Chapter One: Introduction

1.1.Background

Within dynamic business environment and the ways in which jobs are being done, organizations are now giving more importance to their human capital in order to gain a sustainable competitive advantage. This increased focus on human capital has led the researchers to continuously explore ways in which it can best be managed through certain set of HR practices (Amarakoon et al., 2014; Ritthaisong et al., 2014). Previously, extensive research has been done on establishing the relationship of HR practices with the organizational performance. However, many researchers have highlighted the need to explore the impact of HR practices at a micro-level, specifically at individual level outcomes (Paauwe, 2009; Alfes et al., 2013).

Employee engagement is a valuable concept academically and professionally that has gained importance in recent years. It has got significance in different disciplines including management sciences, psychology, HRM and behavioural studies (Shuck et al., 2014). Existing literature shows that employee engagement is vital for successful performance of employees and it is directly related to their satisfaction, commitment, contribution and performance. Yet many studies result consistently reports low levels of employee engagement (Saks and Gruman, 2014, Shuck et al., 2014, Sorenson, 2013, Stairs and Galpin, 2010, Wollard and Shuck, 2011). Academically this concept is far more explained but its practical results and implications are not enough. Therefore, this research focuses on employee engagement in context of service sector of U.K. and China.

Researchers have highlighted the need to excavate ways in which HR practices can influence the behaviours of employees (Alfes et al., 2013). Many researchers have also argued that employee engagement is one of the core attitudinal and behavioural outcomes at individual level that needs to be further enhanced through designing and implementing HR practices (Hewitt, 2012). Therefore, in present study the authors have selected to explore HR practices as presented in High Involvement Work Practices and have attempted to determine their impact on engagement. HIWPs is an important human resource aspect which needs to be explored in relation to employee engagement. By investigating its impact on employee engagement this work will provide greater insights academically and empirically as well (Oppenauer and Van De Voorde, 2016).

1.2.Research objectives

The main objective of this study is to investigate the impact of HIWP on employee engagement. Specific objectives are defined are as follow;

• To assess the impact of HIWP on employee engagement in the Chinese service sector
• To assess the impact of HIWP on employee engagement in the UK service sector
• On the basis of comparative analysis to identify any additional factors which shape this relationship in both of the above mentioned contexts.

1.3.Research significance

The concept of engagement has gained significant importance over the past two decades. According to Macey et al. (2009) the term employee engagement has strongly echoed among the executives and therefore, leading the researchers to conceptualize the term of employee engagement, and identify its antecedents and to determine its impact on individual and organizational level performance (Christian et al., 2011). Despite all the rigorous efforts of researchers, Alfes et al. (2013) have mentioned that the overall levels of engagement across the globe is remarkably low. Similarly, a survey report conducted by Hewitt (2013) has shown that 4/10 employees reported as not being engaged and two out of ten were found to be significantly disengaged. The authors have discussed ‘2015 trends of employee engagement’ and have created a need to further explore this phenomenon. The authors have further suggested that as engagement is very critical in generating higher levels of GDP (22% increase) across the globe, therefore, it should be the concern of key stakeholders especially HR professionals to create an environment of engagement through designing and implementing engagement enhancing practices.

Moving along the same lines, a more recent research conducted by Albrecht et al. (2015) has mentioned that there is a need for HR professionals to move beyond conducting surveys that simply determine the level of employee engagement. The authors suggest that HR professionals should design HR practices and policies in such a way that directly influence employee engagement. The authors have signified the need to investigate the impact of HR practices on employee engagement. Therefore, this study will be significant to give managers a useful into the design of HR practices that can lead to foster engagement within their work environment. As there is no comparative study which is conducted in context of China and U.K. service sector, this research will provide valuable insights about this research issue.

