INTRODUCTION:

Human resource managers have long maintained that employees are the most valuable asset for an organization. Human resource plays a significant role in effective exploitation of other resources for the attainment of the desired goals. It all dates back to the emergence of human relations school with the contribution of Elton Mayo in the first quarter of the twentieth century. Organizations are seen as social system and productivity is influenced by an employee’s motivation at work. Organizations should focus on boosting employee’s morale and satisfaction level as the individual performance of employees’ aggregates as organization performance.

Today, when organizations are facing cut-throat competition in dynamic business environment, the question which comes up is that - can organizations achieve its goals if employees are simply going through motions at work but are not fully engaged? Many contemporary organizations have refocused their attention on fostering employee engagement because it is not just an employee but an engaged employee who is the most valuable asset for a firm.

In the past two decades, voluminous literature has been created in the domain of employee engagement which shows a great deal of curiosity among practitioners and academicians (Saks, 2006). Researchers have shown positive outcomes of employee engagement for organization such as better task performance (Rich et.al, 2010; Shuck, 2010; Soane et.al, 2012), enhanced profitability (Lockwood, 2007; Robinson et.al, 2008; Salanova et.al, 2005), retention (Levinson, 2007; Blessings white, 2008) customer satisfaction and loyalty (Bates, 2004; Saks, 2006; Salanova et.al, 2005; Levinson, 2007). The organizations are refocusing their attention on fostering employee engagement as a driver of organizational success. The recent workplace changes like restructuring of jobs, technological changes, globalization and cut-throat competition are increasing the level of anxiety, ambiguity and fatigue of workforce making them disengaged (Cartwright and Holmes, 2006). A recent study by Gallup¹ found that the level of engagement of US employees is stagnant. Majority of employees (50.8%) were “not engaged” while other employees (17.2%) were “actively disengaged”. This poses a matter of concern as organizations, today are viewing their employees as strategic business partners and their active disengagement can affect an employee’s performance thereby affecting organizational performance.

Organizations are realizing that they cannot function only with contractual relationships with the employees. Employees need to be fully engaged to go that extra mile for the success of their employer. Employee engagement is one of the workplace approaches which results in the right conditions for the employees to put their best foot forward, be committed to their job and organization, enhance their sense of well-being and be motivated to give their best for organizational success. Engagement enables employees to invest themselves fully in their work which has positive impact on their health and well-being (Rothbard, 2001; Cartwright and Holmes, 2006, Mauno et.al, 2007, Lockwood, 2007), improves self efficacy (Luthans and Peterson, 2002) and helps them attain their personal goals.

The increasing awareness that employee engagement is vital for organizational success has led to immense focus on employee engagement by academicians and practitioners. The presence of voluminous literature on employee engagement shows great deal of scope for discussing various definitions in different conceptual spaces. This paper explores the historical development of the construct by studying different perspectives of employee engagement and finding areas of consistency and inconsistency throughout the literature. The paper tries to synthesize the literature and bring clarity on the construct for both academicians and practitioners.

Conceptualization of Employee Engagement Kahn’s Theory of Personal Engagement:

Many scholars (Shuck and Wollard, 2010; Soane et.al, 2012; Parker, 2015 etc.) state that the term engagement was coined by Kahn (1990) who developed a conceptual framework of engagement based on the grounded theory approach by understanding the experiences, perceptions and behaviours of people in two different settings of a summer camp and an architecture firm. He explored the moments in which people attach or detach themselves from their work roles. He conceptualized personal engagement as the harnessing of organization members' selves to their work roles. In engagement, people employ and express themselves physically, cognitively, and emotionally during their role performances (Kahn, 1990, p. 694). Engagement is described as a psychological construct with three conditions - psychological meaningfulness, psychological safety and psychological availability. Kahn (1990) believed that individual, group and organizational factors influence the psychological experience of work which affects a person’s attitude and behaviour.

Psychological Meaningfulness:

Psychological meaningfulness is the sense of return on investments of self in role performances (Kahn, 1990, p. 705). It refers to the employees’ feeling that the work they do makes a contribution. Employees feel worthwhile, important and useful when they perceive to have made a difference with their work. Psychological Meaningfulness is influenced by three factors- task characteristics, role characteristics and work interactions. The work employees do should be clear, challenging, creative and autonomous for them to experience meaningfulness of work. They like to see themselves in work roles which they think fits them well as per their status and image and want rewarding inter-personal interactions with peers and clients.

