Running Head: IMPROVEMENT OF EMPLOYEES ENGAGEMENT

Employees Commitment and Engagement: Some Suggestion for Future Improvement Salmiwati binti Mohamad Jamili (2011248904) University Technology Mara

IMPROVEMENT OF EMPLOYEES ENGAGEMENT

Abstract

IMPROVEMENT OF EMPLOYEES ENGAGEMENT Introduction

Organizations nowadays are critically to sustain their stability by defining a strategic ways to survive in a world that is changing both in terms of the global nature of work. One of the strategies is to having engaged employees who will produce effects at required levels for management. Bevan (2011) mentioned the term engagement is used in the workplace setting to describe the extent to which employees feel connected, involved and valued. Engaged employees feel that the organization has their interest in mind, they have a high level of commitment to the job and their team and they believe they have a future with the organization. Saks (2006) argues that organizational commitment differs from engagement which is commitment refers to a persons attitude and attachment toward the organization. Engagement is not merely an attitude; it is the degree to which an individual is attentive to their work and absorbed in the performance of their role. In other ways, engagement of employees to organization is the extent which employee commitment, both emotional and intellectual, exist enthusiasm to

accomplishing the work and have a drive to fulfill mission and vision of the organization. Employees who feel engaged to company also have a high level of ownership where they maximizing their capability to do whatever they can do for the benefit of the organization.

IMPROVEMENT OF EMPLOYEES ENGAGEMENT

The other clear view of engaged employees are they have a desire to improve their quality of work, understanding the bigger picture of business context as they have a belief in the organization, they always keeping up to date in whatever development in the field as in their inner self have a willingness to go the extra and lastly they are respect and helpful to other colleagues. Due to a positive attitude held by the engaged employees and it will create a values which also will give a lot of benefit to organization, organization must work to develop and nurture engagement. This will require a two way relationship between employer and employee. Vance (2006) linked the importance of employee engagement with success of the company with this statement: To compete today, companies need to win over the minds (rational commitment) and the hearts (emotional commitment) of employees in ways that lead to extraordinary effort. Kular, Gatenby, Rees, Soane and Truss (2008) in their research concluded that there are strong relationship between engagement, employee performance and business outcomes. The key of employee engagement is a combination of communication, opportunities for employees to raise their views, good rewards and support from their managers. These combinations to outbreak the engagement from employees are known as drivers. Organization can effectively manage engagement level of its employees by managing drivers.

IMPROVEMENT OF EMPLOYEES ENGAGEMENT Job Enrichment

According to Seijts and Crim (2006) an employees attitude toward the jobs importance and the company had the greatest impact on loyalty and customer services than all other factors combined. To boost employees great attitude toward the job, employers have to play with combination of human resource practice which can encourage employees toward their task. The nature of work and employment has evolved through a series of stages (Vance, 2006). From farms era, it moved to cottages industries and today the world of work is characterized by formalize employment relationship which outsource production of goods and service on a global scale. Likewise, the nature of job and task designed also evolved through movement of time. Although organization in 20 th century gained efficiency by simplified task, it caused dissatisfied among workers as they feel less meaningful to employment. Due to this, in 1950s many observation and theories regarding job satisfaction and work motivation had emerged that related to job design, particularly the beneficial effects of job enrichment. It does continue with publication of job characteristics model in the early 1970s, interest in the impact of job design on worker motivation and productivity intensified. (Vance, 2006). These characteristic included proposed five cores which is skill variety, task identity, task significance and autonomy also a performance feedback (Hackman and Oldham, 1976).

IMPROVEMENT OF EMPLOYEES ENGAGEMENT

Hackman and Oldham have identifiend the five cores as their job characteristic theories and being simplified by figure as below: Figure 1: Hackman and Oldhams Job Characteristic Model (Hackman and Oldham, 1976)

Employees who are being exposed to these characteristic will have internal motivation, personal responsibility towards job performance and job satisfaction. It will guide into engagement to organization as well. Job enrichment is the practice of enhancing individual jobs to make the responsibilities more rewarding and inspiring for the people who do them. It is a strategy to varieties the jobs so it can offer more satisfying without too boring and monotonous. With job enrichment, employer has to expand the task that someone performs. Employer has to provide more stimulating and interesting work that adds variety and

IMPROVEMENT OF EMPLOYEES ENGAGEMENT

challenge to an employees routine. This will increase the depth of the job and allows people to have more control over their work. Other than that, the most important of job enrichment is giving people more control over their work. It means employer has to give a lack of control to them and allow them to have more influence over planning, executing and evaluating the jobs they do. An activity that can be done to contribute in job enrichment process to the employee is to rotate task and give them an opportunity to use a variety of skills or perform different kinds of work. Employer may move their workers through a variety of jobs and allow them to learn different skills and acquire different experience. This can be useful tools to enrich people who in repetitive jobs or only focus to one skill. Rotate task also can be transform to combine work activities to provide more challenging work assignment. This will allows employees to use a wide of variety skills and they will see a movement of job through start until finish. This activity will add the sense of responsibilities as they realize how important each single task they contribute to complete the whole process. One research done by Raza and Nawwaz (2011) indicated that job enrichment is strongly correlated with job satisfaction. It being proved by the finding from 98.9% from 534 respondents at public sector in Pakistan agreed that job enrichment was a strong predictor of job satisfaction, motivation and commitment. They believed job enrichment are providing freedom of work, responsibility, challenge, participation in decision making, performance feedback, growth and sense achievement which leads to internal motivation and job satisfaction.

IMPROVEMENT OF EMPLOYEES ENGAGEMENT

Conclusion

Reference