analysis of factors of employee engagement

[Lalita Thakur]

Hey all
I am doing a project on the topic "analysis of factors of employee engagement " and is employee engagement related to employee satisfaction based on some parameters...
Can you people throw some light on this??

[Delphine Bondran]

Hi Lalita,

Here is some drivers of employee engagement from John Purcell whom I listened during a conference. There are the more relevant drivers he analysed during a downturn.

Those one drive employee engagement:
• Affective commitment -A sense of belonging, of being part of something, being recognised, able to contribute in a climate of cooperation
• Belief backed by experience that the organisation supports me and my development
• Leaders, especially my line manager, who I can trust and are good to work with, listen to my opinion, and respect my views and contribution, help me develop
• Working for a successful organisation with a clear mission and purpose with able, good, work colleagues
• All leading to reciprocal behaviour

Whereas, other elements can limit engagement :
• Job insecurity and fear
• Jobs with no space –very short cycle times
• Jobs causing high stress –little autonomy, inflexibility
• Unfairness especially in pay and rewards
• Bullying especially poor line management behaviour
• Stuck in the same job for long periods and unable to move

Maybe you can find more researchs from John Purcell on google.

I wish you a good project.
Delphine

[Lalita Thakur]

hey Delphine
Thank you a lot.. i guess this is more concise and will help me a lot.
Thank you
Regards
Lalita

[Abhishek Mittal]

Essentially, what you need to have is an Engagement model in place and through pre-measurement qualitative research uncover broad themes which can affect employee engagement (e.g. training, career growth, leadership, supervision, values, PMS, company image etc.). Then you can use techniques such as regression to understand the relationship between EE and its "influencers".

I do not really believe in having a pre-determnined framework for drivers of engagement, but would rather derive the drivers based on empirical research. The drivers, then, emanate from the organizational and employee context.

[Dr. Scott Kimball]

Anymore, we are less concerned with employee satisfaction and very concerned and invested in employee engagement. In other words, the focus has evolved. Some might even argue that the focus has gone from employee (or job) satisfaction to commitment to engagement.

Think of it this way ... employee engagement in my opinion is best described as the "reciprocal relationship between an employee and their employer” ...meaning that an employee is in most cases only willing to give at the level to which they receive (not just monetarily of course). If an employee is engaged in their job, they are both committed and satisfied. Engagement is an emotional process in that it is the emotional connection and value that an employee sense toward their job, their employer, and specifically toward their boss.

This is a bit of a long-winded answer to your question. Bottom line, if you adequately and accurately can measure employee engagement, you can be rest assured that you are also getting an accurate gauge on the lesser factor of employee satisfaction.

[Abdullah Hood]

Try to think about 'employee satisfaction' in relation to 'feels good' and engagement as 'does good'.

So engagement is the satisfaction + performance. Accordingly you need to ensure that you look at carefully at the differences and don't confuse the two subjects. There are a number of companies that have studied engagement and have shed more light on how we can assess it. Gallup is one of the more famous since they came up with their Q12 survey. As a survey you might find some of the questions similar to what you will see in a satisfaction survey - and other very different points.

Good luck.

[Jennifer Schulte]

Hello Lalita,

In my organization we use Gallup's Q12 approach which basically believes that people can be 'satisfied' about their work for reasons that are not related to 'engagement,' such as "I'm really happy with my pay and it motivates me to do as little as possible at work." Engagement is about the drivers that result in people feeling a deep emotional connection to their work and to the success of their business. A lot of their research is available in the Gallup Management Journal - online at http://gmj.gallup.com/default.aspx

I also can share the 2006 meta-analysis on engagement from the Conference Board that provides lots of data - they compared 'engagement' as measured by 13 different consulting firms (including Gallup) and reported where there are similarities in the definitions. You may find this useful.

[Lalita Thakur]

Hi All
Thanks to all of you for providing me with such vital inputs on this topic.
My project is still in progress, shortlisted 8 factors..now analysis part is left.

[Carol A Harris]

If you haven't already you should research the Gallup work as well as Towers Perrin and Hewitt. These are pretty comprehensive. Really are insightful. Carol