Employee engagement is an essential factor to be considered for any organization to be in a better position to achieve its goals and objectives. This paper brings into light the various levels of employee engagement, which includes the three categories of employees, the engaged, the not engaged, and the strongly disengaged employees. It also provides the employee motivation theories and offers suggestions for which theories fit certain organizations best. It also provides the five performance perspective, which is used in the performance appraisal to measure the employee’s efforts and inputs into the organization. They include financial, customer, social, internal, and employee perspectives.
Gallup, through his study, identifies three levels of employee engagement in consideration of the direct effect on the company’s bottom line. The levels of engagement include; Engaged employees -These are employees who work with passion and feel a profound connection to their company. They are the leading players who can transform their workplaces and work into a source or a generator of innovation and productivity. They are reliable, predictable, and positive. The engaged employees motivate each other, encourage the less engaged and coworkers to increase their productivity, and to improve on their level of engagement. They are focused on their work; their outlook is positive and highly directed and motivated by their company's mission and vision. They feel a profound connection with all that they do and to their coworkers (Anand, 2011).
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Not engaged employees -These are workers and employees who put the time in, but not energy or passion. They generally do adequate work but not to their full potential. They tend not to be driven or motivated by the company's mission and vision. Their work has no significant meaning to them as they immediately leave their workplace after their time elapses. Mostly they are motivated by the engaged employees. They don’t have that profound connection to their work and the people they work with.
Supervisors and managers need to be close to them to ensure they do the work as required their productivity isn’t to their full potential. A large number of employees are categorized as not engaged in most of the organizations.
Actively disengaged- Actively disengaged employees doubt the company's mission and vision. They are unhappy at work, and their negative attitude is known. They talk negatively about their leaders and undermine the accomplishments of the engaged coworkers. They are a burden to the organization because they are paid more relative to their productivity. They are highly resistant to change and delays the workforce and running of the company. They require a lot of supervision to work.
Regarding the motivational approach, an organization with unmotivated or less motivated employees usually face a lot of challenges of higher turnover rates and low productivity. Multiple theories show how employees are motivated and give appropriate suggestions in a situation where there is less motivation. The human resource has to understand which theory fits their organization best so that they apply the most suitable method and be in a better position to retain their employees.
As a manager of an organization, it would be better to embrace the Hawthorne effect theory and the equity theory of employee motivation. The Hawthorne effect theory suggests that employees are motivated and more productive when they know that their work is being studied, measured, and rated by the top management. They are even more engaged and productive when they are given feedback about their measured work, whether bad or good. Employees mostly need recognition for some job well done. They also need to be assured that their opinions matters and should not be looked down upon so that they remain always motivated (Paauwe, 2009).
The equity theory of employee motivation states that employees are always motivated when they perceive how they are treated in the workplace fair and just. They become less motivated or completely unmotivated when they view their treatment as unjust. There could be favors of some group of employees over the others. Managers who exercise this kind of leadership usually face a lot a large group of unmotivated employees and higher rates of job resigning.
It is more appropriate to reasonably measure the employee’s achievements and give credit to them where they deserve. Make sure they continuously measure their work and give regular feedbacks so that employees remain on track and remain motivated to work hard. One would also ensure that they are fair in all their deals and allow them to have equal opportunities to express themselves. Try the best to give the employees equal chances to advance, get bonuses for work done, and benefits from other relevant awards.
Concerning performance perspectives, the five performance perspectives can be used in the performance appraisal to evaluate the performances of employees within an organization. These perspectives include:
Customer perspective- This refers to the involvement of both the internal and external customers. I would focus on the formulation of customer problems and not what the organizations expect from the customers. Ensure that the outcome measures should revolve around customer satisfaction, acquisition of new customers, employee, and customer retention together with significant customer profitability (Campbell & Richter, 2017).
Financial perspective- To decide whether to lend or invest funds, one would have to compare and measure the net income from the organization and return on investments. Measure the profit and financial achievements of the organization to determine the position of the organization financially.
Internal perspective- Here, the identification of the critical internal processes in which the excellence of the organization must be experienced is the main activity. This would ensure the satisfaction of the shareholder’s expectation and deliver the value proportions that will attract and retain customers in a particular market.
Employees perspective- this involves the determination of employee needs to ensure their satisfaction, retention, and productivity at work. Employee satisfaction can be done by using surveys and observing them closely at work. Their satisfaction will finally determine their productivity and retention.
Social perspective- This refers to the social goals of an organization. It focuses on the understanding of employee knowledge, skill, and abilities as it relates to the job and also their creativity, emotions, and personalities. The human resource manager has to understand all these elements to ensure that everyone is represented.
In conclusion, employee engagement is paramount for the accomplishment of tasks in an organization. Human resource managers should engage their employees well so that work is done well. They should also ensure that they motivate their employees in various ways so that they work hard for recognition. When measuring employee performance and appraisal, the five perspectives should be put in place to provide for a balanced scorecard. The elements should include customer satisfaction, financial, social, employee, and internal perspectives.
References
Anand, P. (2011). Case study on employee engagement and performance appraisal ITC Maurya. Review of Management, 1 (2), (83-88)
Campbell, E. J., & Richter, J. M. (2017). Performance Improvement: quality Is in The Cards.
Paauwe, J. (2009). HRM and Performance: Achievement, Methodological issues and Prospects. Journal of Management studies , 46(1)
