Employee Engagement and its Benefits

Introduction

Employee engagement is an important factor of organizations in the twenty first centenary. The aforementioned subject is confabulating among the academic researches and organizations. To begin with, Employee engagement is defined as “the level of an employee’s psychological investment in their organization.” (Aon, 2017,p. 2).

Figure 1.0: The Aon Hewitt Engagement Model

(Source: Aon Hewitt, 2017) The Anon Hewitt Employee Module detail about engagement, business impact of engagement and work related involvement & its element would lead to greater engagement (Aon, 2017,p. 2). According to the model, engagement drives are company practices, basics, work, performance, leadership and the brand. These drives would give outcomes such as say, stay and strive. In fact, business outcomes would be talent; retention, absenteeism, wellness, operational; productivity and safety, customer; satisfaction, NPS, retention and financial; revenue/sales growth, operational income/margin and total shareholder return (Aon, 2017,p. 2).

Furthermore, the phrase ‘engagement’ could be used in a particular employment where the people are passionate, enthusiastic about their employment and have good work practice to achieve higher levels of achievements. (Armstrong, 2010). It is also important to highlight, engagement was defined as the positive attitude of the employee towards the institution and its values. This combine the following facts 1) a positive attitude and pride in the organization, 2) trust in the organization’s products/services, 3) being aware that the organization allows the employee to perform well, 4) a willingness towards good behaviour and to be a good team player, and 5) an understanding of the bigger picture and to go beyond and above job requirements (Robinson, Perryman, & Hayday, 2004).

Also Employee Engagement is with the support of higher management, employees need to engage in devotion, passion and effective leadership skills. In an organization human resources leaders set the motivational drive, creed and spread the positive moral to the employees (Pratima, & Bhagirathi, 2016. Then an engaged employee would be an ambassador whom he or she would give a positive outcome and would be devoted to produce good results in an organization and does not change employment frequently (Priyanka, 2017). In fact, in the present-day to have the work-force engaged, it is important for the leadership to keep a close eye and regularly seek for various techniques (Arti et.al, 2016).

How engagement woks

In terms of engagement there are three types of employees in an organization. Gallup (2016) explains them as;

Engaged employees: In an organization employees that work with passion and feel a profound connection to their work are engaged employees. These employees are driven with innovation and consistently move the organisation forward.

Disengaged employees: Employees that ‘sleep-walk’ through their work day and who does not have any energy or passion towards their work are ‘checked-out’ employees.

Actively disengaged employees: Employees that can undermine what their engaged colleagues have accomplished are unhappy employees at work: they’re busy acting out their unhappiness.

Employees that ‘go the extra mile’ and deliver above and beyond on their job performance are likely to have a grater employee engagement (Robert, 2006).Currently employers are aware of the significances of having an engaged work-force, innovation, productivity, and bottom-line performance are highly recognized in engaged workforce. While this takes place retention in highly competitive talent markets and reducing costs related to hiring is significant (Harvard Business Review, 2013).

Team MyHub (2016) seven perks of increasing employee engagement and solutions on how to; Enhanced productivity, employee satisfaction, lower employee turnover, high degree of creativity, workplace safety, home and work integration and increased revenue.

Likewise when inquire the factors influencing employee engagement and how each factor performs Josephine (2013) detail commitment, motivation, loyalty and trust are four important things when we talk about employee engagement and trust. The quality of engagement of an employee determines the level of an employee. Hence it is important to know the correlation between these factors particularly.

Armstrong (2009) explains, with expanded employee engagement an organization could have higher organizational commitment. These employees are excited about their jobs and give their hundred percent and well aware of their organization and are proud to be a part of it. However; employees could be engaged with employment without a commitment as well. The author explains below ccombinations of the impact of engagement and organizational commitment. Figure: 2:0 Combinations of the impact of engagement and organizational commitment

(Source: Armstrong 2009) Employee commitment should be considered as an essential business factor (Amena & Shahid, 2013). O’Malley (2000) contends five general factors which would enhance employee commitment; affiliative, associative, moral, affective & structural commitment.

Motivated employees are an asset and continuance encouragement is required in order to receive an exceptional outcome. Improving organization operation must be an effort of motivation. These need to be designed effectively to show benefits to the employees. When workers are able to combine their personal ambitions with those of the organization, motivation can be accomplished (Kirti, 2012). Employee motivation is the effect an organization could make for an employee in a way to operate in an organization, it determine the success or failure of the organization. Influencing the behaviours of their employees to behave in certain ways is also important (Dongho, 2006). The author further explains in Figure: 3 two types of rewards; intrinsic (self-satisfaction) – programmes such as employee recognition, involvement, job redesign & scheduling examples a) thank notes b)certificates of appreciation c) participative management, d) quality circles, e) employee stock ownership, f) job sharing, g) rotation, enlargement & h) enrichment, i) flextime, j) telecommunicating.

