Staff Engagement
www.participationcymru.org.uk

Today we are going
to cover…..
• Who are you?
• What is staff engagement?
• Why do it?
• What makes a healthy organisation?
• How to engage with staff?

What is staff
engagement?
David McLeod & Nina Clarke ‘Engaging for
Success’
Some views:
‘HR is fundamental but HR strategies alone won’t deliver’
‘Staff engagement is when the business values the staff
and the staff values the business’
‘Engagement matters because people matter – they are
your only competitive edge. It is people and not
machines that will make the difference’.

Definitions
“Engagement is about creating opportunities
for staff to connect with their colleagues,
managers and wider organisation. It is also
about creating an environment where staff are
motivated to want to connect with their work
and really care about doing a good job…It is a
concept that places flexibility, change and
continuous improvement at the heart of what it
means to be a member of staff and an
employer in a twenty-first century workplace.”
(Professor Katie Truss)

Definitions
“A positive attitude held by the staff towards the
organisation and its values. An engaged staff is
aware of the business context, and works with
colleagues to improve performance within the
job for the benefit of the organisation. The
organisation must work to develop and nurture
engagement, which requires a two-way
relationship between staff and employer.”
(Institute of Employment Studies)

Definitions
“You sort of smell it, don’t you, that
engagement of people as people.
What goes on in meetings, how
people talk to each other. You get
the sense of energy, engagement,
commitment, belief in what the
organisation stands for,” is how
Lord Currie, former Chair of the
Office of Communications (Ofcom)

Your definition
Ask much
more than
you tell Engagement
is your choice
and
responsibility
I disagree, but
Do it, own it,
I will support
improve it
you
Shut your
mouth, open
your ears

Six words
Exercise:
Using 6 words write your
definition of what staff
engagement means to you

Why do it?
Engaged staff are:
•More productive
•Less prone to absenteeism
•Better with customers, service users
•Less likely to leave
•Responsible for improved quality of service

Benefits
Research shows that engaged staff
are:
•12% more productive
•12% more profitable
•27% less prone to absenteeism
•12% better at engaging with
customers, service users

Benefits
• 51% less likely to be a source of theft
• 62% less likely to be involved in job accidents
• 51% less likely to leave (low turnover
organisations)
• 31% less likely to leave (high turnover
organisations)
(Gallup research in Human Sigma)

Disengaged
Staff
• Undermine the effectiveness of new policies
and initiatives (actively or passively)
• Will react negatively to financial pressures
(consent and evade)
• Will leave as soon as they can
• Will not act as advocates
• May even join outside protests

Effective
Engagement
“The Civil Service faces unprecedented challenges
tackling complex policy issues every day. In order to
meet these challenges we must harness the talents of
all our staff to the full. Our staff engagement
programme enables us to do this by understanding and
improving civil servants’ experience of work, helping to
ensure that they have access to the opportunities they
need to achieve success in their roles. This, in turn,
supports our drive to deliver improved public
services and better outcomes for citizens.”
Sir Gus O’Donnell, Cabinet Secretary and Head of the Home Civil Service.

Effective
Engagement
Effective engagement IS effective
engagement whoever you are engaging
with

The National
Principles for Public
Engagement
• Organisations that want to effectively
engage with the public and their service
users need to engage effectively with staff
• Your staff are your greatest asset in public
engagement
• The Principles for Public Engagement can
be applied to staff engagement

Effective Staff
Engagement
Key enablers:
2.Strategic narrative
3.Enabling managers
4.Staff Voice
5.Integrity

3. Staff Voice
There is an informed staff voice throughout the
organisation, for reinforcing and challenging views;
between functions & externally; staff are seen as
part of the solution – not the problem.

4. Integrity
The Values on the wall are
reflected in day to day behaviours

Your
organisation
What shape are you in?

Engaging
questions
In pairs discuss these questions and be
prepared to feedback some of your thoughts
•When it comes to your organisation what
are the stories that come to staff’s minds?
•How are voices of members of staff heard in
your organisation?
•What one new thing could you choose to do
continuously that would foster better staff
engagement?

A healthy
organisation
1. Clear purpose (the BIG idea) that all
staff can relate to
2. Atmosphere of confidence where people
are interested in each other
3. Staff who respect each other and work
well together
4. Staff ‘go the extra mile’
5. Opportunities for personal growth
6. Personally driven staff

Engaging
Leaders
CEO’s: Chief Engagement Officers
Look at the attributes of an effective
engaging leader and ask yourselves the
question on a score of 1 (Low) – 10 (high)
how effective am I as a leader or manager

Tools and
Techniques
• Engagement is a process and NOT an event
• It needs to be part of everyone’s job
• There are tools to enable engagement to happen but
remember ‘No one ever got a pig fat by weighing it!’

Tools and
Techniques
Ways to gauge engagement….
•Satisfaction surveys
•Forums
•Focus groups
•Annual conference
•Regular meetings
•Updates
•Exit surveys
•Temperature check surveys
•Suggestion schemes
•Union partnership agreements

3 key elements

3 key elements
An attitude: An employee feeling a sense of
pride and loyalty in the place they work
A behaviour: be a great advocate of their
organisation to clients / service users, or go the
extra mile to finish a piece of work
An outcome: lower accident rates, higher
productivity, fewer conflicts, more innovation,
lower numbers leaving and reduced sickness
rates