New research suggests UK employee engagement is low
Around a third of staff in the UK are highly engaged in the workplace while just under half admit to being moderately engaged, new research has found.
The remainder of workers have little or no engagement with their roles according to the 2015 engagement: how British business measures up survey which was commissioned by Red Letter Days for Business.
The importance of line managers was also recognised as 98% of highly engaged staff said they had a manager who cares about them.
Opportunities to grow and learn were also in place within jobs where employees felt engaged while having someone to encourage their development also contributed to overall happiness levels.
Productivity breeds benefits
The study explored how different workplace practices affected engagement levels and suggested that focusing on productivity could bring a wide range of benefits.
Investing in training is important as it encouraged staff to increase their efforts and perform at higher levels with the best staff responses noted amongst those whose managers who were there when needed but also enabled people to get on with their jobs independently.
Praising staff and recognising good performance also helped boost engagement while better quality work was produced when staff believed they were contributing to the success and purpose of the company.
Colleagues were also important to engagement levels as people surrounded by committed co-workers were far more productive that those who were not.
Lack of productivity spells danger
Productivity impacts on the bottom-line of a firm by driving up sales and increasing the opportunities for success.
Companies with unproductive staff – who might lack motivation in their work because they do not feel fulfilled in their roles – can struggle as a result and may even have to use business restructuring to help solve this issue.
Business restructuring can help streamline a firm so that unnecessary spending does not occur while also removing roles that are not needed.
Such an approach should help to boost productivity and bring about long-term success which is beneficial to both businesses and its staff.