Decoding Employee Engagement Levels – Transform your Employees to Partners
- Team Advantage Club
- April 15, 2023
Employee engagement level is directly related to the overall work efficiency and company performance, and it begins with a positive workplace.
A satisfying business structure is one that creates a positive work environment for its employees and promotes happiness, loyalty, and commitment, leading to improved performance and business success. All organizations must recognize employees as assets and valuable customers. They must understand that the employee engagement level is directly related to the efficiency of work and the overall company performance.
But, as human nature, employee requirements and behavior constantly evolve. Logically, no business can keep up with all human changing needs – this is where long-term strategies come into play. It begins when Employee engagement expands to consider the employee perception. Research has shown that employee engagement influences organizational performance outcomes like productivity, profitability, employee retention, safety, and customer loyalty.
There is a need for business plans that fit all human changing needs and lead to happy employees, which can result in a high performing entity. Understanding employees’ needs and perceptions can help improve human capital efficiency by working on their engagement level. A well-defined business structure with clear roles and responsibilities helps employees understand what is expected of them and how they fit into the organization. This can give them a sense of purpose and direction and reduce ambiguity and stress.
Having a clear vision of the factors that affect the engagement level will give the HR departments in companies a specific guideline on how to engage their employees. So, it is crucial at this point to further understand employee engagement levels and how to stimulate it to the maximum and for as long as possible. We need to understand what truly motivates employees to maximize productivity and how to use it in transferring them from employees, “the basic engagement level”, to partners, “the highest level of engagement.
What is the employee engagement level?
Employee engagement level measures a person’s emotional investment in and dedication to their job, company, and objectives. It uses and expresses people’s physical, mental, and emotional selves during job performances. Employee perceptions and feelings, whether favourable or unfavourable, towards the company, its working environment, and its management are all considered. To put it another way, engagement entails the level of being mentally and physically present while carrying out a task for an organization.
What are the Levels of Employee Engagement?
HR can identify Employee engagement levels based on the emotional involvement an employee has with the work and workplace. Most organizations display three levels of employee engagement:
- Highly Engaged
- Engaged
- Actively disengaged
Employee engagement levels
Identifying the level of employee engagement is crucial for HR teams. Understanding how employees feel about their work brings helpful insights to develop strategies to improve employee engagement.
Highly Engaged Employees
Engaged employees are highly loyal, committed, and emotionally invested in their work and organization. These staff members are motivated to perform at their best, take the initiative, and exceed their job requirements. Also, they are more likely to be the company’s top achievers who transform the workplace into a hive of innovation, efficiency, and fun. They inspire coworkers and disengaged staff to increase their level of engagement during a particular project or while working together.
Engaged Employees
Actively engaged workers account for 20–25% of most businesses. With dedication towards work, they serve as the company’s performance pillars. Holding pride in their position at the company, the engaged employees complete their assignments on schedule. They put forth additional efforts to frequently and solidly support the company’s objective. Many engaged workers are part of highly engaged teams and typically develop their sources of motivation with team encouragement.
Actively Disengaged Employees
Actively disengaged employees do not enjoy a wholesome emotional connection with their work and organization. They are present at work but have yet to invest in their job or organization fully. They may perform their duties adequately but are not enthusiastic or passionate about their work. Disengaged employees may also need more motivation and actively seek opportunities to improve their performance or contribute to the organization. They may also spread negativity and discontent among their colleagues, quit their job or take extended leaves of absence.
Engaged employees are the most desirable as they are more productive, loyal, and committed to their organization. Effective management practices can change highly disengaged workers into highly engaged team players. Organizations focusing on creating a positive work environment that promotes employee engagement, motivation, and commitment witness such transformations in employee engagement levels.
Engagement levels and Job satisfaction
There is a direct connection between employee engagement levels and job satisfaction. When employees are engaged, they are more satisfied with their jobs. A sense of content can lead to many positive outcomes for the employee and the organization. Job satisfaction influences whether employees are happy and fulfilling their needs and desires at work. Employee internal satisfaction reflects on several measurements, like employee motivation, dedication, and goal achievement.
The level of satisfaction is an integrated process with multiple factors, and the factor affects each other and the final output, which is job satisfaction. Here are some reasons why employee engagement and job satisfaction are closely linked:
- Engaged employees know their purpose and understand how their work propagates the organization's goals.
- They feel their work is meaningful and valuable, which can lead to job satisfaction.
- Employees with more control over their work are comfortable and satisfied.
- Personnel receiving regular feedback and recognition for their work feel that their contributions are valued and appreciated.
- The opportunities for learning and development provide a sense of growth and progress.
- An environment that promotes open communication, teamwork, and support leads to a positive work environment, camaraderie, and job satisfaction.
An employee who is satisfied with his job is positively motivated, productive and committed to the organization, which can lead to improved business outcomes.
Transforming employees to partners
Research indicates a strong and positive relationship between employee engagement and the company’s profitability and competitiveness. The engaged employee consistently demonstrates high performance while interacting internally with stakeholders, like peers and management or externally with customers, vendors, and the public. Companies can employ various helpful strategies and efforts to transform employees into partners through employee engagement. It involves creating a sense of ownership, empowerment, and collaboration. When employees transform into partners, they are invested towards the common organizational goals and work towards the larger success of the company. Here are some transforming strategies to turn employees into partners through employee engagement:
- Engage in open and transparent communication with your employees. This helps build trust and shows that you value their input and ideas. Encourage two-way communication and create opportunities for feedback and dialogue.
- Involve employees in decision-making processes that impact them and their work. Autonomy helps to create a sense of ownership and accountability for the decisions made and empowers employees to take ownership of their roles and responsibilities.
- Ensure that employees have meaningful work that aligns with the organization's mission and values. It creates a sense of purpose and motivation among employees.
- Offer training and development opportunities for employees to grow and develop their skills. The employees feel valued and invested in their work, and this creates a sense of partnership between employees and the organization.
- Recognize and reward employee contributions and achievements. Create a positive work environment to reinforce the sense of partnership between employees and the organization.
- Encourage collaboration and teamwork among employees. A collaborative work environment builds a sense of camaraderie and promotes a culture of partnership and mutual support.
A satisfying business structure can indeed lead to happy employees. However, engagement transforming strategies must be employee-oriented rather than entity-oriented, which in turn will result in a high-performing entity.