Psychological Safety:

Employees want to feel trusted and secured at workplace. Psychological safety is the sense of being able to show and employ self without fear of negative consequences to self-image, status, or career (Kahn, 1990, p.705). It is believed that a sense of safety allows employees to show their preferred self at work and take risks without the fear of failure. The factors which influence psychological safety are interpersonal relationships, group and inter-group dynamics, management style and organizational norms (Kahn, 1990). An employee experiences a sense of psychological safety at work when his interpersonal relationships offer him support, flexibility, trust and openness; leader’s behaviour is consistent, trusting and supporting; group dynamics and organizational norms offer room for expressing and investing himself during his role performances.

Psychological Availability:

Both work and non-work aspects of life can be demanding which distracts an employee to be engaged at work (Kahn, 1990). Psychological availability is the sense of possessing the physical, emotional, and psychological resources necessary for investing self in role performance (Kahn, 1990, p 705). It measures the readiness of an employee to be engaged. The sense of psychological availability is influenced by an employee’s physical energy, emotional energy, and security and outside life (Kahn, 1990). The possession of physical and emotional resources and confidence in their abilities makes an employee available to be engaged at work. Issues in an employee’s outside life also affect his psychological availability at work.

The three psychological conditions of personal engagement conceptualized by Kahn are often cited as the foundation of various measurement tools of employee engagement (May et. al, 2004; Shuck and Wollard, 2010; Shuck, 2010; Rich et.al, 2010; Soane et.al, 2012). Kahn (1992) reexamined the meaning of psychological presence at work and found that employees would not be fully engaged at work until their basic needs of meaningfulness, safety and availability were met from their work experience. It was noted that engagement is observed through behavioural investment of physical, cognitive and emotional energy into work-role (Kahn, 1992).

Building on Kahn’s work, May et.al (2004) explored the mediating effects of psychological conditions (meaningfulness, safety and availability) on employee engagement. It was the first study to empirically examine Kahn’s theory (Shuck, 2010) and found all three psychological conditions to be positively related with employee engagement (May et.al, 2004). Psychological meaningfulness exhibited the strongest relation with employee engagement and was influenced by three workplace dimensions namely job enrichment, work-role fit and co-worker relations. Psychological safety was found to be positively related with supporting supervisor and rewarding co-worker relations while negatively related with adherence to co-worker norms and self-consciousness. Psychological availability was found to be positively associated with resources while negatively related to participation in outside activities (May et.al, 2004).

Another study (Rich et.al, 2010) used Kahn’s theory of psychological conditions to conceptualize various antecedents of employee engagement namely value congruence, perceived organizational support and core self-evaluations. An employee experiences psychological meaningfulness when his work-roles demand behaviours which are congruent with how they see themselves (value congruence). A sense of psychological safety comes when an employee perceives high organizational support which reduces ambiguity and fear of failure (perceived organizational support). Employee experiences psychological availability after appraising his worthiness at work (core self-evaluation). It was found that employee engagement mediates the relationship between these antecedents and job performance (Rich et.al, 2010).

Gruman and Saks (2011) used Kahn’s conceptualization to develop a new theory of employee engagement with performance as the driver. Soane et.al (2012) developed an engagement measurement tool - Intellectual social affective (ISA) engagement scale based on Kahn’s theory. Employee engagement was found to have three requirements of work-role focus, activation and positive affect (Soane et.al, 2010). In 2010, Kahn emphasized that leaders should focus on creating the three psychological conditions at work and reconfirmed that they influence the task performance of an employee at work (Albrecht, 2010).

Burnout-Antithesis Approach:

In the first decade of the twentieth century Kahn’s conceptualization of personal engagement saw another dimension which came out as burnout-antithesis. Employee engagement has been viewed as a remedy to deal with job burnouts (Shuck, 2010; Shuck and Wollard, 2010; Parker, 2015). Job stress, exhaustion and burnout are viewed as occupational hazards which impair psychological well-being and strain work experience of an employee (Cartwright and Holmes, 2006; Maslach and Leiter, 2008). As researchers (Leiter and Maslach, 1998; Maslach et. al., 2001; Leiter and Maslach, 2005; Schaufeli et.al, 2002; Cartwright and Holmes, 2006; Maslach and Leiter, 2008, 2010) started finding the causes of job burnout, engagement emerged as an antithesis of burnout and it got defined as - an energetic state of involvement with personally fulfilling activities that enhance one’s sense of professional efficacy (Leiter and Maslach, 1998).

