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Employee engagement, induction and turnover

Published on July 31, 2022   10 min

A selection of talks on Management, Leadership & Organisation

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0:00
My name is Professor Cristine Cross and I work at the Kemmy Business School at the University of Limerick in Ireland. This topic is about employee engagement, induction and turnover.
0:13
Within any organisation, you will find a flow of employees into and out of the organisation, people leave jobs and new employee start. Companies are forced to downsize and let people go in bad times and can find themselves expanding rapidly and employing more staff in good times. Managers are tasked with identifying high performing employees who they want to keep and put strategies in place to retain them. At the same time, they must monitor the performance of under-performers with the view to potentially let go those, who after support, still fail to improve. While the direct replacement cost of an employee who quits is fairly obvious, there are also many hidden costs within the organisation when all is not well. The cost of under-performing or disengaged employees is not as obvious yet it can impact an organisation significantly in terms of performance outcomes, including profitability and customer satisfaction. Organisations are placing more and more emphasis on adopting a strategic approach to employee retention, a key tool for holding on to high performers and thus reducing undesirable turnover.
1:26
Employers strive to have engaged workers and engagement has now surpassed the concept of employee satisfaction as the must have for organisations. It is recognised by employers as the ideal employee status involving high energy, accompanied by positive emotions. To drive high performance, employers want engaged employees, not simply ones who are satisfied. When employees are engaged the following are evident: vigor, which describes how the employee is physically connected to their work, dedication, which describes how the employee is emotionally connected to their work and absorption, which describes how the employee is psychologically connected to their work. Employee engagement is a broader concept than work engagement in so far as it includes not just the relationship of the employee to his or her work, but also their relationship with the organisation itself. In simple terms, employee engagement is how the employee is connected to the organisation. Nita Clarke and David MacLeod have identified four enablers of engagement, which they believe can help organisations when they're looking at ways in which to meaningfully engage with their employees. Induction is an important organisational initiative