Unit 3 - Four things an organisation needs to do to engage employees

Four things an organisation needs to do to engage employees:

·         Develop Strategic Vision – What the organisation aims at doing.

·         Managers are trained to engage staff.

·         Listen to employee voices at every level

·         Walk the talk – Whatever the organisation says it should be done is reflected on the day to day life of people in the organisation.

Unit 3 - Vision, Opportunity, Impact, Rewards and Incentives; Community; Comunication; entreperneuship or flexibility

Vision
Defining a future direction for an organization unit goes by many names: strategy, goals, objectives, aspirations, themes, values, milestones, mission, intent, and purpose. While there are nuances of differences among these concepts, they all focus on a future direction and investments to make tomorrow’s direction real today.

When employees understand, accept, and align their actions to the direction of the organization, they are more likely to be engaged. There are a number of specific dimensions of the vision that lead to employees being more engaged:

•      Clarity. Visions should combine analytics which lay out statistical projections of the future and stories which capture the impact of the future investments on employees and customers. Visions engage employees when they offer them a sense of purpose that has meaning to each of them.

•      Line of sight. Visions in the abstract remain at the hoped-for-but-not-likely level. When visions translate to employee actions, they become real. Employees who can see how their day-to-day behaviour links to longer term organization visions become more engaged. This is consistent with expectancy theory which advocates the alignment between an employee’s effort and performance and performance and outcomes. When this line of sight exists, employees feel engaged because they believe that their work will have impact.

•      Future focused. Visions focus on what can be, not what has been. By creating the future, visions engage employees in working together to deliver a desired result.

•      Emotive and cognitive. Visions create energy by generating passion among employees about what can be. Energy often comes from emotions that may exist within a company or from the leaders of the company. Cognitive visions ensure that the passions are grounded in reality.

When leaders build purpose-driven organizations, employees are more engaged. Employees in these organizations act like volunteers because they believe in the cause or purpose of the organization. The greater challenge for leaders is to ensure a continuity of engagement with the benefit of an external crisis.

Opportunity

Opportunity means that employees are given the chance to learn and grow through their participation in the work’s activities. Opportunities to participate may come from direct participation involving individual employees, indirect or representative participation through the intermediary of employee representative bodies, such as works councils or trade unions, and financial participation.

•      Direct participation can be seen as taking two main forms: consultative participation where management encourages employees to make their views known on work-related matters, but retains the right to take action or not; and delegative participation where management gives employees increased discretion and responsibility to organize and do their jobs without reference back.

When employees participate, they feel more engaged.

Opportunity also means that employees have prospects of learning and growing at work. This growth may come from formal training and development experiences, but it may also come from work assignments. Learning also comes when a culture exists that encourages risk taking and reflection. Employees are more engaged when they have opportunities to learn.

Impact

Hackman and Oldham’s (1974) work on motivation showed that when employees could see the outcome of their work, they were more likely to be committed to it. Impact means that employees feel that their hard work will lead to desired results. When employees realize that their attitude and behaviors will show up in customer attitude and behaviours, these employees are more engaged as they know that what they do makes a difference.

Leaders can help employees see the impact of their work by helping them understand how their work fits into the overall process of customer service. Every employee has a customer, either inside or outside the organization. When an employee can see the ways in which his or her work delivers value to customers, the employee is more likely to be emotionally engaged in delivering the work.

Rewards and incentive

There are two main forms of financial participation: profit sharing and share ownership.

Employee engagement increases when employees receive financial benefits from their engagement. Remuneration sends communication signals about what matters, serves as a scorecard for performance, and also meets the needs of some employees. Profit sharing and share ownership can be very useful in sensitizing employees to the state of the business. It is a moot point, however, whether they do a great deal for involvement and participation on a day-today basis. Arguably, they need to be raised to the levels available to senior managers to have a serious impact in this respect.

Community

Community affects employee engagement in two ways. First, a community represents cohorts of teams with whom the employee works. Peer pressure and social networks encourage employees to commit to their job. Gallup’s finding of having a friend at work as a source of engagement implies a reciprocal relationship between the employee and his/her peers. Because of personal relationships, employees have goodwill towards their peers and will try to not let them down, and to make sure that they are not the weak link on the team. Richard Hackman’s (2002) research on high-performing teams shows that when employees feel like they are part of a social network, or community, they allocate more effort to supporting the goals of the team.

 

Communication

Employees are more engaged when they know what is going on and why. Communication systems that inform employees help employees feel more a part of the organization. Communications can, of course, be two-way. Thus there can be channels of communicating with employees and channels for ‘listening’ to employees Sometimes the terms ‘top-down’ and ‘bottom-up’ are used. Lack of understanding is a major source of inefficiency and lack of motivation.
Leaders who build top-down, bottom-up, side-to-side, and inside-out communication plans ensure that employees understand what is expected and why it is expected. Employees are more engaged when they are more informed. Some employees like to be at the centre of the information network and become transmitters of information to others. Engaging these employees happens when they become spokespeople for the organization.

Entrepreneurship or flexibility

Finally, we know that employees, particularly the next-generation employees, enjoy flexibility. The playlist generation of employees has been raised on choices through computer technology. In the work setting, flexibility about terms and conditions of work may help engage employees. Flexibility might include work hours, benefits, work location, work attire, office space, and other policies that give employees more choice over their work setting.

Flexibility gives employees choice. When an employee makes a choice about his or her work setting, they are more engaged because they have a feeling of ownership.

Unit 3 - Employee engagement in practice

Engagement is: a set of positive attitudes and behaviours enabling high job performance of a kind which is in tune with the organization’s mission.

To bring this about usually requires a mix of human resource practices built around involvement, perceived appropriate rewards, a set of learning and development opportunities and good leadership at multiple levels.

