Employee Engagement and Organizational Performance

An "engaged employee" is one who is fully involved in and enthusiastic about his or her work and so will act in ways that advance his or her organization's interests. Employee engagement is important to the competitiveness of any organization, particularly in the current business environment.

Research has shown that organizations with high levels of employee engagement excel in customer loyalty/satisfaction, productivity, operational efficiency, profitability, and low employee turnover. Employee engagement plays a critical role in an organization's safety performance. This article will address how to apply engagement concepts to encourage employee engagement in general and, having achieved that, how this can be directed toward driving stellar safety performance.

Employee Engagement

Employee engagement can be viewed from a cognitive, an emotional, and a behavioral perspective. The cognitive aspect revolves around the employees' perception and beliefs regarding the organization and its culture in general, its leaders, and working conditions in particular. The emotional aspect relates to whether the employee has a positive or negative attitude toward the organization and its leaders. The emotional perspective is influenced by the cognitive element. The behavioral aspect of engagement fosters the employee's willingness to apply his or her discretionary effort to the work, resulting in a value-added benefit to the organization. So employee engagement is distinctively different from employee satisfaction, motivation, and organizational culture, though they have a bearing on it.

View of Employee Engagement

Work Practices

Research has shown that certain management practices foster employee involvement and engagement. To paraphrase Jim Collins in his book Good to Great, this starts with putting the "right" people in the "right" position and providing them with the resources so that they can do the "right" thing at the "right" time. For this premise to thrive, the organizational systems have to be integrated, management practices have to be aligned, and the work climate has to be supportive so as to maximize worker engagement. Organizational effectiveness scholars have identified four elements in the work environment that foster high worker involvement. These are power, information, knowledge, and recognition.

Power

The "power" element of involvement means the organization empowers the workers to participate in decision-making regarding their work. At the lower end, it might mean management has to adopt a democratic style of leadership, which encourages workers to voice their opinions and concerns before decision are made. For this to work, the suggestions have to be discussed, their applicability has to be evaluated, and some of the innovative worker suggestions have to be implemented. To achieve greater involvement requires giving the workforce greater input and control. In construction, the toolbox talk creates a forum for this exchange to occur. For this to function optimally, time has to be allocated and workers encouraged to provide suggestions and participate in problem solving.

Information

For workers to be effective in their work, they need "information." This becomes the basis for decision-making, problem solving, and proper execution of the work. The management's challenge is to set up a process by which the worker gets the right information at the right time. Another important aspect that sustains involvement is workers seeing a direct link between what they do on a daily basis and the organizational or project goals and objectives.

Knowledge

Knowledge refers to the worker's capability and skill to perform the work. This means hiring capable workers and then providing them with the training and education that expand their abilities, improve their problem solving, and enhance their risk and exposure assessment so that they can make the "right" decisions. It is with workers who are knowledgeable, skillful, and engaged that the operation can achieve a high level of effectiveness, efficiency, and safety.

Recognition

Recognition is critical to foster involvement and sustain the engagement of workers who are involved in improving themselves and the operations. The worker has to clearly understand that the recognition is for expending discretionary effort that enhances the organization's performance. Recognition can take many forms, but it is critical that, whatever form it takes, it has to be somewhat immediate (soon after achievement), the outcome has to be certain (that worker will get the reward), and the reward has to be meaningful to the recipient. There are many examples in manufacturing operations where a few thousand dollars of bonuses to each worker translated into millions of dollars in operational efficiencies with the added bonus of much higher quality, less waste, more dependable delivery, and fewer occupational incidents.

Change Management

All organizations have some level of employee engagement. To change the level of employee engagement, the organization must also have a good understanding of change management. In any organization, the employees more than likely fall into three general groups: actively disengaged, not engaged, or engaged. Actively disengaged employees aren't just unhappy; they are busy acting out their unhappiness as well as frustrations. If this is not addressed, it can also affect others. The employees who are not engaged are basically "putting in their time." They are doing the bare minimum to get by; they bring little or no energy to their work and are not vested in or passionate about the organization. Engaged employees, on the other hand, are passionate about their work and feel a strong connection to the organization and its leadership. Such workers are effective in their work practices, enhance working relationships, drive innovation, and help move the organization forward.

Categories of Employee Engagement

The effectiveness of high-involvement work practices has been documented in many research studies. These studies compared traditional management methods with high-involvement work practices in automotive, steel, electronic, and apparel manufacturing as well as service organizations. In all cases, workers in the high-involvement plants or operations showed higher levels of positive attitudes, morale, trust, and cooperation and significantly higher labor productivity, including organizational commitment and intrinsic enjoyment of the work. Invariably, those organizations showed superior operational and financial performance as well.