Further, Leiter and Maslach (2005) explained the psychological state of an employee on a continuum ranging from burnout to engagement. The three dimensions of the continuum are exhaustion – energy, cynicism – involvement, and inefficacy – efficacy (Leiter and Maslach, 2005). The exhaustion dimension represents the feelings of depletion of one’s physical and emotional resources. Emotional and physical work stress causes withdrawal of energy from job. The cynicism component refers to the callous attitude of the employee towards his/her work. The employee experiences a lack of involvement and disengages from job. The third dimension of inefficacy represents the feelings of inability and lack of productivity at work (Leiter and Maslach, 2005). The three dimensions of engagement – energy, involvement and efficacy were viewed as opposites of the three dimensions of burnout – exhaustion, cynicism and inefficacy respectively (Leiter and Maslach, 2005). Engagement was considered as the desired goal of organizational interventions to reduce job burnout.

Under this approach, engagement was measured with the reverse scores on Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) (Maslach and Leiter, 1997, Maslach et.al, 2001). According to MBI, engagement is considered as the opposite of burnout which meant low scores of exhaustion and cynicism and high score of efficacy which would mean that an employee is engaged. It was thought that anyone not experiencing burnout would be engaged (Shuck, 2010, p. 26). Schaufeli et.al (2002) tested the MBI and found a negative relation between burnout and engagement. Engagement was conceptualized as - a positive, fulfilling, work-related state of mind that is characterized by vigor, dedication, and absorption (Schaufeli et. al., 2002). Engagement was then operationalized with its own dimensions and not assessed as the opposite profile of MBI. Shorim (2003) supported burnout antithesis approach and suggested that engagement could be differentiated from other constructs like flow and commitment as a result of various studies on burnout (Maslach et.al, 2001; Schaufeli et.al, 2002).

The Gallup’s approach:

Traditionally, the focus of psychology has been on the negatives rather than the positives. In 2002, Gallup’s approach to view engagement by looking at positive aspects rather than negative marked the beginning of positive psychology on employee engagement (Shuck, 2010; Welch, 2011; Parker, 2015). One of the widely cited practitioner’s literatures on employee engagement was published by Harter et.al (2002) who defined employee engagement as - the satisfaction, involvement and enthusiasm of the employee at work (Harter et.al, 2002, p. 417). The Gallup Work Audit (GWA), a 12 item instrument, was used to measure the presence of engagement among employees. The pioneers in employee engagement movement, Gallup states that engaged employees are passionate, creative, entrepreneurial and their enthusiasm fuels growth. Employees are engaged when they know what is expected out of them, have what they need to do work, have opportunities to feel an impact and fulfillment in their work, perceive that they are a part of something significant with co-workers whom they trust and have chances to improve and develop (Harter et. al., 2002).

Harter et.al (2002) linked employee engagement with positive outcomes for business units by using data from 7939 units in 36 companies. Their research acted as a catalyst in increasing the interest among practitioners for employee engagement as it focused on the correlation between employee engagement and profitability, productivity, turnover and customer satisfaction. This research viewed employee engagement from the organization’s point of view rather than an individual’s point of view (Shuck and Wollard, 2010). This construct was different from the previous definitions of employee engagement as it focused on the positive organizational outcomes rather than engagement being an individual’s psychological experience (Wefald and Downey, 2009; Parker, 2015). Employee engagement got described as a two-way relationship between the organization and the employees as the organizations can directly influence and benefit from the high level of engagement of employees (Welch, 2011). Different studies (Corporate Leadership Council, 2004; Lockwood, 2007; Towers Perrin Global Workforce study, 2008) found that the organizations could play a significant role in creating a more engaged workforce and achieving business outcomes which high engagement delivers.

Luthans and Peterson (2002) extended the work of Harter et.al (2002) by examining the relation between employee engagement, manager’s self efficacy and perception of effective management practices. A strong relation was found between employee engagement and manager’s self efficacy when managers rated employee effectiveness and when employees rated manager’s effectiveness. They concluded that successful business units have people doing what they do best, with people they like and have a strong psychological ownership (Luthans and Peterson, 2002, p. 376). Arakawa and Greenberg (2007) also explored the manager’s role in employee engagement and provided empirical support for GWA model.