Extrinsic (rewards given by others) - programmes such as variable pay, skill-based pay and flexible benefits described by a) price-rate pay plan b) gain sharing & profit sharing c) bonuses d) skill e) competence d) knowledge-based pay e) modular plans f) core-plus plans g) flexible spending plans.

Theories such as Reinforcement theory; B. F. Skinner’s theory of reinforcement indicates the application of reward and punishment (Austin & Taiwoo, 2014). It is the course of action taken to control the consequences of the behaviour. This theory is a combination of rewards/ punishments used to reinforce desired behaviour or extinguish unwanted behaviour.

EGR theory; is generally known as the theory of existence, resistance, and growth. It is a study which motivational factors enable to understand the individual human behaviour (Jane, 2012).

Two factor theory: This theory argues two factors which are motivators and hygiene factors influence motivation in the workplace. Motivators are which encourage employees to work hard and hygiene factors are employees unmotivated if they are not present (EPM, 2018).

Vroom’s Expectancy theory; this theory is based on assumptions and has three main elements: expectancy, instrumentality, and valence. A person’s estimate of the probability that job-related effort will result in a given level of performance is expectancy. An individual’s estimate of the probability that a given level of achieved task performance will lead to various work outcomes is instrumentality. Valence is the strength of an employee’s preference for a particular reward. Thus, salary increases, promotion, peer acceptance, recognition by supervisors, or any other reward might have more or less value to individual employees (Fred, 2011).

Figure 3.0: Types of Motivational Programs, Examples, and Linked Theories

(Source: Dongho, 2006)

Moving on to the next factor, loyalty is the characteristic of employees who has faith and devotion towards the organization. Maximum of their time, energy, knowledge, skill and effort is given to the organization to achieve organizational goals (Rishipal, 2013). Whereas trust, is the confidence when the action is consistent with their word. What truly matters is, the organization and its co-workers respects the skills and shows concerns of the employee’s welfare (Robert & Sheryl, 2008).

Human resource system does play a huge part in employee engagement, like staffing, training, and development practices. This will contribute to enhance competitive advantage and potentially maintain the organization and employee fit (Yupono, 2014).

Kahn (1990), explain disengagement as “the withdrawing or defending of oneself physically, cognitively or emotionally during their work role performance.” Outcomes of employee disengagement detail by Zafrul (2017) as; negative job attitude, the absence of teamwork, rigidness to accept feedback, lack of trust, low morale, no learning, the higher rate of turnover, more work place violence and bullying, more health problem, higher conflict, more absenteeism, lower productivity, higher rate if accident and safety problem, more deviant work place behaviour, lateness, loss of cultural values, postponement/ withhold of woks, no innovation and creativity and lack of interpersonal relation.

According to Forbes (2017), 18 percent are actively disengaged of work. This workforce is normally negative; creates a negative environment, unhappy about their employment and I always vocal about it. They would have a significant influence over others. The organization needs to watch-out for these types of employees as they could toxicity the organization and can rarely be transformed into true “A” players.

Benefits of employee engagement

An elevated engagement is beneficial for both organization and employee. Various researches have highlighted that directive and positive performance of employees is influenced by the rewards lead to job satisfaction. In order to improve an organization’s effectiveness, rewards are one of the most efficient tools of management when trying to influence individual or group behaviour. (Ovidiu-Iliuta, 2013). Kahn (1990) stated that employee motivators such as advancement opportunities provide employees’ psychological safety that makes them more motivated towards their work. Likewise, for an organization engagement is a powerful influence towards the performance, driving bottom‐line profit and enabling organisational agility and improved efficiency in driving change initiatives (IES, 2009). Gallup (2018) claims Gallup (2018) claims “High employee engagement directly impacts a business's economic health. Gallup findings indicate that when compared to less engaged businesses, highly engaged business units experience 41% fewer instances of absenteeism. Lower absenteeism rates increase productivity, boost morale, and improve revenue.” In particular, accounting benefits of employee engagement are: reduced mistakes lower the costs and higher profits (Amanda, 2016).

Employee engagement process can be demonstrated by the organizations survey as well. The following example is from Solvay; the Group target is by 2025 to have an engagement index of 80%. This index is used as a yardstick to decide which actions are needed. Initiatives and processes are to cultivate the engagement and well-being of its employees, including: personal development, reward & recognition, inclusive culture and work-life balance (Solvay Annual Integrated Report, 2016).

Conclusion and Recommendations

To summarize, employee engagement is a highly important component of an organization, a price of a product could change easily but it is another thing to change the nature of an engaged workforce (William & Benjamin, 2018).

Employee should be given the freedom to give ideas to the organization as this will boost their morale and consequently lead to higher productivity (Osabiya, 2015).

The following HR policies are recommendable for an effective employee engagement: performance-related rewards, effective and fair means of positioning and selecting employees, designing employee feedback system in respect to leaders' behaviour, and finally improving alignment between HR strategies and the corporate strategy (Maha, 2015).

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