Source:Wikimedia Commons

Good Day!

Today Uranus in retrograde motion moves back into the sign Pisces, the last sign of the zodiac. In case you missed it, this is what I wrote about Uranus in the monthly forecast for August:

In July Uranus entered its annual cycle of retrograde motion. During the entire month of July it slowly traveled back through the very first degree of Aries, and now in August it will move back into Pisces where it will remain until next March.

Since May 27, when Uranus entered Aries, we’ve been getting to know a new face of Uranus. Aries is the spark of entrepreneurial spirit, the initiating drive toward independence and individuality. You may have noticed new ideas incubating and a spirit of bold entrepreneurship in and around your business. But when Uranus moved into retrograde motion, there was probably a disruption in this full-speed-ahead current. You may now feel ambivalent or dissatisfied with your new ideas and initiatives.

And when Uranus moves back into Pisces there’s another major shift. Yes, this is familiar territory; Uranus was in Pisces for most of the last seven years, since March 2003. But it may feel bizarre to be stepping back in time. From our new entrepreneurial spirit we again enter the realm of collective ideas. From our recent forays into a new style of leadership, we fall back into flattened hierarchies and committee decision-making. From enhanced independence we’re back to collaboration and alliances.

Our whole society will seem to be taking steps backwards. Must be something more to learn!

Employee Engagement

In honor of Uranus retrograde and since Pisces is a sign concerned with the emotional connections between us, let’s re-look at the concept of employee engagement. An engaged employee is defined in Wikipedia as:

…one who is fully involved in, and enthusiastic about, his or her work, and thus will act in a way that furthers their organization’s interests …Engagement is distinctively different from satisfaction, motivation, culture, climate and opinion and very difficult to measure.

Yes, it may be hard to measure but we know it when we see it, don’t we? And we know it in ourselves, too. It’s worth our while to pay attention to employee engagement since some studies have found that engaged employees are up to 43% more productive and that there is an almost 52% gap in operating incomes between companies with highly engaged employees and companies whose employees have low-engagement scores. (Source:Wikipedia)

In case you don’t know what you can do to specifically foster engagement, here are some questions adapted from Workforce Management. Ask yourself these questions about your employees and then have a second go and ask them about yourself:

  • Do your employees know what is expected of them at work?
  • Do your employees have the materials and equipment they need to do their work?
  • At work, do your employees have the opportunity to do what they do best every day?
  • In the last seven days, have you given your employees recognition or praise for doing good work?
  • Do you really care about each employee as a person?
  • Do you encourage your employees’ development?
  • At work, do your employees’ opinions count?
  • Does the mission/purpose of your company make your employees feel their job is important?
  • In the last six months, have you talked to each employee about their progress?
  • In the last year, has each employee had opportunities at work to learn and grow?

How did you do? Let’s take advantage of Uranus back in Pisces to shore up our relationships with our employees, our colleagues, and all our business contacts. Pisces is the sign of cohesive unity and as I said above, we must still have more to learn about it. Let’s take a step back to examine the points above and address any weaknesses we find. Then next March, when Uranus moves into Aries again, we’ll have the fully unified force of our collaborators behind us to push ahead into new territory.

Have a great weekend!

To read more about Uranus in Pisces, see the category to the right.

For an overview of the week, see the Astro4Business Weekly Forecast – Aug 9 – 15

For an overview of the month, see the Astro4Business Month Ahead – August 2010

For more info on the business descriptions of Uranus, see Uranus