1.4.Structure of dissertation

• The literature review chapter gives a detailed overview of previous research on employee engagement and HIWP leading to testable research hypotheses. Further, it develops a theoretical framework based on the existing literature to exhibit the relationship among HIWP and employee engagement.
• The methodology chapter discusses the research methods for data collection and analysis. It explains and justifies which research methods are considered suitable for this research.
• The findings and analysis chapter reports the findings of the study in relation to impact of HIWP on employee engagement in the context of service sector in China and U.K.
• Finally, a conclusion is given and directions for future research are mentioned.

2.Chapter Two: Literature Review

2.1.Introduction

This section is dedicated to the review of previous literature on employee engagement (EE) and HR practices. First, it describes the evolution of the concept and definition of EE. Then, it investigates how selected HIWP can lead towards engaging the employees with their tasks and working environment.

2.2.Employee engagement – Overview

Two decades ago, the concept and theoretical basis for employee engagement was firstly introduced by William Kahn, from there it gets significance and now is researched explaining various aspects of organisation. Employee engagement is defined as self-attachment of organisational members to the roles of their work (Shuck et al., 2014). Importance of employee engagement cannot be neglected as organisational outcomes comprising OCB, employee commitment, retention and performance are dependent on it (Stairs and Galpin, 2010, Wollard and Shuck, 2011).

Today’s business environment is characterized by an extraordinary enhanced and frequent change which has manifested itself as a consequence of an increasing trend of establishing global markets where inter organizational competition for talent acquisition has become a norm (Lockwood, 2007). He further states that as more and more organizations get integrated in boundary-less surroundings, the organizational capability for employee engagement and development will gain an unprecedented level of significance. Employers have also begun to understand the value of employee engagement in creation of a highly productive and efficient workforce (Kompaso and Sridevi, 2010). This explains the increased level of focus being shifted towards explaining the construct of employee engagement across management and practice research based literature (Little and Little, 2006).

The contemporary research in HRM has amalgamated the conventional hard approaches, which are generally centred on the notion of performance as the main criteria which can be employed to make an inquiry into organizational work; and the more contemporary soft approaches, which undertake a much more humanistic view of the various aspects of work while also maintaining a link with the performance aspect (Luthans and Peterson, 2002). The authors further stress upon this point by citing a meta-analysis conducted by Gallup Organization. The results of which show that some of the most profitable business units are belonged to those companies, which have their prime focus on their workforce to do their tasks in a best way; with colleagues they have a mutual likeness for and; instigating a strong sensitivity towards perpetuating psychological ownership of task related outcomes. The reason behind this new approach can be linked to various causes such as ever enhancing humanization of the work setting, globalization, the move towards the services based industry, fast paced innovation and the consequent increase in the demand of knowledge workers that have a unique set of requirements; amongst many others. This trend in the HRM research explains the upsurge in focus on the notion of the employee engagement and its operationalization as a “soft-hard approach” (Shuck et al., 2014). The authors also state that literature has considered the construct of employee engagement with regards to multiple contexts, but the adoption and interpretation of this concept has just started to achieve a momentous rigor.

1.1.1.Evolution

Beginning in the 1990s, the idea of employee engagement started gaining an increased amount of attention from the members of the business and consultancy community and has now become one of the central themes of contemporary academic research on HRM (Welch, 2011). The researcher has captured the evolution of enthusiasm for the concept of employee engagement after an extensive literature review, presented in a series of waves.