Job Demand – Resource Model:

While practitioners were looking at ways for capitalizing the positive outcomes of employee engagement, Demerouti et.al (2001) developed a model which viewed employee engagement through the lens of job characteristics. The basic premise of this model is that job characteristics can be divided into two categories of job demands and job resources. Job demands are defined as physical, psychological, social or organizational features of a job which require physical and/or psychological effort from an employee. Workload, work-family conflicts, job insecurity, role conflicts are some of the job demands (Bakker and Demerouti, 2006). On the other hand, job resources were the physical, psychological, social, or organizational features of the job which are functional in achieving work goals, reduce job demands and stimulate personal development (Demerouti et. al, 2001; Mauno et.al, 2007). Some of the job resources are pay, clarity of work, career opportunities, task identity, autonomy (Bakker and Demerouti, 2006).The job demand - resource model suggested that burnout happens in two situations - either when job demands are at a level which causes exhaustion or job resources are limited which leads to one’s physical and psychological withdrawal from work (Bakker and Demerouti, 2006). On the other hand, engagement happens when job resources are adequate to meet and exceed the job demands (Demerouti et.al, 2001). Employees who lack the job resources are likely to lose more resources as they feel burnout which creates a loss spiral (Bakker and Demerouti, 2008). On the other hand, gaining resources boosts engagement level of the employee. Employees feel highly engaged when they possess better resources even when their job demands are high (Bakker and Demerouti, 2006).

In this model, Schaufeli et.al. (2002) defined engagement in terms of three components of absorption, vigor and dedication. Absorption is the total concentration and immersion in work which makes time passing quickly and an employee finds it difficult to detach him from work. High levels of energy, employee willingness to take appreciable efforts and persistence constitutes vigor. Strong psychological involvement in one’s work along with a sense of meaningfulness, enthusiasm and pride define dedication at work (Schaufeli et. al, 2002, p.75). This construct of engagement is in contrast with the burnout engagement model. Firstly, engagement is measured as low scores on the burnout scale under burnout anti-thesis approach. However, engagement is viewed as a separate construct having its own dimensions of vigor, absorption and dedication under the job-demand resource model. Secondly, exhaustion is described as a component of disengagement under the burnout antithesis approach (Leiter and Maslach, 2005) but exhaustion and disengagement are described as separate phenomena under Job-demand resource model which can happen simultaneously (Demerouti et.al, 2001). It was found that disengagement happen due to lack of job resources leading to withdrawal and detachment of a person from his work (Bakker and Demerouti, 2006).

A two-wave longitudinal study conducted over a three weeks period (Llorens et.al, 2004) investigated the relation between job resources (time control and method control), efficacy and engagement using Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES) (Schaufeli et. al., 2002). This study conducted among the university students showed that personal resources mediated the relationship between task resources and work engagement. Engagement in turn boosts the efficacy beliefs which increase task resources over time creating a gain spiral. Another longitudinal study (Mauno et.al. 2007) measured work engagement using UWES (as given by Schaufeli et.al, 2002) for a two-year time period in natural work settings among healthcare personnel in Finland. Job insecurity, time demands of work, work-to-family conflicts were taken as job demands while job control, organization based self-esteem (OBSE) and management quality were considered as the job resources. The study found that job resources predicted engagement better than job demands. Job control and OBSE were the best predictors of the three dimensions of engagement – vigor, absorption and dedication (Mauno et.al, 2007).

Engagement Management Model:

The first academic research to conceptualize the antecedents and consequences of employee engagement was done by Saks (2006). Based on the social exchange theory, employee engagement was defined as a construct which consists of cognitive, emotional and behavioural components associated with individual role performances (Saks, 2006, p.602). Job engagement and organizational engagement were conceptualized as two distinct types of employee engagement having different antecedents (Saks, 2006). The definition by Saks (2006) was inclusive of the previous literature focusing on the cognitive as well as behavioural aspect of employee engagement and tried to bridge the gap between previous theories by academicians and practitioners (Shuck and Wollard, 2010). However, it was argued that employee engagement is doing what one is supposed to do and not about being innovative (Saks, 2008). It was believed that discretionary effort by an employee is an outcome of engagement and not engagement itself (Saks, 2008).

Gruman and Saks (2011) created Engagement Management model which focused on job performance for enhancing employee engagement. The engagement management model was based on Kahn’s theory of personal engagement and Job demand – resource model (Kahn, 1990; Bakker and Demerouti, 2006; Gruman and Saks, 2011). It was argued by Gruman and Saks (2011) that the performance management processes provide the resources to employees which lead to the three psychological conditions of meaningfulness, safety and availability which in turn create high engagement levels (p. 128).

