Employee Engagement & Retention Flashcards
Employee engagement
- Employees’ emotional commitment to an organization, demonstrated by their willingness to put in discretionary effort to promote the organization’s effective functioning.
- Is the opposite of burnout
Employee engagement is Characterized by:
- Vigor
- Energy and investment put into work
- Dedication
- Pride and enthusiasm about work
- Absorption
- Concentration in work
Types of Engagement
- Trait engagement
- State engagement
- Behavioral engagement
- Transnational engagement
Trait engagement
- Inherent personality-based elements that make an individual predisposed to being engaged
- Ex: natural curiosity, a desire to be involved, an interest in problem solving.
- Traits may figure into recruiting and hiring efforts.
State engagement
Influenced by workplace conditions or practices (e.g., task variety, opportunities to participate in work decisions) that can be improved through organizational interventions directly under management’s control.
Behavioral engagement
- Found in effort employees put into their jobs, which leads to greater value, creating higher performance than from their less-engaged counterparts.
- Can occur when both trait and stage engagement are present.
Transnational engagement
- Employees look to be engaged (longer hours, responses to engagement surveys) but are not engaged
- May act engaged due to an organizational expectation or they will be rewarded/punished otherwise
Strategic plan is advanced by creating an environment that
- Promotes positive relations between employers and management
- Seeks to balance the needs of employees with those of the organization
- Marketed by greater employee engagement
Four Drivers of Engagement (consistent across the world)
- The work itself, including opportunities for development
- Confidence and trust in leadership
- Recognition and rewards
- Organizational communication that is delivered in a timely and orderly way
How to look at global engagement
- View global HR decisions in the context of national culture. U
- se valid research—not stereotypes—to align HR practices for a local population with actual employee attitudes and perceptions.
- Remember that the norm for engagement varies widely from country to country, critical to have data on national norms to interpret employee surveys correctly.
Engagement Drivers Include
- Engaging leadership
- Talent focus
- The work
- The basics (job security, safety)
- Agility (collaboration, decision making)
Engaged Employees
- Say
- Speak positively about the organization to coworkers, potential employees, and customers.
- Stay
- Have an intense sense of belonging and a desire to be a part of the organization.
- Strive
- Motivated and put effort toward success in their job and for the company.
Well-being
- Physical, psychological, and social aspects of employee health
- Enhances the relationship between employee engagement and productivity
Highly engaged individuals with high levels of well-being
Most productive and happiest employees
Highly engaged employees with low levels of well-being
- More likely to leave their organizations
- Have high levels of productivity, they were also more likely to experience high levels of burnout.
Employees with low levels of engagement but high levels of well-being
- Posed a problem for organizations.
- They were more likely to stay with the organization but were less committed to the organization’s goals.
Employees who were both disengaged and had low levels of well-being
Contribute the least to the organization
Types of Culture
- Authoritarian
- Mechanistic
- Participative
- Learning
- High-performance
Authoritarian Culture
- Power resides with top-level management.
- Employees have no involvement in the decision-making or goal-setting processes.
Mechanistic Culture
- Tasks and responsibilities are defined clearly to the employees and shaped by formal rules and standard operating procedures.
- Communication processes follow the direction given by the organization.
- Accountability is a key factor.
Participative Culture
- Collaborative decision making and group problem solving are embraced.
- Employees actively participate in the decision-making or goal-setting processes.
Learning Culture
- Organizational conventions, values, practices, and processes encourage individuals—and the organization as a whole—to increase knowledge, competence, and performance.
- Shared and continuous learning are embraced.
High-performance Culture
- Talent is championed.
- Innovation, elevated performance, customer-centric strategies, relationships, communication, and other characteristics are driven from the bottom up.
Questions to Determine Employee Engagement About Organizational Culture
- What organizational culture have we created?
- Does this culture support achievement of our strategic goals? Is it the culture we need and want?
- How can the organization’s culture be expressed in a way that increases employee engagement?
Managers and Engagement
- Managers are one of the most important components of employee engagement.
- Employees want to feel that managers care about them as professionally and personally
- Managers facilitate engagement when they show gratitude, amplify accomplishments, and communicate well and often, with an emphasis on positive feedback.