Table 1: Evolutionary Waves in EE

Evolutionary Wave	Employee Engagement Conceptualization	Principal Contributors
Pre wave	A basic need of employee engagement was recognized by organizations. No explicit use of the terminology of “employee engagement” in literature but its relation to organizational effectiveness was prevalent.	Katz and Kahn (1986)
Wave 1 (1990-1999)	In the beginning of the decade, pioneer work was done in terms of personal engagement; but the use of the term employee engagement was still missing. The later part of the decade is distinguished by an initiation of practitioner enthusiasm and coining of the term employee engagement by Gallup. Business level interest also prompted the constitution of consultancy firms.	Kahn (1990, 1992) Gallup 1999
Wave 2 (2000-2005)	An increased focus on practitioner based work where employee engagement was connected to enhanced organizational performance. An 18 item scale for measurement of the construct was designed. Positive psychology movement increased focus on engagement. Professional bodies also started giving attention to the concept of employee engagement	Harter et al (2002); Hewitt Associate, Consultants; May et al (2004); Schaufeli and Bakker (2004).
Wave 3 (2006-2010)	The concept of employee engagement was explained as positive antithesis to burnout. Consultancy utilization of the concept increased even more. Employee engagement was explained in terms of a psychological state. Employee engagement concept was related to steady state motivation theory	Saks (2006); Kahn (2010).

Source: Constructed by Authors from the Literature Review

The extraordinary pace with which the research on employee engagement has progressed, although phenomenal, has also produced many frenzied explanations of the concept while ignoring the most important aspects such as a substantive definition, dimensions, measurement and a concrete theoretical standing (Saks and Gruman, 2014). In fact, there is also a serious lack of consensus prevalent throughout the literature on what to call this construct. The connotation and the meaning behind the employee engagement concept have been marred with many ambiguities from its inaugural period. The construct of employee engagement has its roots embedded in the concepts of commitment and organizational citizenship behaviour; which have received widespread collegiate prominence and have undergone exhaustive empirical investigations (Kompaso & Sridevi, 2010). But researchers have also pointed out that both these concepts fail to explain the two basic facets of employee engagement; which are its two way attributes and the degree to which the engaged workforce members are assumed to possess fundamental business consciousness. It can thus be deduced that when the researchers cannot agree upon a single name for this construct, the resulting research will naturally have progressed in a haphazard manner while constantly overlapping with the two constructs from which it originated.

1.1.2.Definition

In spite of the large scale discord amongst the members of the practitioner and academic community on the most acceptable, connotative definition and measurement tool of the employee engagement concept; it is most prominently defined in the scholarly realm as “an affirmatively conclusive, fulfilling, work associated mental state that is symbolized by vitality, agility, devotion and absorption” (Albrecht et al., 2015). This paper has attempted to compile the various prominent definitions of employee engagement presented throughout the literature since its academic inception by Kahn (1990). It was a result of the ethnographic investigation the Author conducted on the psychological underpinnings of employee engagement as well as disengagement in an organizational setup.

Table 2: Concept of EE

Authors	Employee Engagement Definition	Research Type
Kahn (1990)	Employee engagement is the concurrent deployment and assertion of an individual’s most favored persons in work related roles and attitudes which strengthen work related and personal ties, an individual’s mental, physical and emotionally substantive presence in the workplace, thus maximizing performance.	Ethnographic study conducted among sixteen personnel from a summer camp and other sixteen from a financial organization
Maslach et al. (2001)	Employee engagement is an invigorating condition of enhanced involvement in individually gratifying tasks which heighten a person’s feeling of professional competence. Engagement is symbolized by the dimensions of involvement, energy and efficacy; the opposites of cynicism, exhaustion and inefficacy, the three elements of burnout.	Conceptual study
Harter et al. (2002)	Employee engagement pertains to the escalated levels of employee involvement, sense of fulfillment and work related devotion.	Meta-analysis conducted across 7939 business units from a multitude of areas.
May et al. (2004)	These researchers were of the view that the construct of employee engagement can never be explained in a definitive manner. They refer to Kahn’s assertion of the explanation of engagement.	Survey conducted from 199 members of the workforce of an insurance company
Saks (2006)	The notion of employee engagement holds the position of a definite, specific and exclusive construct; composed of behavioral, cognitive and emotional attributes which serve as accomplices in efficient achievement of individual role objectives.	Survey conducted from 102 employees selected from an array of occupations.
Macey and Schneider (2008)	The first time that the trait, state and behavioral engagement was characterized as distinct but connected concepts. Trait engagement is achieved when individuals are willing, inclined and oriented towards making acquaintance with the world from a specific vantage point. State engagement has its roots in psychology and serves as an antecedent to behavioral engagement. It encompasses the conceptualizations of involvement, satisfaction, empowerment and commitment. Behavioral engagement is explained by enhance levels of “discretionary efforts”	Conceptual Paper
Robertson and Cooper (2010)	Introduced the concept of “full engagement” which proposes that heightened levels of employees’ psychological well-being needs to be incorporated as part of the concept of employee engagement. This will result in employee engagement to manifest itself over the long term. This is a departure from the previous narrow, commitment centered viewpoint of employee engagement which mostly focuses on organizational benefits of employee engagement while ignoring its benefits to the employees.	Conceptual Paper
Welch (2011)	The research recognizes the construct of employee engagement at an organizational and job level. It is an aggressively dynamic cognitive state which serves as a linkage amongst the workforce and organization, becomes recognizable in the form of enhanced levels of role performance, asserted in terms of cognitive, physical and behavioral attributes, and effected by inter-organizational communication strategy	Conceptual Paper

