I am not a big fan of Why-I-Have-Set-Out-To-Write-This-Blog posts. I believe, that once you have decided that your thoughts are important enough to be inflicted upon the world, it it is quite superfluous to defend / justify your decision. The astute reader may have noticed that the title of this blog does contain an overture to its raison d'etre - it is important to do what makes one feel important.
So let me plunge headfirst into an issue that has been gnawing away at my thinking time for some time now - and that is the imponderable problem of Employee Engagement.
I have often been asked, "What are the engagement activities conducted for employees in XYZ organization / site / function ?" On the first such occasion, being a novice to the Switch-On-Your-All Knowing-Important-Look-When-You-Have-No-Answer strategy, I probed further on what constituted 'engagement activities'. I was assailed with a colourful plethora of examples: Hobby clubs, Diwali celebrations, Yoga lessons.
Later, as I embraced the dynamic and strategic field of Human Resource Management, I noticed, that 'Employee Engagement' constituted a distinct responsibility area within HR (similar to Compensation & Benefits or Recruitment), and consisted of the colourful plethora of activities mentioned above along with more innovative alternatives. Moreover, an oft used indicator of effectiveness in this area was 'the number of engagement activities conducted' in a specific duration of time.
Of course, appended to any report on Employee Engagement, one would be sure to find impressive statistics shouting out to you about the incontestable link between employee engagement and the organization's performance (80% of the organizations, which implemented employee engagement activities registered a growth in revenues, while the corresponding figure was only 30% for those that did not etc. etc.)
What is my point here ? Firstly, let us take a minute to pause and think: Is employee engagement a cause or an effect ? Is it a process or a result ?
It is clearly an effect, a result or an end. Engagement, thus, need not be treated as a distinct process; it is the reflection of the effectiveness of all of your other people processes - recruitment, development, talent, performance and rewards management. People in an organization can be said to be 'engaged', when the organizational policies, processes, culture and strategy motivate them to contribute, and not when they get to attend 4 team dinners in 3 weeks.
I am not at all against organizing Hobby clubs or Diwali celebrations or Yoga classes, however, it pains me that such activities get grouped under the banner of 'Employee Engagement', which then becomes a 'process' in its own right and worse still, gets comfortably tucked under the amorphous blanket of 'HR'. They are, by all means, good and useful activities to have, but 'quantifying' employee engagement based on these activities (also typically substantiated by five-point-feedback-forms) is not only ridiculous, but threatens to divert the focus of employee engagement, from being a desirable 'end' to being an entertaining 'activity'. It is redolent of a tendency to look for quick fixes and jump to solutions before understanding problems (Hey, look, this team has a low engagement score, let's plan a picnic for them!), which is an emblem of all that is wrong with HR management today.
It is important to understand Employee Engagement for what is really is - an indicator, that people see a reason to perform and persist. Employee engagement is the accountability of everyone; we don't need an 'engagement specialist' for it.
So let me plunge headfirst into an issue that has been gnawing away at my thinking time for some time now - and that is the imponderable problem of Employee Engagement.
I have often been asked, "What are the engagement activities conducted for employees in XYZ organization / site / function ?" On the first such occasion, being a novice to the Switch-On-Your-All Knowing-Important-Look-When-You-Have-No-Answer strategy, I probed further on what constituted 'engagement activities'. I was assailed with a colourful plethora of examples: Hobby clubs, Diwali celebrations, Yoga lessons.
Later, as I embraced the dynamic and strategic field of Human Resource Management, I noticed, that 'Employee Engagement' constituted a distinct responsibility area within HR (similar to Compensation & Benefits or Recruitment), and consisted of the colourful plethora of activities mentioned above along with more innovative alternatives. Moreover, an oft used indicator of effectiveness in this area was 'the number of engagement activities conducted' in a specific duration of time.
Of course, appended to any report on Employee Engagement, one would be sure to find impressive statistics shouting out to you about the incontestable link between employee engagement and the organization's performance (80% of the organizations, which implemented employee engagement activities registered a growth in revenues, while the corresponding figure was only 30% for those that did not etc. etc.)
What is my point here ? Firstly, let us take a minute to pause and think: Is employee engagement a cause or an effect ? Is it a process or a result ?
It is clearly an effect, a result or an end. Engagement, thus, need not be treated as a distinct process; it is the reflection of the effectiveness of all of your other people processes - recruitment, development, talent, performance and rewards management. People in an organization can be said to be 'engaged', when the organizational policies, processes, culture and strategy motivate them to contribute, and not when they get to attend 4 team dinners in 3 weeks.
I am not at all against organizing Hobby clubs or Diwali celebrations or Yoga classes, however, it pains me that such activities get grouped under the banner of 'Employee Engagement', which then becomes a 'process' in its own right and worse still, gets comfortably tucked under the amorphous blanket of 'HR'. They are, by all means, good and useful activities to have, but 'quantifying' employee engagement based on these activities (also typically substantiated by five-point-feedback-forms) is not only ridiculous, but threatens to divert the focus of employee engagement, from being a desirable 'end' to being an entertaining 'activity'. It is redolent of a tendency to look for quick fixes and jump to solutions before understanding problems (Hey, look, this team has a low engagement score, let's plan a picnic for them!), which is an emblem of all that is wrong with HR management today.
It is important to understand Employee Engagement for what is really is - an indicator, that people see a reason to perform and persist. Employee engagement is the accountability of everyone; we don't need an 'engagement specialist' for it.
