Employee Engagement and Talent Management

The human capital the knowledge and skills of an organization's employees are important factors that determine the competitive advantage and the success in the achievement of business goals (Ashton and Morton, 2005; Frank and Taylor, 2004). Some organizations need people with highly specialized technical competencies, and skills and these talented people are a priority; without them, the organization will not move forward (Meyers and Van Woerkom, 2014). Therefore, organizations need to attract talented employees, improve their talents, provide opportunities for talent development, and retain talent through human capital management (Du Plooy and Roodt, 2010).

Talent management is the process of identifying, recruiting, retaining and deploying those talented people within an organization. Talent management positively impacts work involvement and employee performance (Sopiah et al., 2020). All individuals possess some talents that can be improved on the job. However, some talented people are motivated and possess the skills and abilities that enable them to outperform others in their specialized work areas.  Hiring and maintaining these talented people is expensive, so existing talent must be developed through training and mentoring by developing and executing talent retention strategies (Vaamonde et al., 2018). Talent audits can identify employees with high potential and provide the basis for benchmarking talent in terms of talent acquisition, talent development, and retention (Armstrong and Taylor, 2020; Aljbour et al., 2021). In addition, the talent development skills model can support future requirements and identify skills shortages (North et al., 2021).

Many government organizations have internal and external secondment schemes that allow employees to join other organizations, including international organizations, and return with a higher silk level (Barkworth, 2004). This enables them to develop their talents, get to know new organizations, build professional networks and return. These posting periods vary in Sri Lanka between two and five years. However, one of the weaknesses in this scheme is that the seconded officers will become junior, similar to an out-of-service period when the person returns to the public service.  This leads to dissatisfaction, and the gifted civil servants leave the civil service for good. Several employees in the organization where I work, initially joined as seconded officials from governments.  Some of these talented employees have secured long term employment with the organization as they are highly qualified and skilled. However, some officers return and reach the helm of their organizations in the public sector as well.  

A system at universities enables academics to take a sabbatical after every seven years of work (Jöns, 2015). Academics use this opportunity to join other reputed internal universities or firms for higher salaries. This opportunity is crucial to retain a highly talented workforce in the long term and offer an opportunity to develop a better professional career. However, as in the public sector, some academics who leave abroad for sabbatical remain on overseas jobs and never return, leaving a vacuum in the highly skilled workforce in the country. Therefore, some institutions have made it mandatory to sign a high value bond in the public sector to encourage employees to return to work.

Nonetheless, it is the responsibility of the organizations to develop a strategic talent management plan so that performance can be steered to ensure they are well committed, engaged, developing their talents by learning from experiences they gain through secondments and sabbatical leave programs (Armstrong and Taylor, 2020)).  For this, support from top management, higher salaries, safety and health insurance, training and career development opportunities and work-life balance are essential (Piansoongnern et al., 2011).

In the current global context, workers, especially young workers, are less concerned about staying with one or a few employers as their attitudes and values ​​differ from older generations, which can challenge talent management and create skills shortages (Eisner, 2005). For the younger generations, variety in the job and work-life balance are more important, which must be considered in global talent management planning, as different age groups have their priorities.

References:

Aljbour, A., French, E. and Ali, M. 2021. An evidence-based multilevel framework of talent management: a systematic review. International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management. ahead-of-print(ahead-of-print).

Armstrong, M. and Taylor, S. 2020. Armstrong's handbook of human resource management practice.

Ashton, C. and Morton, L. 2005. c. Strategic HR review.

Barkworth, R. 2004. Secondments: A review of current research: A background paper for IES research network members.  Institute for Employment Studies.

Du Plooy, J. and Roodt, G. 2010. Work engagement, burnout and related constructs as predictors of turnover intentions. SA journal of Industrial Psychology. 36(1), pp.1-13.

Eisner, S.P. 2005. Managing generation Y. SAM advanced management journal. 70(4), p4.

Frank, F.D. and Taylor, C.R. 2004. Talent management: Trends that will shape the future. Human Resource Planning. 27(1).

Jöns, H. 2015. Talent mobility and the shifting geographies of Latourian knowledge hubs. Population, Space and Place. 21(4), pp.372-389.

Meyers, M.C. and Van Woerkom, M. 2014. The influence of underlying philosophies on talent management: Theory, implications for practice, and research agenda. Journal of World Business. 49(2), pp.192-203.

