What is Employee Engagement?
The term ‘employee engagement’ was introduced in 1990 by William A. Kahn, a professor of organizational behavior at Boston University. Kahn’s study began with the “premise that people can use varying degrees of themselves—physically, cognitively, and emotionally—in work role performances.” When Kahn studied employees at two organizations, he found they were more engaged when they experienced psychological meaningfulness, safety, and availability.
Kahn defined the terms accordingly:
- Psychological meaningfulness: the feeling of receiving a return on investment of oneself in a currency of physical, cognitive, or emotional energy
- Psychological safety: able to show and employ oneself without fear of negative consequences to self-image, status, or career
- Psychological availability: the sense of having the physical, emotional, or psychological resources to personally engage at a particular moment
While icebreaker games and pizza parties may be part of your employee engagement strategy, building genuine engagement is more complex. Let’s look at organizational efforts that can foster each of the factors above.
Organizational Efforts that Build Employee Engagement
1. Create psychological meaningfulness.
To help build psychological meaningfulness for your employees, they must feel rewarded for their contributions. Employees want to feel seen and valued. Here are a couple of ways to systematically accomplish this:
- Regularly recognize employee contributions with shout-outs during meetings or company-wide emails. Even spontaneous “saw you doing something great” moments—expressed directly by managers—will make an impact. If your organization is large enough, consider investing in an employee recognition platform where colleagues can publicly give kudos to the folks they work with.
- Educate employees on how they can advance and grow in your organization. Good long-term employees want to see a path to climb forward and up. One way to do this is to create career progression frameworks to help employees visualize how to move to the next level in your company. You might also add a promotions page to your intranet or SharePoint to document upward and lateral moves. Have employees comment on each stage of their journey.
2. Foster psychological safety.
Employees who feel they can be themselves, take initiative and risks, and try and fail—without fear of significant adverse consequences—will experience psychological safety. Here are a few ways to help employees feel safe at work:
- Train managers and leaders to create a psychologically safe environment by covering topics like active listening and empathetic communication. Management needs to understand the concept of psychological safety and how to build it. For example, one way to foster psychological safety is to learn how to provide constructive feedback without being too harsh.
- Organize team-building workshops focused on trust-building, collaboration, and effective communication. Consider an escape room, trivia game, or wellness challenge since you can easily adapt those activities for in-person, hybrid, or remote teams.
3. Strengthen psychological availability.
To increase psychological availability for employees, your organization must ensure they have the physical, emotional, and psychological resources needed to fully engage at work. Here are some ways you can prioritize holistic employee wellbeing:
- Offer flexible work options. Flex time, floating holidays, remote work options, and generous PTO will help employees balance their work and personal lives, reducing stress and improving employee wellness. If you provide flex options, you can measure the impact on things like employee engagement, satisfaction, and production and output to determine which benefits make the most sense for your organization.
- Provide access to mental and physical health resources. Mental health resources might include benefits like Employee Assistance Programs (EAPs) and teletherapy. In addition to comprehensive health benefits, other physical health benefits might include ergonomic workstations, nutritious snacks, and reimbursements for gym or other fitness memberships.
Prioritizing Employee Engagement
When well cared for, employees tend to bring their whole selves to work—physically, cognitively, and emotionally. To engage your employees, prioritize efforts and benefits that build psychological meaningfulness, safety, and availability. Employees who feel loved and cared for are more willing to invest and engage in their work, team, and mission, resulting in higher retention rates.
