Handbook for Strategic HR - Section 5: Employee Engagement

By OD Network, John Vogelsang PhD, Maya Townsend and 6 more

Employee engagement makes a difference. HR professionals know this intuitively and so do leaders. They want employees to care about their work and actively engage with the job and the organization. But now we know that employee engagement is not just something that makes intuitive sense. It also reaps financial rewards. This section provides case studies, hard data about what is effective, and proven techniques for increasing employee engagement in the important work of the organization in order to boost productivity, quality, and commitment.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Thomas Nelson
• Release date: Apr 1, 2015
• ISBN: 9780814437001

OD Network

OD PRACTITIONER is the quarterly journal of the Organization Development Network, an international association whose members are committed to practicing organization development as an applied behavioral science.

Book preview

SECTION FIVE

Employee Engagement

Introduction

Maya Townsend and Annie Viets

TOPICS COVERED IN THIS SECTION

•   How to build organizational strength through employee involvement.

•   How to foster a culture of collaboration.

•   How to achieve lasting and deep change though employee involvement.

WHY EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT

Employee engagement makes a difference. HR Business Partners know this intuitively. So do leaders: most want employees to care about their work and actively engage with it and the organization. But now we know that employee engagement is not just something that makes intuitive sense. It also reaps financial rewards. Consider, for example:

•   Operating income for organizations with high employee engagement improved 19% while it declined 33% over the same period for companies with low employee engagement (Towers Perrin, 2008).

•   Development Dimensions International (DDI) estimates that in an organization of 10,000 employees, moving a workforce from low to high engagement can have an impact of over $42 million (Wellins, Bernthal, & Phelps, 2005).

•   Earnings per share rose 28% among companies with high employee engagement but declined 11% among companies with low employee engagement (Towers Perrin, 2008).

Engagement makes a difference in the lives and productivity of employees but also in the performance of the organization as a whole. Who would not want to see their company’s operating income rise 19% while competitors with low engagement were seeing their operating income decrease 33%?

Many would, but not every company understands the connection between employee engagement and organization performance. Numbers vary, but the consensus is that most companies’ levels of employee engagement are low. DDI’s research conducted in 2005 suggested that only 19% of employees were engaged at that time (Wellins, Bernthal, & Phelps, 2005). Blessing White (2011), suggests that 31% of employees are currently engaged and Gallup (Robison, 2010) estimates 28% are engaged. However, these numbers are still lower than most leaders would like. Clearly, there is a gap in business leaders’ knowledge about the importance of engaging employees and the ability to do it well.

The challenge is compounded by confusion about what employee engagement actually is and how to use it appropriately within an enterprise. Henry Hornstein (2006), in his OD Practitioner article, Empowerment as a Way to Facilitate Change, explains:

What is empowerment? The answer is unsatisfying but comes down to It depends … It means different things to different people and is dependent on what is going on in the organization at any point in time.

Other OD Practitioner authors have also struggled to define employee engagement. Mastrangelo (2009) in Will Employee Engagement be Hijacked or Reengineered brings more clarity:

engagement is found in employees’ minds, hearts, and hands. We expect engaged employees to decide to continue working for their employer, to feel pride and motivation working for their employer, and to be willing to exert extra energy at work for their employer.

In this section, HR Business Partners will find ways to put employee engagement to practical use and engage minds, hearts, and hands in the important work of the organization. This section includes case studies, hard data about what works, and helpful tips and techniques for increasing employee engagement in an organization.

THE CHAPTERS IN THIS SECTION

The chapters are divided into three segments. Each covers a different topic critical to designing and implementing a successful employee engagement process or initiative:

•   Working Out: Building Strength through Employee Engagement

•   One Plus One Equals Four Star Performance: Engaging in Collaboration

•   Lights, Camera, Action: Close-Ups of Engagement.

Working Out: Building Strength through Employee Engagement

Focusing on the employee engagement basics, this segment opens with a thoughtful chapter, A Brief and Provocative History of Participation (2006), by OD icon Edgar Schein. In it, he describes the history of participation in management theory and explores what it means or can mean to an organization. He delves into the complex relationship between participation and culture and offers some words of wisdom to managers and consultants seeking to realize the benefits of participation.

In Employee Engagement and OD Strategies, Debra Orr and Hona Mathews (2008) present the business case for employees who are committed to their organization and energized by their jobs. They suggest practical OD strategies to promote and strengthen employee participation levels.

Larry Ackerman (2010) explores the important correlations among organizational identity, employee engagement, and business performance in The Identity Effect: How Identity-Based Management Drives Employee Engagement and Business Performance. He clearly defines the concept of organizational identity and then goes on to present a road-map for those seeking to understand the relevance of identity to shaping successful organizations.

In the last piece in this section, Paul Mastrangelo (2009) asks Will Employee Engagement Be Hijacked or Reengineered? To prevent the term from being misappropriated by organizational leaders as the term reengineering was in the 1990s, he recommends that the definition, purpose, and intended outcomes of employee engagement be clarified and the focus of OD interventions be on the underlying business problems that drive or undermine employee engagement.

