The Outlook for Employee Engagement

[Fred Nickols]

Granted, I'm a newbie to employee engagement (EE) but I've been around a while and I know a thing or two about people, organizations and change. As I dig deeper into EE writings and research, my "little voice" is telling me "No way. This EE 'stuff' isn't really going to get anywhere." A few words about why this glum outlook on my part.

It seems clear enough from what I've read so far that employee engagement is a hallmark of a certain kind of organizational culture. If your organization can be said to have large numbers of engaged employees, their presence owes to the organization's culture. Conversely, given a certain kind of culture, large numbers of engaged employees seem likely.

So, let's sort organizations into two categories: Those that have large numbers of engaged employees and those that don't. Let's sort the second category into two sub-categories: (1) those that want large numbers of engaged employees and (2) those that don't or could care less. Those companies that want but don't have large numbers of engaged employees are confronted with the requirement to change their culture. Changing an organization's culture is a long-term effort. That kind of effort poses two requirements of its own: (1) continuity of management and (2) constancy of purpose.

Given the "churn" in senior managers and execs, continuity in management seems like a long shot. Ditto for constancy of purpose. So, I don't think very many organizations will succeed in their efforts to tap into the discretionary effort put forth by engaged employees. They simply can't satisfy the two basic requirements of "continuity of management" and "constancy of purpose." They are too short-term in their thinking, outlook and behavior.

Then again, I could be all wrong.