Employee Engagement and Motivation - Coursework Example

MANAGEMENT REPORT: EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT Name: Tutor: Course: Institution: Date: Management Report: Employee Engagement Introduction Employee engagement has emerged as a critical and effective tool for enhancing productivity, innovation, and motivation in modern organizations. In an increasingly volatile and cycle economy, business executives understand the importance of possessing a high performing and motivated workforce for growth and survival. In addition, there is recognition amongst executives of the role played by motivated and high performing workforces towards high levels of innovation, bottom-line performance, and productivity while at the same time reducing costs associated with retention and hiring new and talented employees in competitive workforce environments. Body Definition of Employee Engagement In essence, employee engagement has been defined as the harnessing of the capacities of the members of an organization within their respective organizational roles to enabling them to express themselves emotionally, cognitively and physical during execution of duties and tasks in their roles and duties. High performing entities note of the role played by engagement initiatives through the development of practices and metrics towards improving and quantification of employee engagement and business performance. Pettinger (2006) notes that measurement of employee engagement is critical towards ensuring effectiveness in engagement of all employees. Measures of employee engagement include an interaction or mix of outcomes and drivers, which makes it difficult to ascertain what should be changed to achieve improved results. Types of Employee Engagement I. Engaged: this is made up of employees who are actively engaged through motivation. They exhibit happiness and productivity due to the profound connection they have with the organization. II. Not-engaged: this are not engaged and lack of motivation to execute their tasks due to being “checked out”. They are simply unhappy with their roles and tasks in the organization. III. Actively disengaged: these are unhappy and unproductive individuals who undermine the output of their fellow colleagues. Dimensions of Employee Engagement What do I get What do I give Do I belong to the organization How can I grow The dimensions are illustrative of the expectations and needs of the employees. It starts with the outcomes anticipated by the employee and followed by the expected duties to be performed. The lack of positive benefits or outcomes impedes optimal contributions or commitment by the employees into the organization. This third dimension is the treatment and attitudes of the organization towards employees which influences their commitment and attitude towards growth in the organization. Employee Engagement and Motivation Johnson, Whittington, & Scholes (2011) notes that some of the critical factors that play a role in the commitment expressed by employees include issues such as care fairness, trust, and concern exhibited by the organization towards its employees. The engagement and commitment of the employees is relative to their willingness and desire to delivery discretionary efforts in their respective organizational capacities. This is influenced by the justice expressed within an organization. Organizational justice is expressed through fairness in the workplace. Fairness is driven by the need to ensure that the workplace is an effective environment for the employees to execute their duties effectively beyond issues such as remuneration, opportunities, and benefits. It involves the ability of the employees to express themselves without being subjected to humiliation and prejudice. Highly engaged employees usually exhibit a high level of personal attachment to their roles and achievement of set out objectives and goals in the organization. They deem themselves as motivated towards delivering exceptional work and services to the clients. The engagement of employees is related to the ability of the employees to visualize and commit themselves towards achievement of set out goals and objectives such as profitability and exceptional customer service levels. Motivational Theories Motivation, based on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, is reliant on the psychological needs of individuals in an organization namely self actualization, esteem, social, safety and psychological needs. Self actualization This is the highest needs and involves intellectual needs, fulfillment of individual capacity and potential in relation to a given position and educational capacity, it is relative to achievement of set out goals and objectives which should be marked by an effective reward system and remuneration program. Esteem Level status within an organization, appreciation and reward systems can be used as a venues for enabling employee engagement. Social Feelings of belongingness and inclusion in decision-making enable or enhance employee engagement. Safety This needs include employment or positional security and safe working environment to ensure execution of duties and tasks as demanded. Psychological These are basic provisions or needs mainly food and shelter. The lack of this results to death. Extrinsic Motivation (Definition and a few examples) The leadership exercised by individuals such as Sergey Brin Larry Page and Eric Schmidt, denotes the culture at Google, which is marked by a mixture of technical and management skills. Schmidt’s success at Google has been associated with his ability to utilize both technical and business skills and employing in business supervision and development of the required corporate infrastructure that has nee necessary towards the entity’s rapid growth strategy over the years. The combination of the three executives has been critical towards development of a culture driven towards motivation of the employees through high levels of engagement and subsequent commitment. The interactions between the employees, management, investors and customers have been critical towards development of a culture that is enviable by other entities. Intrinsic Motivation (definition and a few examples) Employee diversity is also another important consideration of multinational