Source: Compiled by author after reviewing the literature

In the last two decades, the research on the construct of employee engagement has investigated its various antecedents and consequences. The literature has also considered the construct of employee engagement as a mediating factor.

2.3.High Involvement Work Practice System – Overview

A practical work system high-involvement work practices (HIWPs) that is also known as High commitment, high involvement and high performance (Guthrie, 2001)is also under exploration in this research. Four aspect are covered by HIWPs including power, information, reward and knowledge. HIWP refers to a set arrangement that increases skill, knowledge, motivation and performance of employee to achieve desired organisational performance (Guthrie, 2001, Mohr and Zoghi, 2008). There exists a list of management practices which are categorised as HIWP system, this research and this research uses four HR practices as HIWP system and these are personnel selection, socialization, performance management and training. The rationale behind choosing these particular practices is that these are considered to be the main HR practices being adopted by any organization, whether they are focusing on HIWP (see e.g. Sun et al., 2007; Jiang et al., 2012) or they are focusing on engagement in particular (see e.g. Alfes et al., 2013). Although these practices have widely been discussed in different contexts and in terms of different outcomes; yet, researchers (e.g. Albrecht et al., 2015) have suggested to study the direct impact of these practices on EE. Therefore, these practices are discussed in this section with regards to their impact on EE, separately.

1.1.1.Personnel Selection

Employee selection refers to a combination of practices which are structured and designed with the intent of inducting new organizational members against a set of predefined criteria. Most of the research conducted on the conceptualization of employee selection practices is centred on viewing the process of selection as a tool for choosing new employees who are in possession of the requisite knowledge, skills and attitudes in line with the job demands (Costen, 2012). However, the contemporary research carried out on HRM practices design and consequent organizational implications shows that the most competent prospective employees are not merely looking for money; but their focus has now shifted on becoming a part of such an organizational setup which provides them with a multitude of challenging opportunities and engagement (Harter & Blacksmith, 2010). Therefore, for organizations wanting to attract and retain highly competent and engaged employees, it is highly pertinent that they present these valued employees with a “fit” between what they expect from their job roles and the workplace setup, as implicated by Morgeson and Dierdorff (2011). It can be postulated that if selection practices are structured in such a way that they tend to appropriately gauge peoples’ personality attributes this will have favorable impact in terms of enhancing organization wide employee engagement. This will help the newly selected personnel to share the same set of ideals as that of their organization. This concept is also referred to as the person organization fit in the literature.

In line with the above discussion it can be argued that selection practices should be structured with an engagement-centred approach i.e. to appropriately gauge peoples’ personality attributes so that the newly selected personnel share the same set of ideals as that of the organization, and use of evidence based selection practices to infer the personality type which can be easily engaged. The overall impact of such an employee selection program will be manifest in terms of an engaged workforce.

