www.zenithctc.co.uk@ZenithCTC

Dr Sharon Xuereb

Employee Engagement:

What, Why, How

What is employee engagement?

Employee engagement?

Employee engagement is NOT:

• Lots of group hugs.

• Being excited by mundane things.

• Being so focused on your work that

you have no idea what’s happening

around you.

What is employee engagement? Vigour - The physical aspect.

Energy, resilience, effort Dedication - The emotional aspect.

Enthusiasm, inspiration, pride Absorption - The cognitive aspect.

Concentration, being engrossed in what you do

So what is EE? – Based on Kahn’s work 3 components:

Psychological meaningfulness Psychological safety Psychological availability

Developing EE: Psychological meaningfulness

Variety

Job challeng

e

Reward and

recognition

Opportunities for

development

Feedback

Psychological safety

Org justice Job security

Social support Workplace climate

Boss employee relationship Transformational leadership

Psychological availability Role overload

Family-work conflict Resource inadequacies

Dispositions Personal resources

Time urgency Off-work recovery

Is this possible? Organisations will have limited control

over some of these points, e.g. off-work recovery.

Therefore… Do the best you can with those you have

control over, e.g. Flexible working conditions to avoid work-family conflict; Considering current personalities in a team when hiring a new team member.

There is hope!

If you can’t develop some of these

points, focus on the ones you can –

Still employee engagement will

increase.

Why do we need employee engagement?

Increased discretionary effort

Other benefits of engagement (CIPD, 2010)

Engaged employees: Perform better. Are more innovative. Want to stay with the company. Enjoy better personal well-being. Perceive their workload as more

sustainable.

How do you develop employee engagement?

Killing employee engagement No autonomy ‘This is how we have always done it’ Lack of clear strategy Lack of challenging goals Negative personali- ties or dynamics No career prog-

ression

The current picture A CIPD report (2010) found that:

Only 8% are strongly engaged. The majority are moderately engaged.

Previous UK reports found up to 17% of workers disengaged.

Men are less engaged than women. Younger workers are less engaged than older workers. Those on less flexible contracts are less engaged than

others on flexible contracts. Non-managers are less engaged than managers.

Most employees have negative views about their organisation’s HR policies and practices.

EE

Excellent

managers

VisionJob crafting

Excellent managers Does an excellent accountant, engineer, therapist

… make an excellent manager? People skills: A leader who inspires others, is a

good role model, is approachable, makes staff want to do more.

Team manager: Brings team together to work towards the same goal.

Problem management: Whether related to goals or challenging behaviour from employees.

Clear strategy and vision: Taking on board staff opinions and concerns, and communicating back.

How to achieve this? Formal training. Peer support amongst managers. Coaching and mentoring: More intensive

in preparation of the role and towards the beginning.

Proactive and two-way communication with their own managers.

Job crafting Do-it-yourself job descriptions … within limits.

Altering task boundaries: Doing more or fewer tasks, or doing them differently.

Altering relationships, e.g. resdesigning the job to increase or decrease interactions with colleagues or clients.

Changing perception, e.g. an administrator who is considering retraining as a counsellor could see his job as a way to help colleagues when they are struggling.

Vision The current narrative of the organisation. What employees say about the

organisation when with their friends/family. Saving money? Doing more for less? Offering more quantity at the expense of

quality? Surviving

How do you communicate it?

Next step …

What does this mean for you? What is EE like in your organisation? What about in specific teams? What are you doing about this?

How we can help: One-to-one coaching, including over Skype. Training, e.g. Coaching skills for managers,

Managing staff with challenging behaviour.

We can particularly help … Teams not achieving their goals. Teams/staff who have limited

motivation. Managers who waste time firefighting.