entities such as Google seeking dominance and success in the global marketplace. Their ability to create an enabling environment for diversity in terms of religious beliefs, sexual orientation, intellectual and technical capabilities, race and social backgrounds. This has been critical for Google as it provides a means of attracting talented employees. This is indicative of inclusivity in the organization by accommodation of diverse beliefs, races, ethnicities, and capabilities of its employees to optimize the level of engagement of employees. Research indicates that entities that uphold diversity in the workplace excel as a result of the ability to attract talented and capable employees (Boddy, 2011, 37). This is also understood to be critical towards contribution to issues such as respect, commitment, productivity, achievement of bottom line performance expectations and high levels of growth. Employee motivation and Employee Engagement  Organizational justice is relative to the effect of justice on the efficiency and effectiveness in functionalities of an organization. It is conceptualized in three perspectives namely distributive, interactional, and procedural. Procedural concept of organizational justice refers to the perceptions held by the employees in relation to fairness in the processes utilized towards distribution of resources and opportunities in the organization (Boddy, 2011, 23). High procedural justice is effective towards enhancing commitment and engagement of employees because of the high probability of positive benefits from such fair practices in processes and procedures. Distributive justice refers to the conceptualization of fairness in distribution and allocation of resources and decision-making towards ensuring equity amongst all employees. Interactional justice applies to the interpersonal engagements for employees during execution of duties and implementation of procedures. The interactional treatment expressed by management and leaders towards employees determines their dignity and subsequent levels of engagement, performance, innovation, and commitment towards achievement of set out goals and objectives in the organization. Advantages of Employee Engagement Innovation and creativity are critical aspects of Google’s culture and brand image. The work environment in this entity is marked by unique workplace designs and an enabling environment for the employees. It is noted that employees are provided with an opportunity to utilize 20% of their time to develop projects of interest, which has been effective in fostering entrepreneurial attitudes and culture amongst the employees. This can be related to the understanding that employees are brand ambassadors of an entity given that they are the initial point of contact with the customers. Thus motivating the employees through engagement is important towards enabling them to focus on the entity’s goals of exceptional customer experiences, growth, and profitability. Impact of Employee Engagement on profitability Varieties of strategies are utilized by high performance organizations such as Google to link the human resource and management strategies with the objectives or bottom-line financial growth. Employee engagement at Google is evidently operationalised into optimization of the value profit chain within the organization. The service profit chain is understood as related to employee satisfaction to inspire subsequently service delivery and productivity critical towards ensuring the success of the business by driving profitability and growth. The value profit chain focuses on employee characteristics, core capabilities, and valued customer outcomes to given rise to increased revenues and reduction of operational costs (Hargie, Dickson, & Tourish, 2004, 63). Impact of Employee Engagement on customer satisfaction In an increasingly competitive information technology environment, organizations such as Google are driven towards becoming dynamic and universally acceptable to the customers through enabling user friendliness in relation to their products and services. It is evident that high performance and competitive advantage for an organization such as Google is intricately related to the development of firm competencies through the optimized interactions of human resource and workforce systems (Linstead, Fulop, & Lilley, 2009, 19). This highlights the role of leadership or management of an organization in enabling core capabilities, employee satisfaction, and engagement. The management at Google has focused on eliminating obstacles for its employees by providing clear standards of benefits such as laundry rooms, gyms, and dining facilities all aimed at facilitating easy living for its employees. Impact of Employee Engagement on growth of the organization In creation of an appropriate culture, the entity has been focused on enabling and optimizing interactions between employees to aid innovation, problem solving and team cohesion. In addition, the entity has also been focused on providing exceptional user experiences because of creating an enabling environment for the employees to ensure optimum service delivery to the customers. The emphasis at Google is on team cohesion, achievements and pride for individual contributions that enable the entity to achieve its strategic goals and objectives of profitability, growth, and market dominance. Creative ideas and innovations are traded, tested, and actualized with a high level of enthusiasm for success amongst employees. Fostering a highly communicative area through open offices has been effective towards enabling productivity and innovation amongst all employees. Modern workforces such as those that make up Google are made up of employees with distinctive traits made up of skill and demographic mixes which are necessary for multinational entities. These traits are also inclusive of the commitment expressed by the employees towards the organization and behavioral components, which are influenced by the actions of leadership, which in turn influence the organization’s core capabilities and subsequent satisfaction, and engagement levels of the employees. This is indicative that the ;leadership at Google has been effective in imposition of culture that enables team cohesion, innovation and creativity amongst