- HR supportings managers’ efforts to engage employees.
Management Competencies for Enhancing Employee Engagement
- Supporting employee growth theme
- Autonomy and empowerment
- Development
- Feedback, praise and recognition
- Interpersonal Style with Integrity
- Individual interest
- Availability
- Personal manner
- Ethics
- Monitoring direction
- Reviewing and guiding
- Clarifying expecations
- Managing time and resources
- Following processes and procedures
Challenges to Employee Engagement
- Global competition
- Harsh economic conditions
- Continuous innovation
- New technology
- Organizational restructuring and changes to nature and structure of work
- Boundaries between work and non-work life blurred
Engagement Strategy Should
- Commit long term
- Measure consistently
- Connect engagement to business results
- Seek employee input
- Gain leadership support
How to make a business case for employment engagement strategies
Demonstrate measurable outcomes related to organizational goals
Retention
- Ability to keep talented employees in the organization.
- Organizations aspire to keep high performers and to exit the low performers.
Turnover consequences
- Negates time and money put into filling a position
- Rsults in additional time required to rehire and retrain.
- Lost training time and lost knowledge and skills.
- Negatively impacts employee morale and productivity.
- Can compromise an organization’s ability to sustain a diverse workforce.
- May create lost opportunity costs.
High Performers and More Likely to Stay When They
- Believe they are doing meaningful work.
- Recognized for going above and beyond.
- Tools and resources they to succeed are provided
- Performance management systems are fair, consistent, and transparent.
- Appealing incentives and perks
“Friend at work”
- Leaving a job means leaving social and value networks
- Concept many large multinationals encourage to build engagement and commitment.
Retention strategies
- Start with branding and recruitment efforts
- Continue through the employment experience
- Good reputation in the community and industry and employees (past and present) and customers have a better chance of attracting and retaining top talent.
Key Areas of Employee Engagement
- Leadership characteristics
- Team practices
- Organizational values
- Work itself
Categories and activities HR professionals can use in measuring and analyzing employee engagement.
- Career development
- Relationship with management
- Compensation and Benefits
- Work environemnt
Employee survey
- Tool to ollect and assess information on employees’ attitudes on and perceptions of the work environment or employment conditions.
- Gives formal documentation on organizational issues
Types of Employee Surveys
- Employee attitude surveys
- Employee opinion surveys
- Employee engagement surveys
Employee attitude surveys
- Measures employees’ perceptions.
- Topics can include company culture and company image, the quality of management, the effectiveness of compensation and benefits programs, organizational communication and involvement issues, diversity, and safety and health concerns.
Employee opinion surveys
- Measure important data on specific issues.
- Used to to gain opinions on specific processes an employee performs, safety procedures, or some other issue the employer may be evaluating or considering.
Employee engagement surveys
- Focus on employees’ level of job satisfaction, commitment, and morale.
- Survey questions or statements should explicitly link to business objectives.
Company Designed Employee Surveys
Allow you to focus only on your organization
Purchased Employee Surveys
Saves time and may allow you to compare your organization to others
Benefits of Employee Surveys
- A direct way to assess employee attitudes that would otherwise be unreported.
- Improve employee relations by signaling to employees that their views are considered important.
- Increase levels of employee trust—if results are acted upon.
- Improve the satisfaction levels of customers—happy employees = happy customers.
- Detect early warning signs of workforce problems and/or sources of conflict.
Engagement Surveys
Questions need to be tailored to the organization and the current strategic plan and goals
For efficient surveys, employees should be
- Aware of the purpose of the survey
- If it measures attitude, opinion, or engagement.
- Guaranteed confidentiality and anonymity.
- Given feedback on the results.
- Surveyed about significant areas.
- Generic surveys may miss key areas that are crucial to a specific workforce or emphasize areas that are less relevant while minimizing attention on critical areas.
