Full engagement: the integrationof employee engagement and

psychological well-beingIvan T. Robertson

Robertson Cooper Ltd, Manchester, and Leeds University Business School,Leeds, UK, and

Cary L. CooperLancaster University Management School, Lancaster, UK

Abstract

Purpose – By introducing the concept of “full engagement,” this article aims to propose thatemployee engagement is more likely to be sustainable when employee well-being is also high.

Design/methodology/approach – Research evidence covering the separate concepts is reviewedand evidence of the benefits that both engagement and well-being confer on organizations is presented.

Findings – Most current perspectives on employee engagement include little of direct relevance towell-being and reflect a narrow, commitment-based view of engagement. This view focuses too heavilyon benefits to organizations. A broader conception of engagement (referred to as “full engagement”),which includes employee well-being, is a better basis for building sustainable benefits for individualsand organizations.

Research limitations/implications – Research exploring the links between employee engagementand well-being is needed to validate and develop the propositions put forward in this article.

Practical implications – A model for improving full engagement in organizations is presented andbrief; case study illustrations are also given.

Originality/value – The integration of well-being and commitment-based engagement into thesingle construct of full engagement provides a novel perspective.

Keywords Employee attitudes, Work psychology, Occupational psychology, Psychology

Paper type Research paper

Purpose and backgroundThis article seeks to bring together the two previously distinct constructs of employeeengagement and psychological well-being. Both constructs are currently of interest topractitioners and researchers alike but currently they are not normally consideredtogether and form the focus of distinctive and separate research streams. By reviewingthe conceptualisation and measurement of both constructs the article seeks to developthe proposition that current views of engagement are too narrow. The current, narrowfocus of employee engagement concentrates too heavily on employee commitment,attachment and citizenship and not enough on employee psychological well-being. Thearticle seeks to demonstrate that this integrated construct of “full engagement”provides a better theoretical and practical viewpoint.

Around the world there is currently a great deal of interest in the concepts ofemployee engagement and employee well-being. Employee engagement has become avery important issue during the last decade and research from survey data frequently

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at

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Received May 2009Revised September 2009Accepted October 2009

Leadership & OrganizationDevelopment JournalVol. 31 No. 4, 2010pp. 324-336q Emerald Group Publishing Limited0143-7739DOI 10.1108/01437731011043348

reveals low levels of engagement in many countries. For example in mainland China 33percent of people are reported to be partly or fully disengaged, figures for many othercountries show similarly high levels of disengagement. Evidence of high levels ofinterest in employee well-being is more difficult to find on a global basis but there isevidence that interest is growing, at least in some countries. For example, in the UK,the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) reported a very largeincrease (from 26-42 percent), over a one-year period, in the number of employers withan employee well-being strategy or similar approach (CIPD, 2007a). In addition toindications of heightened interest within organizations, there is also significant interestat national government level in well-being. For example, a number of UKgovernment-sponsored working groups and reports have focused on well-being,including the Foresight report on Mental Capital and Well-being(www.foresight.gov.uk), Dame Carol Black’s report on Health, Work and Well-being– and the related government response (Office of Public Sector Information, 2008).

On a national scale, the impact of poor psychological well-being on the economy issignificant. Recent estimates of the costs to business of stress and other mental healthconditions for the UK economy are £3.8 billion a year (CIPD, 2007b). Stress and poormental health represent the tip of the iceberg as far as psychological well-being isconcerned – and take no account of the potential financial gains that could be achievedthrough improvements in positive well-being, for individuals and organisations(Robertson, 2007).

Engagement and psychological well-beingOrganisational and individual benefitsResearch evidence suggests that high levels of psychological well-being and employeeengagement play a central role in delivering some of the important outcomes that areassociated with successful, high performing organisations. First, research hasestablished that psychological well-being is directly correlated with performance.Wright and Cropanzano (2000) report two field studies which both demonstratepositive relationships between levels of psychological well-being and job performance,(see also Cropanzano and Wright, 2004, for an longitudinal examination of therelationship between well-being and performance over a five year period) Thesestudies show that people with higher levels of psychological well-being perform betterat work than those with lower psychological well-being; indeed, the results fromWright and Cropanzano (2000) show that well-being is a stronger predictor of jobperformance than job satisfaction.

