Driving an “Engagement
Culture” is the essential foundation to build an organizations employee
engagement initiative. Organizations must use the findings from their
engagement surveys in order to identify the key factors that drive engagement
& organizational KPIs in their context and then pick the ones that are of
the highest importance to the business, in order to design engagement
initiatives around those specific items (Vance, 2006). In today’s highly competitive business world, more
and more organizations are becoming aware of the importance of employee
engagement and are taking up initiatives to increase the employee’s engagement
levels. As evident on Gallup surveys from 2018, the percentage of engaged
employees is on an increasing trend in the U.S. (increased from 30% in 2012 to
34% in 2018) and this is by no mere coincidence but through organizations
investing on building a culture of engagement (Harter, 2018).
A variety of different
approaches are discussed in literature, in terms of the techniques/strategies
an organization should exploit in order to increase employee engagement.
According to Armstrong (2009), a strategy for enhancing employee engagement
must consider the below 05 key areas, which will be discussed in detail with
relation to a fast-growing organization.
1.
The
work itself: The nature of the work the employees are
assigned to do, can intrinsically trigger their engagement to increase. Employees
today prefer work that is intellectually challenging and interesting which also
gives them a sense of accomplishment while making themselves feel significant
in the organizational big picture (Armstrong, 2009). In fast-growing
organizations, the job roles are usually very specific (narrow job scope) &
can often be monotonous because the roles are designed mainly with efficiency
in mind. At my current workplace, certain roles where these drawbacks exist,
are handled carefully by using methods such as periodic job rotation. For
example, a job role for a specific sub-function where the team members were
required to do quite a lot of monotonous data entry work, was combined with a
less monotonous sub-functional role to create a “hybrid” role for the combined
team.
2. The work environment: This has
to do with cultivating a culture of positive attitude towards work, encouraging
interest and excitement in the work while reducing work pressure. The
organizational talent management practices should be clearly defined. The
employees should feel that their workplace is a psychologically safe place to
work. Ensuring the employees have appropriate physical working conditions (example:
chairs, desks, computers, air conditioning, internet connections) also play a
role in employee engagement. From my experience, the managers of a growing
organization play a vital role in making the work place a psychologically safe
place to work. On the other hand, today’s employees demand good physical
working conditions – this is one aspect where my current organization has
gotten very positive feedback on employee satisfaction surveys from the
employees.
3. Leadership: Here, Armstrong (2009) focuses mainly on the
very important role played by line managers in increasing employee engagement
levels. Also, the author emphasizes on the training of line managers and
prospective managers to equip them with the skills and knowledge required to
play this role. My current organization has invested in this area greatly and
there are a few training programs that are mandatory for different levels of
leaders. Ongoing performance management is done through a human resource
management system and there are periodic trainings & refreshers conducted
for the managers on performance management techniques.
4. Opportunities for personal growth: Creating
a learning culture is an important aspect in nurturing employee engagement. Discretionary learning instead of obligatory
(often unproductive) training programs should be encouraged – this process
takes place when employees truly are interested in acquiring the skills and
knowledge that are needed to support the organization’s mission (Sloman, 2003
Cited in Armstrong, 2009). An
essential aspect of this strategy is that the employees should have an enough amount
of flexibility for them to be able to expand on their roles and contribute in
areas that they are talented in.
However,
this can be challenging unless the guidelines are clearly defined, specially in
fast-growing organizations. The primary role an employee is expected to play,
should not get significantly affected due to him/her focusing on other areas they
wish to contribute in. Career development related guidance and support should
also be covered in the strategy. At my current workplace, the employees are
encouraged to contribute to a suggestions scheme, the suggestions necessarily
do not have to be related to their job role – they are recognized on the
evaluations for their contributions and there are monetary rewards and Non
monetary rewards/awards (recognition from the top) based on the value addition
the suggestion brings in. From a career guidance standpoint, each team member
who joins the organization is assigned an experienced team member (a team lead
or a manager) as their “mentor” & the mentor acts as a “career counselor”
among other things, sharing their wisdom with the new comers. All these things
combined, has created a strong cultural foundation of learning and continuous
improvement. However, it must be said that as the organization continues to
grow, the focus on these initiatives seem to have slightly diluted.
References:
Armstrong, M. (2009). Armstrong's handbook of human resource management
practice. 11th ed. London: Kogan Page, pp 338-340.
Harter,
J. (2018) Employee Engagement on the Rise in the U.S. [Online] Available
at: https://news.gallup.com/poll/241649/employee-engagement-rise.aspx [Accessed on 04 September 2019].
Vance, R. J. (2006) Employee Engagement and Commitment.
[Online] Available at: https://www.shrm.org/hr-today/trends-and-forecasting/special-reports-and-expert-views/Documents/Employee-Engagement-Commitment.pdf
[Accessed 04 September 2019].