North, C., Shortt, M., Bowman, M.A. and Akinkuolie, B. 2021. How Instructional Design Is Operationalized in Various Industries for job-Seeking Learning Designers: Engaging the Talent Development Capability Model. TechTrends. 65(5), pp.713-730.

Piansoongnern, O., Anurit, P. and Kuiyawattananonta, S. 2011. Talent management in Thai cement companies: A study of strategies and factors influencing employee engagement. African Journal of Business Management. 5(5), pp.1578-1583.

Sopiah, S., Kurniawan, D.T., Nora, E. and Narmaditya, B.S. 2020. Does Talent Management Affect Employee Performance?: The Moderating Role of Work Engagement. Journal of Asian Finance Economics and Business. 7(7), pp.335-341.

Vaamonde, J.D., Omar, A. and Salessi, S. 2018. From organizational justice perceptions to turnover intentions: The mediating effects of burnout and job satisfaction. Europe's journal of psychology. 14(3), p554.

 

 

Work Engagement and Job Design

Some jobs are interesting, others boring, some industries are interesting to working with others not. This is partly due to the characteristics of each job.  Job designing is the creation of content, structure, tasks and roles and the environment in which they are performed (Borges-Andrade et al., 2019; Morgeson and Humphrey, 2006). It specifies the content relationship of jobs to ensure productivity, efficiency and quality and to match the job holder’s personal needs, demands with higher standards of engagement (Armstrong and Taylor, 2020).

Job satisfaction is basically a person's feeling of satisfaction with the job. Intrinsic and extrinsic factors can influence job satisfaction, including manager communication, resource support, working conditions, corporate culture, and leadership style (Attridge, 2009; Saad et al., 2021).  Many factors influence job satisfaction and employee wellbeing (Bargsted et al., 2019). For example, a monotonous job may not be satisfying, may not make it feel like the job is meaningful and worthwhile, but it may be a job with a variety of activities. However, variety in the job also requires a wide range of skills and competencies. Research has shown that jobs with a high degree of autonomy, variety of tasks, task importance and feedback are more engaging and satisfying (Shantz et al., 2013).

The job design must be based on the work requirements (Armstrong and Taylor, 2020). It is a challenge to design a job that makes a person more meaningful, emotionally, psychologically, and cognitively engaged in order to perform better (Bailey et al., 2017; Osibanjo et al., 2020). The common job design strategies are job rotation, job enlargement, job enrichment, and job simplification (Rungrueang et al., 2020). When designing jobs, understanding the physical environment and the task environment must be considered (Morgeson and Humphrey, 2006). 

The most important job characteristics are autonomy, diversity of skills, the importance of tasks, feedback on task identity, all contribute to job satisfaction (Ali et al., 2014).  These five main job characteristics lead to three critical psychological states: experience of meaningfulness, responsibility, and knowledge of results. There is a link between the workplace and the employee in terms of skills, experience and employee characteristics. Therefore, employee participation in job design or redesign can improve job characteristics (Guan and Frenkel, 2018; May et al., 2014). Further, employees are more likely to get involved in job crafting when they engage well (Clegg and Spencer, 2007; Wrzesniewski and Dutton, 2001). Research has shown that the work engagement of public-sector workers can be improved by just redesigning their jobs (Hernaus et al., 2017).

However, job satisfaction is mainly determined by intrinsic job components (Huang and Van de Vliert, 2003; Borzaga and Tortia, 2006). Factors such as respectful treatment, recognition and personal achievement are less critical for job satisfaction in countries with low social security, high power distance and high in countries characterized with prosperity and low power distance (Huang and Van de Vliert, 2003). Therefore, careful attention is required when designing jobs in order to make jobs exciting and motivating.

The Work Design Questionnaire (WDQ) can help design jobs (Borzaga and Tortia, 2006). 

The four main elements of the job-Work Design Questionnaire (WDQ) are; 

1. Task characteristics: autonomy, task variety, task significance, task identity, feedback from job,

2. Knowledge characteristics: Job complexity, information processing, problem-solving, skill variety, specialization,

3. Social characteristics: social support, interdependence, interaction outside the organization, feedback from others,

4. Contextual characteristics: ergonomics, physical demands, work conditions, equipment use.

In addition to job satisfaction, increasing the job's complexity has positive and robust effects on stimulating skills development (Russo, 2017). Therefore, redesigning jobs considers including complex and more challenging tasks with high demands. Oftentimes, it is easier to redesign individual tasks or add some suitable quality tasks to a job to redesign it than to design from scratch, as designing and redesigning come at a cost (Sonnentag et al., 2017).

