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Engaging for success: Enhancing performance through employee engagement
have answered the question: ‘why’ And answering that question satisfactorily is the
precondition for them being willing to obey orders unquestioningly when they are
on the front line.
62 Professor John Purcell made a related point to us when he emphasised that the new
ways of working – team working, collaboration, joint problem solving – which
business and services increasingly demand, cannot thrive in an environment where
staff’s abilities are not valued or trusted, particularly since many of the new
approaches depend on discretionary effort willingly given. The 2004 WERS study 41
indicated that staff working in teams with greater autonomy were more satisfied
with the amount of influence they had over their jobs.
Engagement and the individual
63 Engagement is not just about macro-economics. There is a measurable and
significant win for the individual engaged employee. Studies in this field
demonstrate beyond doubt that individuals maximise their psychological well-being
when they are engaged in meaningful work that provides positive emotional
experiences. As our working lives extend with growing longevity, people will want
and demand a greater sense of well-being at work.
64 CMI reported a strong association between motivation and personal productivity
levels. More than two-thirds of those managers who reported that they were
motivated at work also claimed high productivity levels (defined as more than 90
per cent). Only 15 per cent who were motivated experienced low levels of
productivity (defined as less than 70 per cent).
65 Eighty-six per cent of engaged employees say they very often feel happy at work, as
against 11 per cent of the disengaged. Forty-five per cent of the engaged say they
get a great deal of their life happiness from work, against eight per cent of the
disengaged. (Gallup 2006)
66 Gallup also point to the negative effects of disengagement. Fifty-four per cent of
the actively disengaged say that work stress caused them to behave poorly with
friends or family members in the previous three months, against 17 per cent of the
engaged. More alarmingly, 54 per cent of the actively disengaged say their work
lives are having a negative effect on their physical health, versus 12 per cent of the
engaged. 42
67 This damaging effect of disengagement was a theme emphasised to us by Dame
Carol Black, the author of the influential review of the health of the working age
41
Ibid.
42
Crabtree S. (2005), ‘Engagement Keeps the Doctor Away’, Gallup Management Journal; and Gallup Study:
(2005); ‘Feeling Good Matters in the Workplace’, Gallup Management Journal,.
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