Engaged employees 20 points better than the disengaged

The Corporate Leadership Council (CLC) conducted a survey among 50,000 employees in 27 countries in 10 different industries to determine the effect of employee engagement on performance.

 It revealed that highly committed employees perform better than less committed employees with a 20 percentile point edge. This is a manifestation of the need for companies to determine what it is that will motivate their employees to perform their jobs better. This is where the concept of motivation metrics comes in very handy.

The study previously mentioned also revealed that unless employees become highly engaged, they will not exert the level of effort that is required from them in order to contribute to organiaational success. Employee engagement is revealed to be proportional to the level of employee commitment. Commitment is generally categorised into two, rational and emotional.

Rational commitment is defined as the factual, objective, and intellectual reasoning that influence employees to remain in their jobs. These may include salary, work hours, sick leave privileges, or health benefits. Emotional commitment, on the other hand, refers to the feelings that employees have toward their job, like their perceived value in the organisation or the kind of relationship that they have with their supervisors. Emotional commitment is the driving force behind “discretionary effort” or the extent to which an employee is willing to work, even beyond the level required from them. This brought forth the urgency for managers to identify how they should motivate their employees in order to increase their commitment towards their jobs.

In many business organisations, motivation, or the lack thereof, is regarded as an important issue. In fact, it is widely acknowledged by managers that there is an utmost need for them to always be on the lookout for techniques that will positively influence motivation. Moreover, they also need to understand and explain why some techniques work and why others fail. Fortunately for managers, various workshops on employee engagement and motivation are now offered.