The engagement management model consists of three stages of performance agreement, engagement facilitation and performance and engagement appraisal. Goals set for the employees help them understand what is expected out of them. It was found that the inclusion of personal goals of employees with organizational goals enhances engagement through personal investment (Gruman and Saks, 2011). Employees also were found having some explicit and implicit expectations from the organization which manifests in their psychological contracts (Gruman and Saks, 2011) and a breakdown of these expectations by organizations result in disengagement of employees (Parker, 2015). The second stage of engagement facilitation focused on providing employees with necessary resources to fully engage them. Under this, the employees were given a say in their job designs, work roles and assignments to experience psychological meaningfulness (Kahn, 1990; Gruman and Saks, 2011). Coaching and social support also had a role to play to foster engagement and psychological safety (Gruman and Saks, 2011; Kahn, 1990). Transformational leadership motivates employees to improve their performance and training helps employees to cope with job demands enhancing their psychological availability at work (Gruman and Saks, 2011). The third stage of this model was performance and engagement appraisal which assessed the engagement behaviour of employees (Gruman and Saks, 2011). Fairness and justice in the appraisal mechanism was found to be vital for enhancing employee engagement (Jones and Harter, 2005; Bhatnagar and Biswas, 2010) and it was suggested that the employees should be provided with constructive feedback to enhance their performance at work (Mone et. al., 2011, Gruman and Saks, 2011).

Mone et.al. (2011) provided support for engagement-management model. Performance management activities such as setting goals, ongoing feedback and recognition, managing employee development, conducting appraisals and building trust enhanced engagement among employees. The study emphasized that organizations should focus on performance management to drive employee engagement.

The three facets of employee engagement:

The concept of employee engagement was brought to the center stage by Macey and Schneider (2008) explaining the three facets of engagement, viz., psychological, behavioural and trait engagement. This multidimensional construct of employee engagement subsumed the previous definitions given by researchers (Shuck, 2010) and conceptualized trait engagement as the third facet of employee engagement in addition to psychological and behavioural engagement. An employee’s psychological engagement was found to be embracing job satisfaction, organizational commitment, job involvement and the feelings of empowerment (Macey and Schneider, 2008). The construct of psychological state engagement was viewed as old wine in new bottle as it overlapped with the existing constructs (Macey and Schneider, 2008, Newman and Harrison, 2008). The second facet of behavioural engagement considered it to be something extra or special rather than typical performance. It implied going beyond the usual or typical and demonstrating innovative and adaptive performances (Macey and Schneider, 2011; Masson et.al, 2008; Towers Perrin Global Workforce study, 2008). Organizational Citizenship Behaviour (OCB), role expansion, proactive personal initiatives taken by employees demonstrated behavioural engagement (Macey and Schneider, 2008; Soane et.al, 2012; Rich et.al, 2010; Masson et.al, 2008; Jones and Harter, 2005). The third facet of trait engagement included the attributes of employees which yield state and behavioural engagement (Macey and Schneider, 2008). Employees’ traits like positive affectivity, conscientiousness, proactive and autotelic personality interact with the workplace conditions to foster employee engagement (Macey and Schneider, 2008). This construct emphasized that organizations should focus on fostering psychological, trait and behavioural engagement to be able to benefit from them.

The construct of trait engagement given by Macey and Schneider (2008) was supported in literature. It was believed that traits of employees would make employees more inclined to experience engagement at workplace (Masson et.al, 2008). Newman and Harrison (2008) reviewed Macey and Schneider’s (2008) construct and argued that psychological state engagement is a redundant construct as it overlaps with the construct of job attitude. They defined employee engagement as - behavioural provision of time and energy into one’s work (p.34). Dalal et.al. (2008) also made modifications to Macey and Schneider’s (2008) construct by defining engagement as a cognitive affective construct. They argued that trait and behavioural engagement are dispositional antecedents and behavioural consequences of engagement respectively.

Areas of consistency and inconsistency:

The review of literature unfolds several definitions of employee engagement. While these models represent a unique perspective of employee engagement, it is also important to look at engagement from practitioner’s point of view. Smith and Markwick (2009) listed definitions of employee engagement given by various organizations. According to Vodafone² - employee engagement is an outcome measured or seen as a result of people being committed to something or someone in the business- a very best effort that is willingly seen.Dell³ refers to being engaged as giving time and talent to team building activities. Barclays⁴ define engagement as the extent to which an employee feels a sense of attachment to the organization he or she works for, believes in goals and support its values. Nokia Siemens Network define engagement as an emotional attachment to organization, pride and willingness to be an advocate of the organization, a rational understanding of organization’s strategic goals and values and how employees fit, motivation and willingness to invest discretionary effort to go above and beyond.⁵ Leeds Metropolitan University refers it as using talents to full wherever possible.⁶ University of York defines it as a combination of commitment to organization and its values plus a willingness to help out colleagues.⁷Thus, practitioners look at employee engagement as positive outcomes for the organization due to employees’ contribution and their positive experience at work. The literature review revealed the presence of various overlapping definitions but with distinct differences when used by the organizations. Wefald and Downey (2009) and Shuck and Wollard (2010) stated that a lack of precision in defining engagement creates a conceptual chaos. We identify various areas of consistency and inconsistency from the literature which has been reviewed above.

