survey—it’s an in-depth, scientifically based look at key metrics gauging employee satisfaction. The fact that FHE has consistently scored high on this survey for seven years is a big deal, because it reflects a company culture that values employees and wants them to feel valued and happy in their jobs.”
What Defines Employee Job Satisfaction at a “Top Workplace” Like FHE?
Job satisfaction is the level of contentment employees feel about their job and their degree of engagement. Dunkiel said this is measured by the degree to which employees are motivated, feel passionate about their jobs, and are committed to the organization’s financial growth and success. When employees are happy or content, “that creates a positive work environment for themselves and others, including the patients in our care,” Dunkiel noted. “It also means lower staff turnover, higher productivity, and reduced company costs.”
What Survey Answers Revealed About Employees’ Experiences at FHE
If employee engagement is a key measure of employee satisfaction, what does that look like at FHE in particular? Were there recurring themes in FHE employees’ survey answers that help to show why employees are enthusiastic and engaged working for FHE? To answer this question, Dunkiel pulled out an official survey document consisting of pages of “engagement comments” from FHE employees. The answers reveal some common themes, which Dunkiel was quick to point out.
- Love for the job – Some of the more popular reasons employees said they loved their job:
- The feeling that what they do “makes a difference” and “changes lives” for the better
- Being part of and working with “a great multidisciplinary team,” “family,” and/or “community”
- Feeling “valued” in one’s position
- FHE’s commitment to work-life balance – At a time when record numbers of Americans are resigning from jobs to find more work-life balance, it was striking to see “flexibility” and variations of it mentioned the most (on a short list of work-life benefits).
- Feeling appreciated by coworkers, patients, managers, and the owner – Across the board, whether in clinical services, support services, nursing, or administration, FHE employees said they felt appreciated. They used terms like “gratitude,” “support,” and “encouragement,” to convey this sense of appreciation that they felt from coworkers, patients, managers, and the owner of the company.
- The desire to keep working at FHE – When asked what contributed most to their wanting to stay with FHE, employees gave reasons like “the mission, people, and vision,” “helping people and career advancement,” and “the drive to want to help others.” One person said they were “happy with the company because they want me to grow and learn more” and are “willing to invest in my future.”
- How managers make it easier to do one’s job and care about employee concerns – This theme emerged in answers that described managers as “available,” good listeners, and “always willing to help and educate,” as well as provide “the training and tools necessary” to do one’s job.
No workplace is perfect. At its core, the annual Energage survey is an opportunity to get detailed and uncensored feedback from employees about their experience at FHE—”so we can know what’s working well and what could use improvement,” Dunkiel said. “The fact that in that process FHE has won ‘Top Workplace’ for a seventh year helps us know we’re doing a lot of things right, and that’s encouraging.”
Interested in employment at FHE Health? Check out the possibilities.
