Page 1 of 7 ASSIGNMENT INSTRUCTIONS Interim/Final: Final/January intake First/Resit First Assessment Code: 010 Academic Year: 2016/17 Semester: 2 Module Title: Academic Research and Writing Module Code: MOD003311 Level: 3 Module Leader: Mark Stannard Weighting: 100% Word Limit: 1500 words Submission Date: This assignment must be received by no later than 14:00 on Monday, 15 May 2017 WRITING YOUR ASSIGNMENT:  This assignment must be completed individually.  Your work must indicate the number of words you have used. Do not exceed the maximum number of words specified above; all assignments which do so will be penalised. The penalty will be the deduction of marks at the Marker’s judgement.  Assignment submissions are to be made anonymously. Do not write your name anywhere on your work. Write your student ID number at the top of every page.  Where the assignment comprises more than one task, all tasks must be submitted in a single document.  You must number all pages. SUBMITTING YOUR ASSIGNMENT:  You must submit your assignment using Turnitin software and obtain a receipt.  Requests for short-term extensions will only be considered in the case of illness or other cause considered valid by the Welfare Adviser ([email protected]). These must normally be received and agreed by the Welfare Adviser in writing at least TWENTY-FOUR (24) hours prior to the deadline.  Mitigation claims must be submitted by the student or in exceptional circumstances (e.g. when a student has been hospitalised) by a Director of Studies, Programme Leader or Student Adviser on behalf of the student no later than five working days after the deadline.  Work submitted up to 5 working days after the deadline will be marked. The penalty for missing the deadline will be the capping of the mark for the assessment at 40%.  Work cannot be uploaded to Turnitin after the 5 working day period following the deadline. A mark of 0% will be recorded unless an extension has been approved in advance of the deadline. Please refer to the Academic Regulations or your Student Handbook for full details. Page 2 of 7 Task 1 – to be completed by week 5 Summarise the following text in your own words What is employee engagement? 01 Employee Engagement Despite the absence of a single definition, when talking about what engagement means, some key themes emerge pretty quickly. Words such as involvement, commitment, discretionary effort, collaboration, motivation and performance are common. How practitioners then choose to convert these themes into an actual definition is up to them. There are also those who believe an exact definition is not needed: you know it when you see it; it is something that you feel and is beyond a single definition. In fact, some organizations I work with choose not to define employee engagement at all. Instead they choose to talk about creating a great place to work or similar. The critical success factor is that however you choose to define or talk about engagement within your organization, people understand this. It’s vital that, amongst the senior leadership team at the very least, there is a common understanding of what you collectively mean by ‘employee engagement’. The term has become so ubiquitous that it is often used freely within organizations to mean different things to different people. Developing a definition, or expressing what you understand by employee engagement within your organization, is a great place to start to improve engagement. A brief history of employee engagement When was the first time you heard the term ‘employee engagement’? I can’t remember exactly when it was I first heard it but it was early on in the 2000s. You might be surprised to learn that engagement was first referred to in an article by William Kahn in 1990, although he talks about personal engagement and disengagement, rather than employee engagement. Kahn’s research looked specifically at the psychological conditions of personal engagement and disengagement at work. Within the article Kahn talks about personal engagement as the extent to which people employ and express their personal selves at work, and disengagement as the extent to which people withdraw and defend their personal selves at work. Interestingly Kahn identified meaningfulness, safety and availability as psychological conditions that impact personal engagement at work: these are themes that come up time and again when looking at what employee engagement means. When looking at the academic literature, engagement is a term used in the following ways:  to refer to a psychological state (eg involvement, commitment,attachment, mood);  to refer to a performance construct (eg either effort or observable behaviour, including pro-social and organizational citizenship behaviour);  to refer to a disposition (eg positive affect); or for some a combination of the above. The hugely influential work of Gallup, as reported by Harter et al (2012),played no small part in the rise in interest in employee engagement. Gallup began by looking at what was unique Page 3 of 7 to high-performing businesses and business units. Their extensive work resulted in the development of the Q12® tool, which is essentially a 12-question survey designed to measure engagement. Their substantial credibility and expertise, coupled with a tool allowing measurement of employee engagement, appealed to a number of chief or senior executives (commonly known as the ‘c-suite’) and an industry of employee engagement surveys was born. We have seen interest in employee engagement growing year on year. More and more surveys appear, with different models, many claiming that they are the correct (and only) way to define and measure engagement. And with the rise of the survey we have also seen a growing body of evidence to create a compelling business case that employee engagement matters – more of that in the next chapter. In the UK alone the Engage for Success movement received endorsement and support from both the Labour government and more recently the Coalition government. Employee engagement is now everyday language within organizations, and yet there is still a huge amount of discussion as to what it actually means. Let’s take a look at some of the definitions of employee engagement that currently exist Definitions of employee engagement Different definitions of employee engagement make reference to a range of human resource management (HRM) and organizational behaviour concepts such as work effort, commitment to the organization, job satisfaction, motivation and optimal functioning. However, what they tend to have in common is that they view engagement as an internal state of being. Engagement is something that the employee has to offer and cannot be ‘required’ as part of the employment contract or objective setting process. The following definitions provide a flavour of the many definitions that exist. What is Employee Engagement? 5 The Engage for Success website defines engagement as: ‘A workplace approach designed to ensure that employees are committed to their organization’s goals and values, motivated to contribute to organizational success, and are able at the same time to enhance their own sense of well-being.’ The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), in their work with the Kingston Employee Engagement Consortium, define employee engagement as: ‘being positively present during the performance of work by willingly contributing intellectual effort, experiencing positive emotions and meaningful connections to others’ (Alfes et al, 2010). This definition provides three dimensions to employee engagement: 1 Intellectual engagement, ie thinking hard about the job and how to do it better. 2 Affective engagement, ie feeling positively about doing a good job. 3 Social engagement, ie actively taking opportunities to discuss workrelated improvements with others at work. Interestingly, academics tend to talk about ‘work engagement’ as opposed to employee engagement. Shaufeli and Bakker (2004), two well-known and highly regarded academics who have made a significant contribution to the world of engagement, define work Page 4 of 7 engagement as: ‘a positive, fulfilling, work-related state of mind that is characterized by vigour, dedication, and absorption. Rather than a momentary and specific state, engagement refers to a more persistent and pervasive affective-cognitive state that is not focused on any particular object, event, individual, or behaviour.’ Vigour is characterized by high levels of energy and mental resilience while working, the willingness to invest effort in one’s work, and persistence even in the face of difficulties. Dedication refers to being strongly involved in one’s work and experiencing a sense of significance, enthusiasm, inspiration, pride and challenge. Absorption is characterized by being fully concentrated and happily engrossed in one’s work, whereby time passes quickly and one has difficulties with detaching oneself from work. It is easy to see that there are overlaps between this academic definition of work engagement and the CIPD’s definition of employee engagement. Professor Katie Truss, who was instrumental in setting up the Kingston Engagement Consortium, defines employee engagement (in Alfes et al, 2010) as: about creating opportunities for employees to connect with their colleagues, managers and wider organization. It is also about creating an environment where employees 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 an employee and an employer in a 21st century workplace. The Institute of Employment Studies (IES) defines (Robinson et al, 2004) engagement as: [a] positive attitude held by the employee towards the organization and its values. An engaged employee is aware of the business context, and works with colleagues to improve performance within the job for the benefit of the organization. The organization must work to develop and nurture engagement, which requires a two-way relationship between employee and employer. It is clear to see from these definitions alone that there are common themes that run through them. When asking people to define employee engagement, though, one of the big questions asks whether engagement is an attitude, a behaviour or an outcome. Some would argue engagement is all about attitudes towards the organization, or people we work with. For example, we may feel proud to work at a particular company, we might like the people we work with or our boss.For others engagement is all about behaviours, for example, would we recommend our company to others? Or do we go the extra mile to finish a piece of work? Finally for others, engagement is all about the business outcomes, for example, are people staying with the company rather than leaving? Are employees less absent, or is there more innovation? Most engagement surveys seek to measure all three of these components andthey are difficult to separate. For example, employees choosing to stay with the company is both a behaviour and a business outcome and quite likely the result of the beliefs and attitudes the employee holds about the organization.However, these attitudes could be, ‘I want to keep working here because I love my job and the people I work with,’ or they could be, ‘I don’t really want to be here any more but it’s tough out there and I’m not sure I could find another job like this, so I’ll stay put.’ With this example, you begin to see the danger of simply focusing on one aspect of engagement. People may be staying because they are highly engaged, or they may be staying because there are few jobs in the current marketplace. It’s my belief that they are all related and important for engagement. It is less important which comes first, what the pre-conditions of engagement are; what we tend to observe is that they all reinforce each other to contribute to employees’ overall engagement. Bridger, E., 2014, Employee Engagement, [e-book] London: Kogan Page, . Available from: ProQuest Ebook Central. [Accessed 16 August 2016]. Page 5 of 7 Assessment criteria  The work must not include direct quotations taken from the text – you are being assessed on whether you can summarise another writer’s ideas effectively.  You should only include information that is in the original text – do not include your own opinion.  Remember that this is a summary- you must only include the main points of the original.  You must write in clear, formal academic language, avoiding unnecessary grammar or spelling errors.  Use Size 11 or 12 font and a standard, professional typeface such as Arial, Calibri or Times New Roman. (Approximately 500 words) (Total = 30 marks) Page 6 of 7 Task 2 – to be completed by week 8 ‘Cigarettes should be made illegal.’ Discuss. Assessment criteria:  Ensure there is a clear introduction, main body and conclusion.  In the introduction, present the situation, preview arguments and give a clear thesis statement.  In the main body, present arguments for both sides, using one paragraph for each point you make.  In the conclusion, use what you have written to decide to what extent you agree or disagree with the statement.  Use Size 11 or 12 font and a standard, professional typeface such as Arial, Calibri or Times New Roman.  Ensure that your arguments are supported with evidence or examples.  Use Size 11 or 12 font and a standard, professional typeface such as Arial, Calibri or Times New Roman. (Approximately 500 words) (Total = 35 marks) Page 7 of 7 Task 3 – to be completed by week 11 Compare and contrast your own personal work experience with two motivation/management theories. If you have never been employed, use your personal experience at home or in education. You may choose from the following theorists: Maslow, Herzberg, Vroom, McGregor, Taylor, Fayol, Mayo. Assessment criteria 1. Ensure there is a clear introduction, main body and conclusion. 2. In the introduction, present the situation and state clearly what you are going to do in the essay. 3. In the main body, start by describing your own personal experience 4. Then highlight similarities and differences between this experience and two motivation/management theories. 5. Ensure that you support your points with evidence, examples or explanation. 6. Conclude by summarising what you have written and making suggestions as to how, in the light of this, your own personal experience could improve / have been improved. 7. You must write in clear, formal academic language, avoiding unnecessary grammar or spelling errors. 8. Use Size 11 or 12 font and a standard, professional typeface such as Arial, Calibri or Times New Roman. (Approximately 500 words) (Total = 35 Marks)