As well as the research by Wright and Cropanzano, linking psychologicalwell-being with performance, Donald et al. (2005) in a study of 16,000 employees foundthat almost 25 percent of the variance in reported levels of employee productivity waspredicted by psychological well-being, the perceived “commitment of the organisationto the employee” and “resources and communication”. Using meta-analysis techniquesHarter et al. (2002) analysed data from nearly 8,000 separate business units in 36companies. They found significant relationships between scores on an employeesurvey and business unit level outcomes, such as customer satisfaction, productivity,profitability, employee turnover and sickness/absence levels. Their research reportsare particularly interesting, as they illustrate the potential relationships betweenpsychological well-being and employee engagement. Although they discuss their work

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as an illustration of the “well-being” approach in some of their publications (Harteret al., 2003), they also refer to the survey that they use as a measure ofengagement-satisfaction (Harter et al., 2002).

For employees, psychological well-being is linked to important individual outcomes,including a range of mental and physical health issues, with lower levels ofpsychological well-being linked to poorer health. The impact of job strain on theindividual has been heavily reported by researchers (Cooper and Quick, 1999). Theimpact of job strain on employees in the public sector has been extensively studied inthe UK. A series of research studies (e.g. Ferrie et al., 2005; Griffin et al., 2007) haveexplored the relationships between job conditions, individual health and otheroutcomes in a study of government employees. Kuper and Marmot (2003) looked at acohort of over 10,000 British Civil servants. The results revealed that factors in the job,such as low levels of control and autonomy, were associated with an increased risk ofserious illness. So, low psychological well-being caused by workplace factors is a majorhealth risk for employees. Studies elsewhere (e.g. Cohen et al., 2006) have shown linkswith minor physical illnesses, such as the common cold.

Employee engagementIn fact, although there is some broad agreement about the type of factors included in“employee engagement”, there is a lack of clarity about its definition and measurement.Robinson et al. (2004, p. 9) give a definition of engagement as, “ A positive attitude heldby the employee towards the organisation and its values. An engaged employee isaware of business context, and works with colleagues to improve performance withinthe job for the benefit of the organization . . . ”. In general, the items in mostengagement surveys focus on the aspects of engagement that are most obviouslyrelated to “positive” employee behavior, and cover established psychological concepts,such as organizational citizenship (e.g. Organ and Paine, 1999) and organizationalcommitment and attachment (e.g. Meyer, 1997). For example, the Utrecht WorkEngagement Survey (Schaufeli et al., 2006) concentrates on three factors: vigour,dedication and absorption. The Gallup Workplace Audit (see Harter et al., 2002)focuses on factors such as clarity – knowing what’s expected and control (input andopportunity). By and large practitioners and researchers views of engagement embodythe three core concepts of Attachment, Commitment and Organisational Citizenship.These concepts reflect a focus on the aspects of engagement that are likely to be mostdirectly involved in driving positive employee behaviour. As such, they reflect a focuson “Narrow Engagement” – i.e. the factors that are of most direct interest to employersand organizations, since they describe positive employee behaviour that is likely tolead to more effective performance and confer direct benefits on the organization.

Typical questions in (narrow) employee engagement surveys are illustrated below:

The goals of my organization make me feel that my job is important.

I am committed to this organization.

My opinions are listened to by my bosses at work.

I am enthusiastic about the job I do.

At work, I am prepared to work hard, even when things do not go well.

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The Narrow Engagement approach reflects a “commitment/citizenship” model ofengagement, in which employees’ commitment and citizenship are seen as importantfactors in the overall success of the organization. In addition to this focus on “narrowengagement”, many engagement questionnaires also include at least a few items thatfocus on employee psychological well-being (e.g. “I enjoy my work and feel happy atwork”) – but, by and large, they do not distinguish between employee psychologicalwell-being and the narrow engagement factors. Of course, narrow (strong commitmentand good citizenship) engagement is important for the organization, but in some waysit is less important for employees. There are certainly benefits to employees from beingcommitted to their work and feeling positive about the organization that they work for,but the long-term benefit for employees “themselves” is closely linked to their personalpsychological well-being.

