Employee engagement is the extent to which employees feel valued and involved in their everyday work.
It is a good idea to measure employee engagement as it is an important indicator of the health of your business and a good way to spot areas for improvement.
Levels of employee engagement
Highly engaged employees – These employees are brand advocates and have a favourable opinion about their company. They demonstrate a strong connection with their team and perform duties outside the scope of their job responsibilities to help the company succeed because they clearly understand their organisation’s overall goals and vision.
Moderately Engaged Employees – Employees may have a general understanding of their role in their company but barely work beyond their duties and responsibilities. These employees are dependable workers with the potential to excel. However, something is usually holding them back.
Barely Engaged Employees – Employees who are barely engaged and do the bare minimum. These employees look at their work as a task. They usually don’t clearly understand how important their role is toward the success of the company. Consequently, they’re generally looking for other job opportunities.
Disengaged Employees – Disengaged employees are unhappy and demonstrate no commitment to their work responsibilities. The disconnection to their job duties, the company mission, and the company vision, aid in their discontentment. They actively spread their negativity with colleagues.
Why measure engagement?
When employees are engaged with their work, they’re more fulfilled and more motivated that ultimately leads to higher productivity. Highly engaged employees typically have a forward-thinking disposition about their company. And because they’re always thinking of ways to improve work operations, they have a team-oriented mindset demonstrating strong leadership skills that can elevate those who are moderately and barely engaged. They may even be able to communicate with disengaged employees to give them a better sense of purpose and responsibility. That’s why employee engagement is so important to the success of your company. Can you afford not to measure it?
“An engaged employee is most likely satisfied, but not all satisfied employees are engaged.”
A good employee engagement survey will measure several factors, including:
Leadership behaviour
Effective management can make or break your employee engagement. It’s not just whether your senior management treats employees well or whether they act ethically (of course, that’s important too!). It’s crucial to have effective leadership at every level of the organization. That means managers who articulate company values, communicate well, and follow up with appropriate actions.
Nature of work
Most people don’t actually want an easy job. They want to be challenged and tested in their day-to-day work. Challenging work can be immensely motivating for employees—as long as employees can see clearly how their work ties to the company’s performance.
Career development
Ambitious employees are a good thing. They can be the most self-motivated and productive members of your team—as long as it’s clear to them how you can help them advance in their career. If it’s not, you’ll risk losing them. Clarity around career goals is important, but you’ve also got to offer a helping hand.
Company pride
When employees are proud of where they work, it shows. They’re true believers in your mission and they want to see your company succeed. That attitude translates to their performance: When people take pride in their company, they’ll take pride in their work. Fostering this feeling of pride isn’t just about making employees feel good about themselves. It makes them show up to work focused, aligned with their peers, and ready to tackle problems with commitment.
Colleagues
It goes without saying that we spend a lot of time interacting with our co-workers. In companies of every size, it’s important to think about the working relationships between employees: how they interact, how they view each other’s abilities, and what they see as the strengths and weaknesses of the workforce. How employees view their colleagues can have huge impact on their morale and faith in meeting company goals.
Benefits of employee engagement surveys
- 1. Improve employee morale
- 2. Happier employees
- 3. Increased employee safety/quality of life
- 4. Increased employee satisfaction
- 5. Higher employee retention rate
- 6. Positive shift in company culture
Do get in touch if you think an Engagement Survey could be just what you need in your company.