The concept of employee engagement is an emergent result when workplaces adopt concepts and ideas designed to increase communication between the employers and the employee, thus increasing their worker’s loyalty and commitment to their organisation’s goals and means. An engaged employee is one whom exhibits emotional commitments to the company, usually distinguishable through the voluntary effort they exercise in their roles to better the organisation. They will actively seek out ways to further the business and its efforts; they are perseverant, passionate and loyal to the workplace. This inherent motivation to contribute to their company’s success …show more content…
Although the concrete definition of employee engagement is subject to debate, there is growing consensus that employee engagement is a clear reflection of the two-way exchange of effort between employees and employers (Markos & Sridevi, 2010). This underlying theme that employee engagement is the culmination of a two-way effort provides insight that employee engagement can be considerably improved through focusing and richening the communication between employees and the employer. Non-engaged employees who are neither actively engaged nor disengaged potentially offer the organisation the biggest untapped resource of prospective growth. They are not explicitly troublesome nor will they go the extra mile to better the organisation; they are zombies in the workplace having little concern about service quality, productivity and goals. Improving employee engagement through means of better communication, training and incentives persuades these non-engaged individuals to become engaged, resulting in radical improvements within the organisational performance outcomes such as retention rates, productivity, loyalty and safety (Markos & Sridevi, 2010). This is achieved by creating a positive and mutually benefitting atmosphere between the employees and …show more content…
Conversely, the attempt to empirically measure engagement proves to be one of difficulty as explored in Shuck (2011). However, the underlying message suggests that improving communication between workers and assessing their wants and needs paves way to improving engagement within the workplace. Shuck (2011) states “Research points to evidence suggesting that having a higher proportion of engaged employees leads to significant and important organisational outcomes” (p. 321). The truth of this statement is further affirmed by Anitha (2014) who proclaims that there is a distinct correlation between employee engagement and overall employee performance. She also states that of all factors that impact employee engagement, the relationship with one’s co-workers is one of the most significant influences in establishing emotional commitment. The prominence placed on co-worker relationships illustrates how essential communication between employees and employers is in improving employee