The first inconsistency in the literature concerns the type of employee engagement. Some authors define employee engagement as a psychological construct (Kahn 1990; Rothbard, 2001; Maslach et.al, 2001; Hallberg and Schaufeli, 2006; Wefald and Downey, 2009) while others focus on the behavioural aspect of engagement (Tasker, 2004; Jones and Harter, 2005; Masson et.al, 2008; Pati and Kumar, 2011; Newman and Harrison, 2008). In some definitions (Saks, 2006; Macey and Schneider, 2008, Shuck and Wollard, 2010, CIPD, 2015) different types of engagement- cognitive, behavioural and emotional are identified. Saks (2006) empirically tested the idea of engagement being a multi-dimensional construct and found different antecedents and consequences of job and organizational engagement. Building on the same lines, Macey and Schneider (2008) took a holistic view of employee engagement- psychological, behavioural and trait engagement having different variables. They argued that looking at engagement from different perspectives would open new possibilities for organizations for developing engagement strategies. Understanding the different types of employee engagement becomes imperative as each have different antecedents and consequences (Macey and Schneider, 2008; Saks, 2008). It is unwise for an organization to keep focusing on behavioural engagement when psychological and trait engagement precede the behaviour of an employee (Macey and Schneider, 2008; Shuck and Wollard, 2010).

But some authors (Dalal et.al, 2008, Saks, 2008) expressed a different opinion when they viewed engagement as a cognitive-affective construct and not a dispositional-behavioural construct as these were dispositional antecedents and behavioural consequences of engagement and not engagement itself.

Consistently, the researchers (Kahn, 1990; Macey and Schneider, 2008; Shuck and Wollard, 2010; Gruman and Saks, 2011, Parker, 2015) agree that employee engagement has its manifestation in behaviour of the employees. Behavioural manifestation of employee engagement is consistently seen as an employee’s internal decision which is positive for the organization (Shuck and Wollard, 2010) but inconsistently understood in the literature as discretionary effort (PHRPS Research Committee, 2002; Blizzard, 2004; Readership Institute, 2004; Macey and Schneider, 2008; Masson et.al, 2008), employee’s work performance (Jones and Harter, 2005; Newman and Harrison, 2008; Blessings White, 2008; Gruman and Saks, 2011; Pati and Kumar, 2011) or organization’s success and profits (Robinson et.al, 2004; Lockwood, 2007; Towers Perrin study, 2008; Nayar, 2010).

Another inconsistency is about the decision to become engaged. Some researchers (Kahn, 1990; Saks, 2006; Macey and Schneider, 2008) view engagement as a personal decision of the employee to be engaged. This personal experience of employee engagement is inseparable from the employee (Shuck and Wollard, 2010). On the other hand, some practitioners (Robinson et.al, 2004; Lockwood, 2007) consider employee engagement as an organizational level variable to leverage high engagement levels of employees for achieving organizational success⁸. This confusion arises as organizations view the macro aspect while academicians focus on the micro aspect of employee engagement.

The literature review also reveals confusion about the distinctiveness of employee engagement from satisfaction, commitment and involvement. There has been skepticism about employee engagement being a unique construct or just old wine in new bottle. Some definitions equate engagement with employee satisfaction (Harter et.al, 2002; Blessings White, 2008, 2011; Newman and Harrison, 2008) while many suggest that employee engagement is broader and distinct from satisfaction (Koscec, 2003; Bates, 2004; Blizzard, 2004). Both satisfaction and engagement have differences in terms of their measurement. An employee may be satisfied with job but not necessarily engaged at work (Koscec, 2003; Macey and Schneider, 2008; Frese, 2008). Perelman (2007) suggests that difference lies in execution of discretionary effort by an employee. A satisfied employee will not go an extra mile to do the work while an engaged employee doesn’t think twice before pulling out all of the stops.

