Employee Engagement Starts at the Top

Andrew Carnegie has been quoted as saying, “Teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common vision. The ability to direct individual accomplishments toward organizational objectives.” What Carnegie was describing, in essence, is employee engagement.

Employee engagement can be thought of as the relationship between the individual employee and their employer. An engaged employee is one who is fully immersed in, and passionate about, their work and therefore takes positive action to further his or her organizations’ goals and vision.

With all else being held equal, an organization that has higher levels of employee engagement would be expected to outperform those organizations with lower levels of employee engagement.

While engaged employees drive business performance, unengaged or disengaged employees actually cost employers. Their negative attitude and behaviors can undermine the success of their team, effectively decreasing performance and costing their company time and money.

The forthcoming “Creating a Leadership Pipeline: Developing the Millennial Generation into Finance Leaders” states millennials have an inherent dislike for conformity, which could be considered an advantage in today’s work climate. All employees are urged repeatedly to “think outside the box,” to be more creative, and to move away from rigid procedures.

“Gen Y [Millennials] is likely to equate job satisfaction with a positive work climate, flexibility, and the opportunity to learn and grow more than any prior generation. Compared with other generations, Gen Y tends to have less respect for rank and more respect for ability and accomplishment. It is likely to trade more pay for work it feels is meaningful at a company where it feels appreciated”.

Consequently, better pay is not the path to increasing employee engagement. Rather, an organization’s senior leaders must create a culture that encourages engagement and sets strategic goals that guide the company toward their ultimate vision.

Engagement, therefore, truly starts at the top. Some additional considerations around employee engagement include the following.

• Perceptions of job importance
• Clarity of job expectations
• Career advancement opportunities
• Regular feedback & dialogue with supervisors
• Quality of working relationships with co-workers
• Perceived values of the organization
• Effective internal employee communications

Employee engagement is not dictated, it’s demonstrated by senior leaders: from hiring the right people to fill existing needs to setting clear expectations and motivating staff to outperform. Senior leaders who trust their employees and are trusted by their employees build the foundation of employee engagement that establishes their organization’s path for future success.