Job characteristics are important in attracting top talent as highly skilled people may look for autonomous and challenging jobs without micromanagement. However, in the public sector, job descriptions or duty lists are flexible for some officers; for instance, field officers enjoy higher autonomy.   

 

References:

Ali, S.A.M., Said, N.A., Yunus, N.a.M., Kader, S.F.A., Latif, D.S.A. and Munap, R. 2014. Hackman and Oldham's Job Characteristics Model to Job Satisfaction. Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences. 129, pp.46-52.

Armstrong, M. and Taylor, S. 2020. Armstrong's handbook of human resource management practice.

Attridge, M. 2009. Measuring and Managing Employee Work Engagement: A Review of the Research and Business Literature. Journal of Workplace Behavioral Health. 24(4), pp.383-398.

Bailey, C., Madden, A., Alfes, K. and Fletcher, L. 2017. The Meaning, Antecedents and Outcomes of Employee Engagement: A Narrative Synthesis. International Journal of Management Reviews. 19(1), pp.31-53.

Bargsted, M., Ramirez-Vielma, R. and Yeves, J. 2019. Professional Self-efficacy and Job Satisfaction: The Mediator Role of Work Design. Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology-Revista De Psicologia Del Trabajo Y De Las Organizaciones. 35(3), pp.157-163.

Borges-Andrade, J.E., Peixoto, A.L.A., Queiroga, F. and Pérez-Nebra, A.R. 2019. Adaptation of the work design questionnaire to Brazil. Revista Psicologia Organizações e Trabalho. 19(3), pp.720-731.

Borzaga, C. and Tortia, E. 2006. Worker motivations, job satisfaction, and loyalty in public and nonprofit social services. Nonprofit and voluntary sector quarterly. 35(2), pp.225-248.

Clegg, C. and Spencer, C. 2007. A circular and dynamic model of the process of job design. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology. 80, pp.321-339.

Guan, X.Y. and Frenkel, S. 2018. How HR practice, work engagement and job crafting influence employee performance. Chinese Management Studies. 12(3), pp.591-607.

Hernaus, T., Vujcic, M.T. and Aleksic, A. 2017. Changing Work Engagement: The Longitudinal Effect of a Job Redesign Intervention Among Public Sector Employees. Strategic Management. 22(2), pp.3-8.

Huang, X. and Van de Vliert, E. 2003. Where intrinsic job satisfaction fails to work: National moderators of intrinsic motivation. Journal of Organizational Behavior: The International Journal of Industrial, Occupational and Organizational Psychology and Behavior. 24(2), pp.159-179.

May, G., Maghazei, O., Taisch, M., Bettoni, A., Cinus, M. and Matarazzo, A. 2014. Toward Human-Centric Factories: Requirements and Design Aspects of a Worker-Centric Job Allocator. In: Advances in Production Management Systems: Innovative and Knowledge-Based Production Management in a Global-Local World, APMS 2014, PT III. pp.417-424.

 Morgeson, F.P. and Humphrey, S.E. 2006. The Work Design Questionnaire (WDQ): developing and validating a comprehensive measure for assessing job design and the nature of work. Journal of applied psychology. 91(6), p1321.

Osibanjo, A., Adeniji, A., Salau, O., Atolagbe, T., Osoko, A., Edewor, O. and Olowu, J. 2020. Bolstering human capital management and engagement in the health sectors. COGENT BUSINESS & MANAGEMENT. 7(1).

Rungrueang, A., Khantanapha, N. and Piriyakul, R. 2020. Study on elements of job design to develop high-performance workforce in the Thai garment industry. International Journal of Advanced and Applied Sciences. 7(8), pp.65-73.

Russo, G. 2017. Job Design and Skill Development In The Workplace.

Saad, M.M., Gaber, H.R. and Labib, A.A. 2021. Investigating the impact of human resource management practices on employee engagement, and the moderating role of strategy implementation in Egypt. SA Journal of Human Resource Management. 19.

Shantz, A., Alfes, K., Truss, C. and Soane, E. 2013. The role of employee engagement in the relationship between job design and task performance, citizenship and deviant behaviours. International Journal of Human Resource Management. 24(13), pp.2608-2627.

Sonnentag, S., Venz, L. and Casper, A. 2017. Advances in recovery research: What have we learned? What should be done next? Journal of occupational health psychology. 22(3), p365.

Wrzesniewski, A. and Dutton, J.E. 2001. Crafting a job: Revisioning employees as active crafters of their work. Academy of management review. 26(2), pp.179-201.