Employment Survey Issues
- HR and leaders should be prepared for the brutally honest evaluation done by employees
- Don’t address issues with employees unless you are prepared to address the problems
- HR is always criticized or scrutinized
- Multiple translators may be needed
- Cultural differences in acceptance of surveys
Guidelines for Employee Engagement Surveys
- Include questions that could be asked every year to create a basline of engagement
- Language should be neutral or positive
- Focus on behaviors
- Beware of loaded or uninformative questions (questions that would give a no even for engaged workers)
- Keep reasonable length
- Taylor a standard list of questions
- Consider what you are saying about the organization’s values by sending a survey
- Ask for a few written comments
- Consider doing multiple types of surveys with different questions, frequencies and audiences
Communicating Employment Survey Results
- Data should be broken down for each business unit to make changes
- Line managers can communicate results to own employees and create action plans to respond to survey recommendations
- All employees may have engagement objectives in performance reviews - allowing engagment goals to be developed both top down and bottom up
Employment Survey Results
- Once results have been analyzed, action must take place on the information received in a way employees recognize that action is being taken
- Surveys can be harmful to engagement levels if not properly handled.
How to respond to employment survey restults
- Identify drivers of engagement each time an engagement survey is conducted.
- Identify engagement drivers that can be realistically addressed given available resources.
- Make action plans realistic and measurable.
- Track and communicate efforts and results.
Advantages of Employee Surveys Online
- Higher response rates due to employee access convenience (e.g., online access 24 hours a day via Internet or intranet connections).
- No surveys are “lost in the mail.”
- Increased and/or improved responses to open-ended questions.
- Quicker results.
- Current viewing of up-to-the-minute results (via password-protected access).
- Elimination of interviewer biases.
- Ease and flexibility in analyzing data.
Disadvantages of Employee Surveys Online
- Information may be confidential but not anonymous
- All employees must have access and ability to use a computer
- Accurate, up-to-date e-mail addresses are required.
- Pilot testing is critical to ensure reliability of the format and delivery across all operating platforms.
- Respondents may run out of space to answer open-ended questions.
- Virus-checking software must be kept current.
- The server must be secure to ensure the integrity of the results (e.g., one survey per person, only authorized people take the survey) and to prevent unauthorized people from reading the results.
Stay interviews
- Structured conversations with employees
- Goal is to find what aspects of a job encourage employee retention or may be improved to do so.
Stay interviews Advantages
- Assesses degree of employment satisfaction and engagement in department/organization
- Provides opportunity to build trust with employees
How to have an effective stay interview
- Conducted by manager - they have more impact on work conditions of employees
- Standard and structured questions asked in casual and conversational manner
Employee life cycle (ELC) Phases
- Recruitment
- Integration
- Development
- Transition
Transition phase of employee life cycle
Could include resignation, firing, transfer, promotion, demotion, returement
Ways to Increase Engagement during Employment
- Job enrichment
- Learning and development
- Strategic compensation
- Performance and career management
Job Enrichment To Increase Engagement
Incorporate meaning, variety, autonomy, and coworker respect into jobs.
Job enrichment
Incorporate meaning, variety, autonomy, and coworker respect into jobs.
Strategice compensation
- Equitable exchange
- Pay-for-performance
- Competency-based pay
Performance and career management
- Challenging goals that align with strategic objectives
- Positive feedback and recognition for accomplisments
- Appraisal methods free of bias
- Recognition and appreciation for extra voluntary contributions
Realistic job preview (RJP)
- Gives a job applicant with honest, complete information about a job and the work environment.
Realistic job preview (RJP) Objectives
- Give candidates as much information as possible so that they can make an informed decision about their suitability for the job
- Portray the job objectively—include both good and bad aspects
- To increase the potential of a good match between the candidate and the organization
Types of realistic previews
- Description of a typical day on the job
- Organization’s vision, mission, values
- Description of the organization’s products and/or services
- Written job description
- Aspects of the job that have been difficult for other employees
- Aspects of the job that have been rewarding for other employees
- Opportunities for professional development and advancement
- Compensation and benefit realities
- Unique aspects of the job (e.g., dealing with customer complaints, overtime)
- Pending organizational layoffs, reorganizations, mergers, acquisitions, etc.
