Employee engagement: what’s your strategy?
| Date | 11 June 2018 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/SHR-03-2018-0025 |
| Published date | 11 June 2018 |
| Pages | 150-154 |
| Author | Geoffrey Matthews |
| Subject Matter | HR & organizational behaviour,Employee behaviour |
On Another Note
Employee engagement: what’s your
strategy?
Geoffrey Matthews
Abstract
Purpose –This paper aims to explore someof the reasons why employee engagement activities may
lack effectivenessand sets out some proposals as to what organizations can do to takea more strategic
approachin future.
Design/methodology/approach –This paper is based on a research of current practices in
organizationscombined with the author’s experienceand views on employee engagement activities.
Findings –The paper highlights the limitations of approaches in many organizationsand proposes a series
of strategic choices that organizations need to make to help ensure their future approach is more effective.
Originality/value –This paper sets out a model that can be used by HR executives with business
leadersto decide on a clear engagement strategy for the future.
Keywords Human resource management, Strategy, Employee engagement
Paper type Research paper
The lack of progress in employee engagement
Almost 30 years have elapsed since William Kahn first proposed the concept of
“personal engagement” (Kahn, 1990), ever since when there has been growing
appreciation of the subject of employee engagement, culminating in the 2009 MacLeod
Report to the UK Government, which underlined its importance as a business issue. Yet
despite this awareness, and the huge industry surrounding the topic (consulting,
surveys, etc.), how much progress has really occurred in the past quarter of a century?
Excepting some notable case studies showing progress (e.g. Tomlinson, 2010), this
activity has not generally translated into significant improvements in engagement
scores. Recent UK research reported only 35 per cent of people felt their employer
inspired them to give their very best [Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development
(CIPD), 2016], and 45 per cent of US employees are apparently likely or very likely to
look for a job outside their current organization in the next 12 months [Society for
Human Resource Management (SHRM), 2016].
While the economic uncertainty since 2008 may have affected employee attitudes
negatively, could it also be a consequence of ineffective engagement activities by
employers? Some experts argue that employee engagement is not strategic (Brooks and
Saltzman, 2012), while only 34 per cent of US employees felt their employer had an official
employee engagement strategy anyway (Business Wire, 2016). Likewise, one UK study
(People Lab, 2016) reported that fewer than half of companies had any engagement
strategy in place, and that most activity was focused on internal communication and
running surveys. Research into major Swiss companies (Matthews, 2013) showed that of 20
Geoffrey Matthews is an HR
Consultant and Writer in
Geneva, Switzerland.
PAGE150 jSTRATEGIC HR REVIEW jVOL. 17 NO.3 2018,pp.150-154, ©EmeraldPublishing Limited, ISSN 1475-4398 DOI10.1108/SHR-03-2018-0025
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