H1: Engagement-centred selection practices will lead to high levels of employee engagement.

1.1.2.Socialization

Chao, O'Leary-Kelly, Wolf, Klein, and Gardner (1994) have defined organizational socialization as a phenomenon where newly selected employees are acclimatized to their organizational and work related content and various mechanisms involved therein. Newly selected members of the workforce naturally feel a certain level of excitement about their impending new career beginnings; but accompanying this they also have a certain level of uncertainty and are fearful and anxious about settling into an alien environment (Albrecht et al., 2015). The researchers elaborate on this further by stating that the organization needs to adopt a two pronged approach here; first it needs to adopt mechanisms to minimize the new entrants fear of the unknown and secondly the organization also needs to capitalize on their excitement levels in order to translate it into employee engagement.

Kompaso and Sridevi (2010) have pointed out that productive socialization programs are to be taken as the first building blocks for instigating organization wide employee engagement notions. Ignoring the importance of the socialization process can result in a disengaged workforce (Saks &Gruman, 2011). Authors have identified certain techniques for organizational socialization of new employees aimed at enhancing employee engagement, these are; (a) collective against individual, (b) formal socialization versus informal, (c) sequential versus random socialization (the planned against on spot), (d) fixed against variable, (e) serial Vs disjunctive (involvement of role model or not), and (f) investiture vs. divestiture (they receive positive internal support or not) (Song, Chon, Ding, &Gu, 2015) (p. 181).

The model presented by Kahn (1990) on personal engagement can be used to devise a method to curb the feelings of anxiety faced by the newcomers (Albrecht et al., 2015). Kahn (1990) proposes that an employee’s level of engagement can be gauged by the three psychological conditions proposed in his model. These are psychological meaningfulness, safety and availability. This stipulates that an organization should be able to instill these psychological feelings amongst the newly selected employees during the organizational socialization process. The direct impact of this will be manifested in the form of an engaged workforce.

The feeling of meaningfulness can be generated among the newly selected personnel by making sure that there is a perceptible level of feedback and task significance (Katz, 1978). Along the same lines, Colarelli, Dean, and Konstans (1987) found that feedback and task related autonomy are prone to disseminate positive behaviors; in a sample study of newly selected personnel in an organization. Thus it can be stated that an organization needs to make sure that the newly inducted individuals are given robust and compelling tasks. This will engender feelings of psychological meaningfulness amongst the workforce.

In view of the above discussion it is stated here that design of organizational socialization process needs to be centered on employee engagement. This entails the socialization process centered on feedback, task autonomy, fostering strong feelings of community, and instilling self-efficacy amongst the newly selected employees. If accurately adopted, this will enhance the level of employee engagement amongst the newly inducted workforce.

H2: Engagement-centered organizational socialization process will lead to high levels employee engagement.

1.1.3.Performance Management (PM)

When the employees are selected and socialized into their respective roles effectively, the next area to be focused on by HR professionals or managers is to help them achieving desired level of performance and achieving higher level of job engagement. Performance management is a set of activities involved in a continuing organizational process which aims at identifying, evaluating and stimulating both individual or collective (i.e. teams) performance in order to achieve the desired organizational goals and objectives (Albrecht et al., 2015; Mone and London, 2014). With the dynamic market conditions, the pressure to gain sustainable competitive advantage has increased and the organizations are relying on their human capital to remain ahead of their competitors. According to Buchner (2007) performance management is becoming the primary choice of many organizations to bring desired improvements in their employees’ performance. According to Albrecht et al. (2015) PM can directly influence the level of employee engagement and this influence can be positive as well. The authors further argue that PMS has the ability to affect the employees’ perceptions of their jobs in terms of the demands, meaningfulness and the availability of resources to perform their tasks effectively.