- Steps in the selection process
Advantages of realistic job previews
- Shows realities and lessens unrealistic expectations
- Encourages self-selection
- Increases job satisfaction
- Prevents disappointments
- Reduces post-entry stress
- Reduces employment turnover
Work Life Programs
- Convenience/ concierge services
- Employee assistance/ development programs
- Family assistance programs
- Flexible work arrangements
- Leave of absence
- Total working hours
- Wellness programs
Implementation of work/life programs can be affected by:
- Laws
- Labor relations
- Organizational culture
- National cultures
- Maturity of the organization
- Market practices
- Expectations and needs of employees
To effectively implement flexible staffing, HR professionals should:
- Chose employees who can work well in those roles given work styles and skill levels
- Clearly communicate expecatations, reporting and performance objectives
- Contact IT to obtain technical resources for telecommuting and virtual respurces
- Include flexible arrangements in performance management systems
- Continuously evaluate job satisfaction and employee contribution to the organization
- Evaluate cost-effectiveness
Role of HR in Employee Recognition
- Promote a strategic recognition program.
- Tie recognition programs to corporate values.
- Encourage corporate spending on employee recognition.
Criteria of recognition systems
- Recognition should be tied to performance that helps the organization meet its strategic goals and to the organization’s values.
- The type of recognition should have significance for the recipient.
Employee Alumni Network
Organizations offer ex-employees entry to formal alumni networks with tangible perks such as access to special events, referral incentives, and social networks or e-newsletters
Employee Alumni Network Benefits for Employer
- Branding
- New business
- Employees can come back as a client
- Industry intelligence
- Former employees provide insight
- Boomerangs
- Former employees coming back
- Employee referrals
Performance management
Process usesd to manage, maintain, and/or improve the job performance of employees
For performance management systems are effective if
- They have support of senior leaders
- Managers understand how to implement and appreciate the value it brings
- Employees are educated about the system—how to get the most value from it and how to ensure their rights to provide responses and feedback.
- The implementation is regularly evaluated and improved and its alignment with strategy and culture is adjusted as needed.
Factors of a Performance Management System
- Organizational values and goals
- Performance management standards
- Employee performance/behaviors
- Measurement and feedback
- Business results and employee growth
Individual performance goals
- Should be aligned to the organization
- Show employees how their individual efforts help the organization’s strategy
Performance standards
- Expectations of management in two deliverables
- Behaviors
- Results
Behaviors
What the organization wants the employees to do.
Results
What the organization wants the employees to produce or deliver.
Performance Standards Measures Include
- Quality
- Quantity
- Timeliness
- Cost-effectiveness
Performance appraisal
- Measuring and evaluating an employee’s adherence to performance standards and providing feedback to the employee
- Formal method of evaluating and giving feedback
Performance appraisal purpose
- Provide feedback and counseling
- Help in allocating rewards and opportunities
- Help in determining employees’ aspirations and planning developmental needs
Appraisal Methods
- Category rating methods
- Comparative methods
- Narrative methods
- Management by objectives (MBO)
- Behaviorally anchored rating scale (BARS)
Category rating methods
- Least complex means of appraising performance
- The appraiser marks an employee’s level of performance on a designated form
Types of Category rating methods
- Graphic Scale
- Ex: rating 1-5
- Checklist
- Ex: check off list of words and items that describe characteristics of performance
- Forced choice
- Ex: appraser checks two to four statements one the employee is most like and one they are least
Comparative methods
Appraiser directly compares the performance of each employee with that of the others
Comparative method Types
- Ranking
- Paid-comparison
- Forced distribution
Ranking comparative method
- The appraiser lists all employees from highest to lowest.
- If there are 20 employees, the appraiser ranks them in order from 1 to 20—best to poorest in performance.
Paired-comparison comparative method
- Each of the employees is paired with every other employee and compared, one at a time, using the same scale for performance.
- This method provides more information about individual employees than ranking.
Forced distribution comparative method
Employees are rated and placed at different percentage points along a bell-shaped curve
Narrative methods
The appraiser submits written narrative performance appraisals
Narrative Method Types
- Essay
- Critical incidents
- Field review
Essay Narrartive Method
- Appraiser writes a short essay describing the performance of each employee during the rating period.
- Usually the appraiser is given several topic areas for comment
Critical Incident Narrative Method
- A record of employee actions is kept in addition to actual ratings.
- Both positive and negative actions are recorded for the entire rating period.
Field Review Narrative Method
- The supervisor or manager and a human resource professional cooperate in this method.
