Employee engagement

Citation

Nolan, S. (2009), "Employee engagement", Strategic HR Review, Vol. 8 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/shr.2009.37208baa.001

Employee engagement

Article Type: Editorial From: Strategic HR Review, Volume 8, Issue 2

The theme of this issue of Strategic HR Review is employee engagement – an ongoing challenge for HR professionals – and our authors have taken some interesting approaches to this topic. Our first paper, “Creating engagement through employee benefits” by Terry Pegg, highlights the importance of communication in both the development of benefits to meet employee needs and in letting staff know what is available and why. Research into voluntary employee benefits carried out by AIG UK Benefits shows a mismatch between the perceptions of employers/HR professionals and employees when it comes to issues such as the interest in and usage of benefits, the levels of consultation with employees on benefits selection and the quality of the communication of benefits to employees. This can have a major impact on employee engagement levels and efforts made to offer benefits that engage and motivate can be wasted unnecessarily. Pegg provides a case study of a UK retailer that has successfully implemented a strong communication program and presents steps that employers and reward professionals can take to improve their own benefits communication. Crucially, communication needs to be two-way so that the organization understands what its employees need from their benefits program, and staff fully understand the program and how it can benefit them. In this way, he says, a virtuous circle can be created.

In “Flexible working and engagement – the importance of choice”, Deirdre Anderson and Dr Clare Kelliher report the findings of a study that show the employee engagement benefits of flexible working. The study backs up the generally accepted use of flexible working as a tool for attracting and retaining talent, but also finds that it can be linked to levels of commitment to the organization, employee job satisfaction and willingness to go the extra mile – the results of giving people choice over when, where and how they work. The authors provide a case study of flexible working in practice, where a team given flexibility had no staff turnover in 18 months despite being in a high-pressured environment. Implementation did have its challenges and the authors go on to identify best practices for successfully introducing flexible working into an organization in order to achieve its full benefits, including enhanced employee engagement.

Alison Gill focuses on engagement during times of change in her paper, “Employee engagement in a change environment”. She discusses the concept of Precision Business Psychology and how it can be applied to help achieve successful organizational change through employee engagement. The concept, developed by Crelos and embodied in a five-stage model, is based on existing models and theories plus experience in the field of achieving lasting change. It is about understanding how people behave in the face of change and developing appropriate and precise interventions to engage employees in the change process. This means starting the planning process earlier than is normal in many change programs, being thorough in assessment of needs and personalizing the change journey in recognition of the different ways in which people behave when faced with change. Such attention to detail, planning and the behavioral aspects of change should result in engaged and inspired employees that put their weight behind the change process and what it means to the business.

In the case study feature, “Engaging a globally diverse workforce”, Pratik Kumar discusses how the global IT services provider, Wipro Corporation, achieved early engagement with its fast growing, globally diverse workforce. High growth and rapid scaling of processes and operations resulted in the organization losing its ability to connect with individuals and to help them to quickly become a part of the driving force for growth and expansion. This led to a high turnover of staff, particularly in the first six to 12 months of joining the organization, before new recruits could experience the long-term career and development benefits on offer. Exit interviews identified the issues associated with working in such a fast growing and globally diverse environment and led to a focus on employee on-boarding and acclimation practices through an innovative program of initiatives to ensure early engagement. Since then, satisfaction levels of new hires have risen significantly and talent retention is looking positive at the organization.

Our final paper on employee engagement also looks at flexible working, and specifically at how it can be used to engage an older workforce. In his paper, “Flexible work options for older workers”, Sergio Koc-Menard examines the current and future HR challenges surrounding changing demographics and the need to engage more effectively with an aging workforce as a means of tapping in to the “grey” talent pool. He identifies three best practices for engaging with this workforce – offering a portfolio of flexible benefits, putting in place flexible work options for retirees and aligning flexible work opportunities with pension scheme options – and discusses three organizations that have put these into practice. Each approach has its benefits, but the author argues that a customized approach, despite the difficulties and costs surrounding its implementation, may yield the best results and be the best approach at a time when talent is scarce.

Sara NolanE-mail: shr@emeraldinsight.com