Psychological well-beingResearchers interested in the measurement and impact of psychological well-beingidentify two broad approaches to the concept. The first broad approach (usuallyreferred to as “hedonic”) associates well-being with the experience of positive feelings(moods and emotions) and factors such as overall life satisfaction. In other words, forthis approach, well-being involves feeling good. This approach to well-being is limitedas it takes no account of the importance of life experiences having a purpose. The other,complementary, approach to well-being takes account of the importance of the“purpose” in well-being. This approach is usually referred to as the “eudaimonic”approach. To understand the distinction between “eudaimonic” and “hedonic”approaches to well-being, it helps to distinguish between experiences and feelings ofwell-being. For example, most people will readily accept that an unrelenting series ofwhat are initially pleasurable experiences will gradually become less enjoyable and failto produce the same positive emotional experience. For example, sitting on a yacht inthe Mediterranean with unlimited sun, food and drink would certainly make mostpeople happy for a while – but day after day, week after week – and year after year, itwould surely begin to seem pointless and would challenge the happiness of even themost determined hedonist. In fact, most people will also accept that living a life thatinvolves moving from one positive experience to another will not be particularlyenjoyable – unless the experiences have a point – or lead towards achieving aworthwhile goal of some kind. This key principle of a worthwhile life being one thathas a point or “a purpose” is the core of the eudaimonic approach to well-being. AsBoniwell and Henry (2007) point out, Aristotle was the originator of the termeudaimonia and conceived that true happiness is found by “. . . doing what is worthdoing” (Boniwell and Henry, 2007, p. 8).

More recent work in the area of positive psychology also supports the idea ofpurpose and positive emotion, as the key ingredients of psychological well-being.Findings emerge from the cumulative impact of a number of research studies andexperiments (e.g. Fredrickson, 1998; Fredrickson and Joiner, 2002; Seligman et al.,2005). The message from these findings is that the development of psychologicalwell-being is dependent on two key factors. The first key factor is the beneficial impactthat positive emotional experiences have on the growth of psychological well-being.Fredrickson (1998) proposed a new theory specifically for positive emotions.Essentially, Fredrickson shows that the experience of positive emotions serves to

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broaden the scope of people’s attention, thought processes and action; furthermore italso serves to build physical, intellectual and social resources. Further research hasalso shown that the broadening effect of positive emotions leads to an upward positivespiral in which, “. . . positive affect and broad-minded coping serially enhanced oneanother . . . positive emotions initiate upward spirals towards enhanced emotionalwell-being . . . ” (Fredrickson and Joiner, 2002, p. 172).

The second key finding is that an overall “sense of purpose”, that gives directionand meaning to people’s actions, enhances the impact that positive emotions can haveon psychological well-being. In a study of people who were recovering from the traumaof the terrorist attacks on the United States on September 11th, 2001, Fredrickson et al.(2003) observed the beneficial effect that positive emotions had and suggested that, “. . .finding positive meaning may be the most powerful leverage point for cultivatingpositive emotions during times of crisis” (Fredrickson et al., 2003, p. 374).

These points suggest that a complete concept of well-being should include both“pleasure” and “purpose”. A workable view of psychological well-being at worktherefore needs to encompass both the degree to which employees experience positiveemotions at work and the extent to which they experience meaning and purpose intheir work. Robertson and Flint-Taylor (2008) define psychological well-being at workas, “The affective and purposive psychological state that people experience while theyare at work”.

Full engagementThe evidence reviewed above suggests strongly that a wider construct of “fullengagement”, which incorporates both commitment/citizenship and employeewell-being is likely to provide more beneficial outcomes for employees andorganisations alike. Concentrating only on commitment and citizenship leavesemployees at risk of poor psychological health and implies that high levels ofengagement are unlikely to be sustained over time. The concept of full engagementrests on the principle that the beneficial impact of narrow engagement is enhancedwhen psychological well-being is also high – and similarly the negative effects of lowengagement would be exacerbated when psychological well-being is poor. Robertsonand Birch (2010) have provided recent empirical evidence to support this proposition.They carried out an investigation with a sample of over 10,000 people across 12different organisations. Their results revealed that the inclusion of measures ofpsychological well-being enhanced the relationships between narrow engagement andvarious outcomes (e.g. productivity).