Six fundamental elements that drive employee engagement are:

1. Work
   1. Meaningful work/sense of accomplishment
   2. Autonomy/empowerment
   3. Aligned processes
   4. Resources
2. Organizational system and practices
   1. Integrated policies and procedures
   2. Performance management
   3. Company values, vision, ethics, etc.
3. People (executives, managers, supervisors, peers, and others)
   1. Inspiring leadership
   2. Respectful and assertive relationships
   3. Open two-way communication
   4. Synergy and reciprocity
4.  Opportunities
   1. Career opportunities
   2. Development opportunities (training and education)
   3. Involvement opportunities
5. Rewards
   1. Pay and bonuses
   2. Benefits
   3. Recognition
6. Quality of life
   1. Physical work environment
   2. Work climate (trust, respect, valuing people, fairness, etc.)
   3. Work-life balance

Some studies have found a significant positive correlation between employee engagement and safety performance. One study found that engaged employees were five times less likely than non-engaged employees to have a safety-related incident and seven times less likely to have a lost-time incident. In addition, the average cost of a safety incident was six times lower for engaged employees compared to non-engaged ones. Upon examining the six fundamental elements that drive employee engagement, it is easy to see how these can be incorporated into the safety management processes to garner their intrinsic benefits.

Focus on Safety

When it comes to work, typically in safety, performing the task the "safe" way usually takes more effort on the worker's part than doing it the way he or she is used to. In construction, very little attention is given to work (task) design and demand. The task in which the employee is going to engage can be designed in such a way that the task provides positive reinforcement by way of making the task easier to perform or requiring less effort. Another aspect of work that doesn't get sufficient attention is task assignment, where the worker's capabilities are not matched up with the task demands. The way the task is assigned (presented to the worker) can make the work meaningful or not. The worker can be given an achievable goal before starting the task, and the successful completion of the task will give the employee a sense of accomplishment. Involving the worker in the task design, planning for the work, or assessing the risk involved will also increase involvement. These are just a few suggested techniques that will increase engagement.

The organizational and operational systems should be integrated so as not to create conflicting demands on the worker. In many instances, production goals place workers in a position where they have to choose between working safely and keeping their jobs. There are ample opportunities to evaluate the practices for integration and alignment. Integration of safety into the operational planning process is a very simple and effective form of amalgamation, and the involvement of workers at some point in the process may foster engagement as well as have a positive effect of safety. Another traditional safety shortcoming is the fact that the metrics used are historical and do not provide operational "just-in-time" information with which to manage risk. Each organization should be able to map its operational processes and find operational indicators that will provide such information related to safety so that it can be effectively managed. The organizational values must be in line with management's behavior so as to garner trust and foster involvement.

Of the six fundamental elements of engagement, the people element is probably the most important. There are basically two types of people involved: the producers (workers) and management. Management devises the organizational and operational systems (policies and procedures), sanctions the practices, creates the work climate, rewards compliance, manages performance, etc. So management's actions and behaviors either reinforce the stated policies or undermine them. Management actions play a significant role in the level of worker engagement. Management's leadership skills and style play a critical role in fostering respectful relationships, building trust, opening two-way communication, and creating an empowering work climate. Leaders must be willing to actively listen, manage by walking around, go out of their way to treat everyone fairly, and involve workers as much as possible in problem solving as well as decision-making.

Employees must be treated with respect. Safety-related interactions must preserve personal respect, even in disciplinary situations. Leadership support is critical to foster an environment that supports these factors. This extends to safety personnel. Employee perceptions about organizational commitment to safety are often based on their interactions with operational personnel who are supported by safety staff. When there is a disconnect between operational requirements and safety prognostications, employees may feel that management does not care about their well-being and may view safety practitioners as safety cops who simply implement and enforce management initiatives and are not truly there to look out for the welfare of the employees. Though employees may comply with safety rules most of the time, they may believe that these rules slow them down and/or make their jobs more difficult. Where employees are engaged, they believe that management is truly concerned about their well-being and tend to respond in ways that benefit the organization.

Conclusion

Employee engagement is a powerful concept that organizations can utilize to improve many of their business functions, including safety performance. The degree of employee engagement is directly related to addressing the six fundamental elements above and the level of involvement that employees are given in managing their work processes, practices, and activities. Some of the ways that employees can become involved in addressing the safety of the work in which they are going to be engaged may include participating in production goal assessment, having input into planning the work, assessing the risk, evaluating the procedures, suggesting possible practice methods, addressing logistics, selecting risk mitigation techniques, having the "right" information, etc.

Factors Necessary for High Performance

Of course, this will require that the workforce be capable, skillful, knowledgeable, and motivated. The organization will have to have selected the "right" workers as well as supervisors, have a safety staff that is knowledgeable of the operational functions, and have a deep understanding of human nature. They will also have to have an enlightened leadership, a culture and climate that foster and support engagement, and integrated and aligned organizational and operational systems. There has to be robust and open communication, fair treatment, and feedback as well as opportunity for growth and development. The degree to which these aspects are implemented and function seamlessly will determine the level of engagement and the outcomes that drive the organization's success.


References

Furst, G. P. (2014). Employee Engagement & Organizational Performance.[Online].Available at<https://www.irmi.com/articles/expert-commentary/employee-engagement-and-organizational-performance

James,L.(2012). What is Organizational Performance.[Online].Available at< http://www.growth.pitcher.com.au/resources/articles/what-is-organisational-performance