Moreover, researchers have identified several other factors which, if included, in performance management system can result in more engaged employees. Such factors might include employee proactivity, adaptability and creativity leading to behaviourally engaged employees (Gruman and Sacks, 2011).As a major market shift has occurred within the past few decades, i.e. from manufacturing to more services sector; there is an increase in the number of knowledge workers, leading to multifaceted and complex nature of modern jobs. Das (2003) argue that the modern PMS are designed to facilitate the performance by creating enabling conditions that foster, rather than managing employees’ performance. Commonly, a comprehensive approach requires controlling the performance in order to manage certain level of performance of employees.

However, in case of knowledge workers, the desired outcomes of their performance are beyond the control of the managers or supervisors (Buchner, 2007). Similarly, Pulakos et al. (2008) argue that because of the varied nature of work performed by knowledge workers, it is not possible to set the objectives and subsequently managing them accordingly. Therefore, it can be suggested that for such type of employees’ engagement instead of focusing on setting and managing objectives, more focus should be given to creating favourable conditions and the enabling environment to facilitate their performance. Moreover, the primary focus of PMS today has shifted towards more result oriented than behaviour and personality focused. Therefore, the context of performance is of greater significance to foster employee engagement for modern types of jobs and knowledge workers.

Summarizing the above arguments and discussion it can be argued that, an engagement-focused PMS which includes not only the management of performance but also the enabling conditions, will have an impact on enhanced level of employees’ engagement. These conditions should facilitate their performance to become more engaged and also be designed according to the nature of work and the needs of employees at different levels. Therefore, this leads to the third hypothesis:

H3: An engagement-focused PMS will result in increased engagement of employees.

1.1.4.Training

The next important dimension to foster employees’ engagement is the training and development practice which enables employees to become more focused on their job related tasks. As noted by Paradise (2008) that training helps in improving the quality of services provided by the employees and therefore, leads to the higher levels of employee engagement through enhanced service related performance. Therefore, it can be suggested that when employees go through the properly designed training programmes according to the nature and requirements of their jobs; their confidence level boosts up and this leads to more engaged employees within the organization. Researchers have even argued that providing training and development opportunities to employees is somewhat similar to that of rewarding them since it gives them an opportunity for personal growth (Alderfer, 1972; Anitha, 2014). According to Alderfer (1972) the growth needs of employees are satisfied when they find the opportunities to fully grow in order to become what they can be at the highest levels. Therefore, it becomes more apparent for the management to focus more on providing career ladders to their employees based on T&D opportunities. This may lead to the more engaged employees within their work settings.

Moreover, following the same lines researchers have also mentioned that boosting self-efficacy beliefs of employees will lead to increased engagement (Salanova and Schaufeli, 2008). Salanova et al. (2005) concluded that boosting the levels of self-efficacy of students leads to their higher level of engagement. According to Albrecht et al. (2015) managers especially the HR professionals are responsible for providing the organizations and employees at all levels with the polices and systems which enable them to identify as well as satisfy their needs of learning and development. For instance, the frontline employees who are in face to face contact with their customers can be trained with the required skills, competencies and knowledge to increase the level of sales through high customer satisfaction. Therefore, having the right equipment to cope with their job requirements may result in higher levels of employee engagement.

It can be argued that training and development can play a prime role in creating more engaged employees. The interventions should be carefully designed in terms of being engagement-centred i.e. according to the nature and requirements of the job, to provide them with career ladders and, to increase the level of self-efficacy through optimization of personal resources. The design of training and development process comprising of above mentioned interventions can lead to more engaged employees. This leads to the fourth hypothesis:

H4: Engagement-cantered training interventions will lead to high level of employees’ engagement.

1.2.Theoretical Framework

The discussion from the literature review related to employee engagement and the four core HR practices known as HIWP leads to the formation of following framework:

Figure 1: Theoretical Framework

Impact of HIWP on Employee Engagement in service sector

Impact of HIWP on Employee Engagement in China

Impact of HIWP on Employee Engagement in U.K.

Conclusion

 

 

 

 

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