BOOK SUMMARY 251
The Engagement
Equation
·
Summary written by: Jane Bushby
“Engagement is fundamentally an
individualized equation. What might make one employee engaged might turn off
the person in the next cubicle...To truly be engaged, people need to be
satisfied with their immediate work and their career opportunities”
- The Engagement Equation, page xi-xii
Christopher Rice, Fraser Marlow and Mary Ann Masarech
have written a book jam-packed with analyses and descriptions of what employee
engagement is and is not. They provide strategies, tactics, hints and tips to
those seeking to improve their organization’s levels of employee engagement. In
doing so, Rice and his co-authors explore the importance of organizational
culture, the return on investment of having engaged employees and the
importance of career development and managers themselves being engaged.
The Golden Egg
It's About Give and Take
"Full employee engagement represents an alignment of
maximum satisfaction for the individual with maximum contribution for the
organization. EE = MSi+ MCo, where MSi represents individuals who have maximum
satisfaction at work, and MCo represents employees who are willing and able to
perform mission critical tasks successfully."- The Engagement Equation,
page 4-5
Rice et al. identify that these two parameters feed off
each other, the challenge being to manage this relationship to achieve employee
engagement. It is vital to do so in a sustainable way. Building a culture of
engagement does not happen instantly, but it is a key ingredient to becoming a
high performing organization. The authors identify and discuss factors which
can influence individuals to attain and maintain full engagement.
Satisfaction:
·
Compensation: is important for attraction and
retention purposes. However, many studies show that compensation alone doesn’t
have a significant impact on engagement.
·
Career: the authors devote a chapter to this
complex topic because there is no straightforward solution. Employees and
employers should work together to identify new challenges or experiences,
opportunities to acquire new skills and knowledge, and discuss future growth
opportunities at the organization.
·
Job Fit: is a combination of employees liking
their work because it satisfies their values and interests, allows them to use
their unique talents, is stimulating and provides opportunities to grow, and
matters to other parts of the organization, customers, or the broader
community. Job conditions are another important component and reflect the
organization’s culture and the requirements of a particular role. Here the
authors note that what is a terrible role for one person will be someone else’s
idea of nirvana.
·
Recognition and Rewards: help individuals
feel valued and appreciated. Again this is personal and needs to be
individualized, and the authors posit that recognition is most effective at the
local level.
Contribution:
·
Clarity of Priorities and Alignment with
Overall Strategy: employees need to understand what is expected of them. A
chapter of the book is devoted to this topic as there are many variables and
considerations to create goal alignment and effective performance management.
·
Resources and Tools: insufficient resources
will erode satisfaction.
·
Feedback and Development: this is critical
for ensuring employees understand how they are doing, know their strengths and
have opportunities to build the knowledge and skills required to stay up to date
with future organizational requirements.
Other factors:
·
Immediate Manager: these individuals are in a
pivotal role to influence engagement levels.
·
Senior Executives: have a wide ranging
responsibility to walk the talk and model the expectations they have for the
rest of the workforce.
·
Organizational Change: impacts employee
satisfaction and contribution, for example by altering reporting lines and
relationships, new technology or ways of working which may impact job
requirements.
·
The World Outside: changes in the
organization’s external environment will have an impact on your employee
engagement levels so must not be ignored.
Gem #1
Engagement is Not a One Off Activity
"Fully engaged is not a fixed state of being. Once
it is realized, you can’t check it off your to-do list and move on to another
project. If you’re serious about engagement, it must stay on your leadership
radar and be woven into your daily conversations."- The Engagement
Equation, page 22
Many organizations run staff surveys which provide them
with large amounts of data on how their employees feel about their work. These
are often run bi-annually and a lot of energy and effort is expended in
creating action plans in response to these surveys. Frequently I have observed
organizations which then move their focus elsewhere to look at the tasks and
mission critical activities that need to be implemented to achieve their
strategic goals. This usually leads to attention moving away from engagement
with the sense that the ‘action plan will address the issues.’ However,
despondency can set in when the organization runs another survey to find little
has changed. The authors focus on how to address this in two specific chapters
and discuss some of the pitfalls that can result from surveys and action plans
and the potential solutions.
The pitfalls include the following:
·
Disagreement at the top: senior executives
may not be on the same page.
·
Communication mistakes: leaders fail to
engage the hearts and minds of their employees, don’t communicate frequently
enough or don’t allow enough time for discussion of the information they have
shared.
·
Disconnects on the front lines: employees
don’t see how their job contributes to the organizational strategy.
The potential solutions to avoid the above pitfalls include:
·
Align senior leaders: ensure they are on the
same page and in agreement with each other about the organization’s mission,
vision, values and strategy.
·
Communicate deliberately and often: create an
approach that addresses the communication barriers within your organization.
·
Communicate for clarity and inspiration:
share the why of a decision as well as the what, it is the why
that adds commitment to clarity.
·
Beyond Leadership Behaviour: recognizing that
engagement is everybody’s responsibility, the organization needs to encourage
manager-employee dialogue, create an effective performance management system
and clarify the organization’s mission and values.
Gem #2
You Can’t Build Engagement if you are Disengaged
"It takes a lot of energy to infuse your team with a
sense of purpose and urgency. And while drive and enthusiasm can be positively
infectious, disengagement is contagious too. You can’t fake being
engaged."- The Engagement Equation, page 91
While Rice and colleagues are explicit in that all individuals
are responsible for their own engagement they are absolutely clear that a
leader has to go first. The authors note that senior managers have a propensity
for engagement because they have more autonomy and are closer to the
decision-making. However, some become disengaged for various reasons and it is
unlikely that subordinates will flag their observations with their executive.
The authors emphasize the importance of executives managing their own
self-awareness, including regular reflection of key questions posed in the book
and seeking feedback from others with whom they work and interact.
This is a book to which I will return as I develop
strategies for engagement within my organization. The authors have provided a
wonderful book brimming with explanations and ideas to improve employee
engagement. It is a must read for any manager seeking to address engagement in
their organization.
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