A broader focus on full engagement gives due emphasis to the psychologicalwell-being of employees. This wider focus on psychological well-being is importantand better reflects a more rounded view of engagement, covering both the aspects ofnarrow engagement that describe positive employee behaviour but also assuringunderlying employee psychological well-being, which in turn is important insupporting high engagement. As the research reported above (Robertson and Birch,2010) suggests, attempts to enhance employee engagement will achieve only limitedsuccess if they focus narrowly on commitment and citizenship, without seeking tonurture employee psychological well-being. There is clear evidence that people withhigher levels of psychological well-being are healthier (mentally and physically), havehappier lives and live longer (Cartwright and Cooper, 2008) but importantly, research

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also shows that they are likely to take a more positive approach to their work and theirrelationships with colleagues. High levels of psychological well-being are associatedwith a range of positive outcomes and behaviours that would support strongeremployee engagement. People with higher levels of psychological well-being are lesslikely to see ambiguous events as threatening (Seidlitz and Diener, 1993; Seidlitz et al.,1997). Processing neutral or ambiguous events as threatening, for instance, is mostunhelpful in an organisational setting, where change is taking place and is likely tolead to higher levels of resistance, suspicion and disengagement. Evidence also showsthat unfavourable feedback is seen as more hurtful by people with lower psychologicalwell-being, and positive feedback produces more benefits for people with higherpsychological well-being. People with lower psychological well-being also use morecontentious interpersonal tactics (e.g. Larsen and Ketelar, 1991; Derryberry and Read,1994). On the other hand, people with higher levels of psychological well-being, learnand problem solve more effectively, are more enthusiastic about change, relate toothers more positively and accept change more readily (Cartwright and Cooper, 2008).It is difficult to think of another set of characteristics, apart from job-specific skills, thatare more important to an organisation’s success, or provide a better basis fordeveloping strong levels of engagement. The findings reviewed above reinforce theidea that employee psychological well-being might be a critically important factor insupporting high levels of engagement.

We believe that it is important to utilize the concept of “full engagement”, whichmeasures both the narrow engagement factors such as organizational citizenship andemployee commitment (which are easily recognized by employers as important), andthe aspect of positive psychological well-being that reflect full engagement.

Applying the modelThe incorporation of commitment/citizenship and psychological well-being into asingle concept of full engagement provides a construct that delivers benefits for bothemployees and organizations. For both practitioners and researchers it is thereforeimportant to be able to identify the key factors that might be used to bring aboutimprovements in full engagement. Faragher et al. (2007) report on a means ofmeasuring the aspects of the workplace that block well-being and limit potentialengagement levels. The key factors that they assess through the psychometric measureASSET are:

. work relationships;

. work-life balance;

. work overload;

. job security;

. control/autonomy;

. resources and communications;

. pay and benefits;

. job satisfaction.

More recently the ASSET measure has been further developed to incorporate directmeasures of full engagement, including:

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. sense of purpose;

. organisational commitment;

. engagement;

. positive psychological well-being as well as physical health and psychologicalhealth (Robertson Cooper, 2008b).

Obviously measuring current levels of full engagement and the workplace factors thatblock or enhance it represents an essential stage in improving engagement but from apractical point of view other steps are also critical. These steps include developing abusiness case.

The business caseWithout a “business case” there is limited hope of engaging business leaders with theidea of investing in well-being. There will almost certainly be those who equatewell-being with providing free massages and doing yoga in the workplace, rather thanseeing it as a tangible and value-adding process of improving levels of psychologicalwell-being that leads to sustainable levels of high performance. This starting pointmeans that those responsible for corporate well-being often still find it difficult topresent a solid business case for investing in an integrated approach to well-being.However, as the evidence reviewed above indicates, there is a substantial body of workdemonstrating the potential benefits. It is clear that some progress is being made with42 percent of respondents to a recent UK survey (CIPD, 2007b) indicating that expecttheir organisation’s well-being “spend” will increase in future – but only 11 percent ofrespondents believe their organisation’s employees fully appreciate the benefit of thisspend. Nearly 40 percent of respondents rate their organisation’s communicationstrategy on employee well-being as poor (CIPD, 2007b).

The critical role of the business case is to bring together the research evidence andintegrate it with where the organisation is right now. The research helps the topmanagement to believe that well-being and engagement interventions really work. Akey to a successful full engagement intervention involves clarity about the benefits atan early stage, so that action can be focused effectively and progress monitored. Whatthis implies is that one of the first steps in improving full engagement is to identify thestrategic goals that improvements in full engagement will help the organisation toachieve. These organisation-specific benefits make the vision and potential of anengaged workforce feel “real” for the organisation. The initiative becomes anchored,focused and crucially, success becomes measurable.

Measuring well-being and engagement levelsOnce the need to invest in is recognised, it’s important to be able to measure currentlevels of full engagement and examine the views of the workforce on the key workplacefactors that drive well-being and engagement. This generally means anorganisation-wide survey that is specifically focused on the relevant issues, perhapssupplemented with information from focus groups across key areas of theorganisation.