its employees as noted by the brand strength, dominant market position, profitability and development of pioneer products and services (Mullins, 2011, 48 ). Impact of employee Engagement on Employee Retention Trust, commitment, credibility, and focus are some of the traits of high performance organizations such as Google. Google is one of the most profitable and a renowned brand around the world given it is the most used internet site. The “Google Effect” has been termed as a form of Intranet 2.0 that provides an online environment whereby a majority of the content is developed by users or clients. The entity has been focused on developing user friendly and consumer oriented interfaces by redeveloping organizational culture. In an interview Liane Hornsey, a Director of People Operations for Europe at Google noted that the growth and innovative products and services at Google have been realized solely due to a high level of employee engagement. Disadvantages of disengaged and demotivated Employees The lack of engagement of employees results in personal disengagement. Personal disengagement has been defined as the disorientation from individual work roles and responsibilities. It is noted that one of the primary challenges at Google is to sustain the employee engagement levels despite its large number of employees. To develop effective relationships with the employees, the entity has resorted towards sustaining the “small company feel” whereby it takes into consideration the diverse expectations, needs and capabilities of the employees seriously (Cole, 2011, 29). The entity has a high regard for employee recruitment and selection processes to ensure high levels of subsequent employee engagement. The wellbeing of the employees is a critical aspect in the organization, which is evident through the dedication of extensive resources in social activities aimed at motivating the employees and inducing a team culture. This also plays a role in affirming the presence of a psychological contract between the employer and employee as opposed to traditional transactional relationships. The lack of engagement of employees could be an impediment towards the achievement of bottom-line performance and competitive advantage. The ability of employees to avail themselves emotionally, physically, cognitively is critical for efficient and effective performance of role and execution of duties and responsibilities. Research indicates that employee engagement in modern organizations in relation meaningful tasks and work can give rise to positive benefits and outcomes in the workplace. Additionally, various measures of engagement such as enthusiasm and involvement are connected attributes such as customer satisfaction, employee turnover, productivity, profitability criteria, customer loyalty and safety. Thus there are a variety of reasons that business executives in organizations should focus on ensuring high levels of employee engagement to optimize productivity and organizational performance. Conclusions and Recommendations Accommodation of diversity contributes significantly to the emotional wellbeing of the employees by enabling them to respect the diverse aspects of religious beliefs, sexual orientation, ethnicity, and culture of other employees (Sutherland & Canwell, 2004, 101). This creates an environment of mutual understanding and enables cohesiveness in teams and more so healthy competition amongst the employees. The wellbeing of the employees is a critical aspect in the organization, which is evident through the dedication of extensive resources in social activities aimed at motivating the employees and inducing a team culture. This also plays a role in affirming the presence of a psychological contract between the employer and employee as opposed to traditional transactional relationships. The focus at Google should be on delivery of leadership that creates a culture of mutual respect to ensure motivation of all employees without any bias. This will evidently contribute to the presence of high levels of engagement and subsequent commitment, employee satisfaction and loyalty in execution of tasks and responsibilities within their respective organizational capacities. Emotional and intellectual commitment of the employees towards their roles and duties in the organization are critical components of engagement of employees in their roles in an organization. It is evident that highly engaged employees usually exhibit a high level of personal attachment to their roles and achievement of set out objectives and goals in the organization. They deem themselves as motivated towards delivering exceptional work and services to the clients (Reeves, 2004, 44). The engagement of employees is related to the ability of the employees to visualize and commit themselves towards achievement of set out goals and objectives such as profitability and exceptional customer service levels. Leadership within any given organization should focus on enabling employees to make decisions that affect their work directly and indirectly. Bibliography Boddy, D., (2011), Management - An Introduction, 5th edn., Harlow, Essex, Pearson Education Ltd. Core Text:  Cole, G. A., (2011), Management Theory and Practice, 7th edn, Publisher Cengage Learning EMEA ISBN Handy C. B., (1993) Understanding Organizations, 4th edn, London, Penguin.  Hargie, O., Dickson, D., & Tourish, D., (2004) Communication Skills for effective Management, Basingstoke, Hants, Palgrave Macmillan.  Johnson, G., Whittington, R., & Scholes, K. (2011) Exploring Corporate Strategy, Pearson Education, 2011  Linstead, S., Fulop, L., & Lilley, S., (2009), Management and Organization: A Critical Text, 2nd edn., Basingstoke, Hants, Palgrave Macmillan.  Mullins Laurie (2011 )Management and Organizational Behavior, 7th Edition, Palgrave Macmillan.  Naylor, J., (2004), Management, 2nd edn., Harlow, Essex, Pearson Education.  Needle, D., (2010) Business in Context, 35th edition, London, Cengage Learning.  Pettinger, R., (2006) Introduction to Management, 4th edn., Hants, Palgrave Macmillan  Sutherland, J., & Canwell, D., (2004), Key Concepts in Management, Hants, Palgrave Macmillan.  Creating Leaders, (2003) Economist, 25 June vol. 369 p7. Reeves, R., (2004), Real Leaders Just Do It, Management Today, June, p29.  Read More