- HR interviews the supervisor about the performance of each employee. After the interview, HR compiles comparison ratings for each employee and then submits the ratings to the supervisor for approval or changes.
Management by objectives (MBO)
- Employees help set objectives for themselves, defining what they intend to achieve within a specified time period.
- Objectives are based on overall goals and objectives for the organization.
- Dialog occurs between employee and manager to reach mutual agreement on goals and objectives
Assumptions of MBO (Management By Objectives)
- A strategic plan is in place.
- A higher level of commitment and performance results from employees who plan and set their own goals.
- The employee will better accomplish objectives that are clearly defined.
- Performance objectives are measurable and specify desired results.
Behaviorally anchored rating scale (BARS)
- Designed to overcome the problems of category rating by describing examples of desirable and undesirable behavior. Examples are then measured against a scale of performance levels.
- Works best when many employees are performing the same tasks
- Method requires time and energy to dvelop and maintain
BARS Advantages
- More accurate gauge of performance.
- Clearer standards of performance.
- Feedback.
- Independent dimensions.
BARS Requires Organization to
- Generate critical incidents.
- Develop performance dimensions.
- Scale the incidents.
- Develop the final instrument.
Graphic scales Advantages
Scales are simple to use and provide a quantitative rating for each employee.
Graphic scales Disadvantages
Standards may be unclear.
Ranking Advantages
Ranking is simple to use but not as simple as graphic scales.
Ranking Disadvantages
Ranking can cause disagreements among employees and may be unfair if all employees are excellent.
Forced distribution advanages
Distribution forces a predetermined number of people into each group.
Forced distribution disadvantages
Appraisal results depend on the adequacy of the original choice of cutoff points.
Critical incidents advantages
- Shows what is “right” and “wrong” about the employee’s performance
- Forces the supervisor to evaluate subordinates on an ongoing basis.
Critical incidents disadvantages
It may be difficult to rate or rank employees relative to one another
MBO Advantages
Tool is tied to jointly agreed-upon performance objectives.
MBO Disadvantages
Tool may be time-consuming to implement
BARS Advantages
Behavioral “anchors” are very accurate.
BARS Disadvantages
Can be difficult to develop
Errors in Performance Appraisals
- Halo/horn effect
- Recency
- Primacy
- Bias
- Strictness
- Leniency
- Central tendency
- Contrast
Halo effect
When an employee is extremely competent in one area and is therefore rated high in all categories.
Horn effect
Occurs when one weakness results in an overall low rating.
Recency Error
When an appraiser gives more weight to recent occurrences and discounts or minimizes the employee’s earlier performance during the appraisal period.
Primacy error
When an appraiser gives more weight to the employee’s earlier performance and discounts or minimizes recent occurrences
Bias Error
An appraiser’s values, beliefs, or prejudices distort ratings (either consciously or unconsciously), the error is due to bias.
Strictness Error
- Some appraisers may be reluctant to give high ratings.
- Appraisers who believe that standards are too low may inflate the standards in an effort to make the standards meaningful in their eyes.
Leniency errors
- When an appraisers does not want to give low scores.
- All employees in this case are given high scores
Central tendency errors
When an appraiser rates all employees within a narrow range, regardless of differences in actual performance
Contrast Error
When an employee’s rating is based on how his or her performance compares to that of another employee instead of on objective performance standards.
In appraisal meeting appraiser and employee must
- Get agreement on appraisal ratings.
- Set specific objectives that the employee is to achieve before the next appraisal period.
- Create an implementation plan for how the employee will meet the objectives.
- Discuss how the appraiser will follow up with the employee to see that the objectives are being met.
- Discuss what must be accomplished before the next review period.
Actions to evaluate performance management systems
- Completion of training among the system users.
- Completion of performance management activities.
- Have periodic manager review of performance standards used in ratings to ensure continued validity.
- Secure senior management review with consideration of organization’s strategic goals.
- Periodically align performance appraisal results with promotions and pay increases to confirm that there is a positive relationship.
- Solicit feedback from users.
Employee Absence Rate Formula
Workers’ compensation incident rate formula
Monthly Voluntary Turnover Rate Formula
Revenue per employee formula
Yield Ratios
Percentage of applicants for recruitment source to make it to determined stage of application process
Retention Rate formula
Turnover