 

Engaged employees had:

•      Higher employee participation in company programs

•      Retention

•      receptiveness to change

•      loyalty

In addition, employee engagement has also been found to be related to less:

•      role conflict and stress;

•      cynicism about the organization and its goals;

and more:

•      sense of control over one’s work environment;

•      confidence in the future of the organization;

•      sense of self-confidence in the ability to make change happen in the organization;

•      willingness to learn and experiment;

•      willing to stay with the company (lower turnover or higher retention);

•      motivation;

•      creative ideas and solutions; continuous improvement;

•      team working;

•      organization identity

Unit 3 - The VOICE framework

The VOICE framework

•      Vision: The use of good leadership techniques which give the organisational unit a clear sense of the future that engages hearts and minds and creates pride among employees.

•      Opportunity: The work on offer provides a chance to grow both personally and professionally, through participation in the organisation’s activities.

•      Incentive: The compensation package is fair and equitable, including base salary, bonus, and other financial incentives.

•      Impact: The work itself makes a difference or creates meaning, particularly as it connects the employee with a customer who uses the employee’s work.

•      Community: The social environment includes being part of a team when appropriate, and working with co-workers who care. This can be considered in relation to employee participation and involvement, as well as the strategic management of the employment relationship.

•      Communication: The flow of information is two-way, so employees are in the know about what is going on. Communication is a vital element of employee participation and involvement.

•      Experimentation: The hours of work, dress, and other policies are flexible and designed to adapt to the needs of both the firm and the employee.


 

Unit 3 - Employee Engagement Enablers

Employee Engagement Enablers

LEADERSHIP provides a strong strategic narrative which has widespread ownership and commitment from managers and employees at all levels. The narrative is a clearly expressed story about what the purpose of an organisation is, why it has the broad vision it has, and how an individual contributes to that purpose. Employees have a clear line of sight between their job and the narrative, and understand where their work fits in. These aims and values are reflected in a strong, transparent and explicit organisational culture and way of working.

ENGAGING MANAGERS are at the heart of this organisational culture– they facilitate and empower rather than control or restrict their staff; they treat their staff with appreciation and respect and show commitment to developing, increasing and rewarding the capabilities of those they manage. As Chris Bones told us, “the line manager is the lens through which I see the company and the company sees me.”

VOICE An effective and empowered employee voice – employees’ views are sought out; they are listened to and see that their opinions count and make a difference. They speak out and challenge when appropriate. A strong sense of listening and of responsiveness permeates the organisation, enabled by effective communication.

INTEGRITY Behaviour throughout the organisation is consistent with stated values, leading to trust and a sense of integrity.

Unit 2 Performance-related pay systems

2.6 Performance-related pay systems

Performance-related pay (PRP) systems are sometimes known as incentive pay systems. These terms cover a number of different types of approach including, for example,

1.       payment by results (PBR), where pay is determined ‘objectively’ by amount or number of items produced or work done;

2.        and merit pay, where pay is related to subjective assessments by a supervisor or manager.

Advantages and disadvantages of PRP.

The claimed advantages of performance-related pay are that it focuses (or rather can perhaps be made to focus) effort on key organisational objectives or targets; it underpins a performance-oriented culture, and so on.

The disadvantages (risks) are that performance-related schemes can distort effort: people may overly focus on only those aspects which are measured for reward and thus neglect other tasks which are also necessary for customer service. Additionally, it may undermine teamwork, and also individuals learn how to play the system to their advantage. Another risk, especially in the public sector, is that individual performance-related pay schemes may be perceived as introduced for mainly symbolic reasons – that is, in order to give the appearance of a commercial edge – and they may be counter-cultural and ineffective.

Mitigation of these risks might be sought through continual review and refreshment of the pay systems; there may be some attempt to introduce team-based performance pay; employees may be consulted about what a fair system would comprise.

The criticism of much current practice concerning individual PRP does not mean that it should never be used. However, it does mean that careful attention needs to be given to assessing its applicability – for example, whether employees are likely to put a high value on any extra pay, whether the work is such that performance can be measured in a reliable, meaningful and acceptable way, and whether there is a danger that it might undermine team or group performance.

The advantages of group pay are:

•        It can fit with important performance measures which often make more sense at a group level, such as quality, cost reduction, output or sales.

•        Unlike individual PRP, it fits with team working.

•        Group schemes are an effective means of communicating with employees about key issues such as quality, costs and productivity.

Unit 2 Reward management

2.5 Reward management

Reward management plays a major part in performance management. In practice, much of the emphasis in terms of reward has been on linking pay with performance. The growth of performance-related pay (PRP), including various types of bonuses, has been an important management trend. There is a danger that reward systems can be distorted, with unintended, damaging consequences, if only performance measurement is considered. As a result, when considering how pay and other rewards can be linked to performance, it is important to realise that other factors will need to be borne in mind and that there may need to be a trade-off between different needs and purposes.

Central to models of performance management is the idea that performance can be continuously improved, or at least maintained, if the right actions are taken following performance review. Essentially, this can be done in one of three ways:

1.      by rewarding individuals appropriately in the hope that this will motivate them to work harder

2.    by developing individuals so that they are better able to carry out the responsibilities and tasks they take on.

3.     by taking corrective action.

The performance review may point to the need for change at individual or other organisational level. It may be necessary to modify goals and plans in the light of what has been learned, or even sanction individuals if their behaviour falls below the required standards. The review may also point up wider organisational problems that are preventing individuals achieving good performance, and as a result changes may be needed to organisational structures, systems or procedures.

Organisations are able to offer a range of rewards, from things that are intrinsic to jobs, such as interesting and varied work, to extrinsic material rewards such as pay, bonuses and other perks.