Commitment and engagement are also interchangeably used in literature (Newman and Harrison, 2008)⁹ but are also considered to be distinct concepts (May et.al, 2004; Hallberg and Schaufeli, 2006). Robinson et.al (2004) compared engagement with involvement and OCB and by no means found them to be perfect match of each other. Employee engagement was defined as a unique construct by Saks (2008) who argued that defining it in terms of older construct is just muddying the concept of engagement and coming back to point where one started from. Employee engagement is not old wine in a new bottle rather it is made up of many wines and spirits. (Saks, 2008, p. 40).

CONCLUSION:

This review paper explores the development of the construct of employee engagement using different perspectives from literature as published in prominent academic journals as well as some of the organizational practices. A clear gap exists in the foundation of the construct. The presence of numerous, often inconsistent, definitions of employee engagement indicate the lack of conceptual clarity. However, lack of precision in conceptualization of employee engagement does not indicate the lack of practical utility. Researchers have shown employee engagement has a significant positive impact on organizational performance. Engagement is a positive experience in itself for the employee. It is a matter of concern for both HR scholars and practitioners to measure the engagement level of employees and capitalize it for organization’s success. However, the absence of a distinct meaning of employee engagement poses challenges for the organizations to develop strategies and tools to appreciate the potential of highly engaged workforce and leverage it.

Throughout literature, employee engagement is inconsistently conceptualized by various academicians, practitioners and consultants but consistently seen as an employee’s positive attitude towards job and the organization which enables him/her to process changes and enhance individual’s performance for the benefit of the organization. The review of literature also shows employee engagement constituting three components of cognitive, affective and behavioural engagement at both the levels of job as well as organization. Cognitive engagement would be directed towards an employee’s understanding of his/her organization’s goals and the knowledge of what is expected out of him/her at the workplace. Affective engagement would show the feelings of the employee towards work and the organization. Both cognitive and affective engagements are manifested in the behaviour of the employees. Behavioural engagement would demonstrate the discretionary efforts and pro-active initiatives undertaken by an employee to contribute productively at work.

Another finding from the literature review is that employee engagement is a two-way proposition between the employer and the employee. It is important to understand the needs and expectations of the employees from their work and the organization. HR managers have a key role in enabling engagement among employees by linking individual and organizational goals.

Lastly, engagement is an individual level construct as it is the choice of an employee to invest himself/herself or not. Employee engagement is a personal decision of every employee and organizations should focus on the individual variables to foster it. Looking at engagement from organizational perspective will only help top managers to get an overall reading of the engagement level.

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Endnotes:

1. Gallup conducted a survey in 2016 on the basis of GWA on US employees to examine their level of Engagement. The report and snippets are available at http://www.gallup. com/topic/employee_engagement.aspx

2. This statement about Vodafone’s conceptualization of Employee Engagement and strategy is available at www.xperthr.co.uk/editors-choice/vodafones-entertaining-employee-engagement-strategy/85399

3. Dell’s implementation of employee engagement is cited from www.scribd.com/document/employee-engagement-implemented-by-Dell-Cp

4. Cited in Smith and Markwick, 2009

5. See Corporate Responsibility Report 2008 by Nokia Siemens Networks Retrieved from http://www.nokia.com/sites/default/files/nsn_cr_report_2008_full.pdf

6. See Leeds Metropolitan University, Employee engagement, www.leedsmet.ac.uk

7. Cited in Mishra et.al, 2012

8. Apart from Robinson et.al, 2004 and Lockwood, 2007, Best Companies to Work For (www.bestcompanies.co.uk) developed Workplace Insight Tool which also considers employee engagement as an important lever for organizational success.

9. It is also used interchangeably at Vodafone (www.xperthr.co.uk/editors-choice/vodafones-entertaining-employee-engagement-strategy/85399)