One Plus One Equals Four Star Performance: Engaging in Collaboration

In this segment, HR business partners can find practical advice and insight into how to build employee engagement into their organizations.

In The Power of Interactive Collaborative Designs (2002), Jean-Pierre Beaulieu, Emile Carriere, and Christopher Schoch explain how the utilization of interactive, collaborative design technologies such as Open Space, Future Search, Appreciative Inquiry, and The Conference Model can foster collaboration and engagement in organizations. They provide examples from four organizations where interactive collaborative designs were implemented with positive outcomes.

Nancy Southern (2006) uses her work with the managers of a city government to illustrate a process for Creating a Culture of Collaboration in a City Government. She asserts there are five conditions for collaboration and that, ultimately, the ideal consequence of the creation of a collaborative culture is the development of an organization-wide learning community.

Lights, Camera, Action: Close-Ups of Engagement

There are three powerful case studies in this segment. In the first, Employee-Led Organizational Change: Theory and Practice, Victor Woodell and Sanyani Edwards (2006) describe a case in which committed employee teams effectively design and implement a change project in partnership with, but independent of, middle and senior management. They conclude that engaged frontline employees can be highly instrumental in changing their organizations.

In The Politics of Implementation: The Importance of Building Consensus Around Employee Performance Management, Victor Woodell (2002) relates the story of a project that illuminates the interplay between politics and organization development. He offers lessons from the process as guides to HR Business Partners embarking on similar implementations that require employee engagement.

Managers wanted to close the plant but employees wanted to keep it open. Such are the positions held by the two sides in a fascinating case presented in Interest-Based Problem Solving: Foundation of a Labor and Management Partnership. Jeff Jackson and Adrienne Easton (2006) describe how the power of interest-based decision-making was employed in engaging these two seemingly irreconcilable sides in a collaborative partnership.

FOR ADDITIONAL LEARNING

For more information about employee engagement, you may want to read the following articles.

•   Frost, B. (2005). Capacity building is a verb not a noun: Developing a system for action. OD Practitioner, 37(4), 26-30.

Frost provides a case study of employee engagement in a multi-organizational strategic planning effort in Tulare County, California.

•   Kanter, R. M. (1981). The politicization of organizational life: Skills for critical issue management in a changing organizational environment. OD Practitioner, 13(3), 1–7.

Kanter describes how to manage critical issues; learning how to position and work with critical societal and external changes.

•   Lewis, S. A. (1987). Participative management: Myths vs. realities. OD Practitioner, 19(3), 11–14.

Lewis discusses the misconceptions about participative management and describes the four factors necessary for its success.

•   Whitney, D., & Gibbs, C. (2006) Appreciative Inquiry: Creating cultures of positive participation. OD Practitioner, 38(4), 46–51.

This case study uses the appreciative inquiry technique to engage 200 people from 40 countries in an ambitious endeavor to create a community of dedicated participants who would collaboratively generate plans needed to extend the United Religions Initiative into new parts of the world. The case contains valuable lessons on how to create engagement and collaboration across geographic and cultural differences.

References

Blessing White (2011). Employee engagement report 2011: Beyond the numbers: A practical approach for individuals, managers, and executives. Retrieved from www.blessingwhite.com/research

Borg, I., & Mastrangelo, P. M. (2008). Employee surveys in management: Theories, tools, and practical applications. Cambridge, MA: Hogrefe & Huber.

Hornstein, H. (2006). Empowerment as a way to facilitate change: Can process consultation help? OD Practitioner, 38(1) 4–9.

Lewis, S. A. (1987). Participative management: Myths vs. realities. OD Practitioner 19(3), 11–14.

Macey, W. H., & Schneider, B. (2008). The meaning of employee engagement. Industrial and Organizational Psychology, 1, 3–30.

Robison, J. (2010). Despite the downturn, employees remain engaged. Gallup Management Journal. Retrieved from http://gmj.gallup.com/content/125036/despite-downturn-employees-remain-engaged.aspx

Towers Perrin (2008). Closing the engagement gap: A road map for driving superior business performance. Retrieved from www.towersperrin.com

Wellins, R. S., Bernthal, P., & Phelps, M. (2005). Employee engagement: The key to realizing Competitive advantage. Retrieved from www.ddi.com

CHAPTER 42

A Brief and Provocative

History of Participation

Edgar H. Schein

Participation is one of these wonderful abstractions that seems to mean something good, yet it is very hard to define in a practical context. For many managers it means to give away some of their power to their employees, only to discover that the employees then actually want to exercise power, something that the manager had not actually bargained for or anticipated. For other managers it means telling employees what is going on, asking if there are any questions, and if none arise in 5 seconds, assuming that they have now provided their employees a chance to participate. Having had that chance they should now obey like good soldiers. For still others it is the key to higher quality work because more total involvement of the employee presumably leads to more motivation and care in getting the job done.

For many consultants it means