Annexure

Review of Employee Engagement Theories

Study	Major contributions	Variables
Kahn,1990 (ER)	· Theoretical framework of personal engagement and disengagement. · First study to define the construct of engagement. · Conceptualized three psychological conditions of psychological meaningfulness, safety and availability.	· Psychological meaningfulness [task characteristics, role characteristics, interpersonal relations · Psychological safety[Interpersonal relationships, group and inter-group dynamics, management style and organizational norms] · Psychological availability-[physical energy, emotional energy, security and outside life]
Kahn, 1992(CR)	· Explored psychological presence in workplace context. · Introduced the concept of meeting the basic needs of meaningfulness, safety and availability as a function of engagement.
May et.al, 2004(ER)	· First research to empirically test the psychological conditions given by Kahn (1990). · Found all psychological conditions to be positively related with employee engagement.	· Psychological Meaningfulness[ job enrichment, work-role fit and co-worker relations (Positively related) · Psychological safety- supervisor and co-worker relations (positively related), adherence to co-worker norms and self-consciousness (negatively related). · Psychological availability- Resources (positively related) and outside activities (negatively related).
Rich et.al, 2010 (ER)	· Based their employee engagement measurement instrument on Kahn’s theory. · Found that employee engagement mediates the relationship between its antecedents and job performance.	· Value congruence · Perceived organizational support · Core self-evaluations
Maslach et.al, 2001 (CR)	· First major work on employee engagement after Kahn’s conceptualization of personal engagement. · Conceptualized engagement as an opposite of burnout.
Leiter and Maslach, 2005 (CR)	· Developed a continuum ranging from burnout to engagement. · The three dimensions of continuum ranged from exhaustion– energy, cynicism–involvement, and inefficacy– efficacy.	· Energy · Involvement · Efficacy
Schaufeli et.al, 2002 (ER)	· Tested MBI model and found negative relation between burnout and engagement. · Conceptualized engagement with dimensions of vigor, absorption and dedication.	· Vigor · Absorption · Dedication
Shorim, 2003 (CR)	· Engagement was separated from other constructs of flow and commitment as a result of antithesis of burnout.
Harter et.al, 2002 (MA)	· First study to link employee engagement with business unit outcomes. · Linked employee engagement with profitability, productivity, customer satisfaction and loyalty. · Looked at employee engagement from organization’s point of view.	· Satisfaction · Involvement
Luthans and Peterson, 2002 (ER)	· Extended Harter et.al’s work and found positive relation between employee engagement and manager’s self efficacy.
Arakawa and Greenberg, 2007 (ER)	· Explored role of managers in employee engagement. · Found that management style influences employee engagement, optimism and team performance.
Demerouti et.al, 2001 (ER)	· of an employee. First study to conceptualize engagement from the perspective of job demands and job resources. · Job demands – physical work load, time pressure, physical environment, shift work and recipient contact. · Job resources- feedback, rewards, job control, participation, job security and supervisor support. · Job demands caused exhaustion while lack of job resources caused disengagement	· Job demands · Job resources
Bakker and Demerouti, 2006 (CR)	· Encompass Demand control model (DCM) and Effort reward imbalance model (ERI) to develop Job demand-resource model in a flexible and rigorous manner. · Engagement happens when job resources are adequate to meet and exceed the job demands.
Llorens et.al 2004 (ER)	· Investigated the relation between job resources (time control and method control), efficacy and engagement. · Personal resources mediated the relationship between task resources and work engagement. · Engagement boosts the efficacy beliefs which in turn increase task resources over time creating a gain spiral.
Mauno et.al, 2007 (ER)	· Job resources predicted engagement better than job demands. · Job control and organization-based self esteem (OBSE) were the best predictors of the three dimensions of engagement –vigor, absorption and dedication.
Saks, 2006 (ER)	· First academic research to conceptualize the antecedents and consequences of employee engagement. · Job engagement and organizational engagement were conceptualized as two distinct types of employee engagement.
Gruman and Saks, 2011 (CR)	· Developed a model to foster engagement through performance management. · The three stages of the model are performance agreement, engagement facilitation and performance and engagement appraisal.	· Performance Agreement · Engagement facilitation · Performance and engagement appraisal
Mone et.al, 2011 (CR)	· Concluded that organizations should focus on performance management to drive employee engagement. · Activities such as setting goals, ongoing feedback and recognition, managing employee development, conducting appraisals and building trust enhanced engagement among employees.
Macey and Schneider, 2008 (CR)	· Defined three facets of employee engagement- Psychological, trait and Behavioural engagement. · Psychological engagement embraces in job satisfaction, organizational commitment, job involvement and the feelings of empowerment. · Trait engagement comprises of positive affectivity, conscientiousness, proactive and autotelic personality. · Behavioural engagement is demonstrated by organizational Citizenship Behaviour (OCB), role expansion, proactive personal initiatives taken by employees.	· Psychological Engagement · Trait Engagement · Behavioural Engagement
Masson et.al, 2008 (CR)	· Supported Macey and Schneider’s conceptualization.
Newman and Harrison , 2008 (CR)	· Psychological engagement is a redundant construct. · Emphasized on behavioural engagement.
Dalal et.al, 2008 (CR)	· Engagement is a cognitive-affective construct. · Trait engagement is an antecedent and behavioural engagement is a consequence of employee engagement.

ER-Empirical Research; CR- Conceptual Research; MA- Meta-Analysis