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Taking actionOnce clear information about the current situation is available the focus turns todevelopment of an interventions, designed to bring about improvements in fullengagement. The use of a very simple three category system provides a way oforganizing the types of interventions that might be developed to improve well-beingand engagement:

(1) composition (e.g. changing the composition of people in the work force, throughselection processes, redeployment and job placement);

(2) development (i.e. developing the people who are already part of the workforce,through training, coaching, feedback and other development activities); and

(3) situational engineering (i.e. re-engineering the situation that people work inthrough job and work redesign, changes in management and supervision andorganizational change).

These three areas cover all of the main types of interventions that anyone workingwith people in organizations could hope to make.

A critical issue for many organisations here is the extent to which the differentfunctional areas are integrated and capable of coordinating their efforts. For examplein a setting where Occupational Health, Talent Management and Health and Safety areall distinctly different functions with their own agendas it may be difficult to organisean intervention strategy that gains the commitment of all three areas. Talentmanagement specialists may be heavily focused on the attraction and selection oftalent, whereas occupational health personnel may prioritise employee psychologicalhealth and the creation of effective employee assistance programmes. In practice, highlevels of psychological well-being will help in the attraction of new talent and theretention of existing people and coordinated effort from both areas will bring greaterbenefits than if they act separately.

Existing research and practice can provide support and help in all three types ofintervention noted above (i.e. composition, development and situational engineering).In relation to the composition of the workforce the focus needs to be on the full range oftalent management issues, but, in particular, ensuring that employees are well-suited tothe demands that their roles will place on them by advising organisations on matchingthe employees’ characteristics (personality and abilities) with the demands of the role.In terms of development there is for example, a growing research literature on positivepsychology and the development of resilience (e.g. Tugade and Fredrickson, 2004;Yehuda et al., 2006). This literature provides a basis for the development of effectivetraining programmes that build resilience in employees so that they can copeeffectively with the stresses and strains of their roles. There is also an even morewell-established approach to stress management training which has been shown toproduce positive results.

When it comes to the situation that people work in, there is an extensive literature onjob and work design (e.g. Bond and Bunce, 2001) to help organisations to providepsychologically healthy and engaging jobs for employees. Perhaps the biggest singleinfluence on every employees day to day experience of work is his or her line manager.At the operational level the leader or manager is in a uniquely powerful position when itcomes to influencing the psychological well-being and engagement of others. Researchhas established that poor and unsupportive management is linked to a range of negative

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pressures and outcomes such as high employee turnover (e.g. Sosik and Godshalk, 2000).Gilbreath and Benson (2004) showed that supervisor behaviour had an incrementalimpact on employee psychological well-being with supervisor behaviour contributing tothe prediction of psychiatric disturbance beyond age, health practices, support fromother people at work, support from home, stressful life events, and stressful work events.As they noted, “. . . this provides additional evidence that supervisor behaviour canaffect employee well-being and suggests that those seeking to create healthierworkplaces should not neglect supervision.” (Gilbreath and Benson, 2004, p 255).

Figure 1 and Table I provide an indication of how the results of an audit ofwell-being and engagement in an organisation can be used to develop an interventionplan.

Figure 1 illustrates how the key factors (see above for a list of the factors) that drivewell-being and engagement can be combined with the three broad types of interventionto form a grid that can then be populated with possible specific interventions. Table Igives an illustration of interventions designed to improve full engagement byinfluencing one of the key factors (work-life balance).

Figure 2 provides an overview of the steps involved in developing interventions toimprove full engagement.

Figure 1.Identifying interventions

Division “A”Key driver Composition Development Situational engineering

Balancedworkload

Review selection proceduresto focus on better predictorsof full engagementRedeploy staffRecruit key types of staffUse engagement scores toattract better recruits

Develop clinical leaders tobalance challenge andsupport more effectivelyReview and revise theappraisal and performancemanagement processesResilience training foremployees and managers

Review and improve workplanning and distributionmechanismsReduce workloadAdapt technology andresources

Table I.Illustrative action plan

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One of the biggest pitfalls for well-being initiatives is “consultation without action” –every year staff in organisations show a lot of good will when they complete all mannerof surveys and they are entitled to expect to see a clear plan of action when the resultsare in. But it’s not only plans that they’re looking for – they want to see realimprovement in their working lives, so it’s important to budget beyond the initialsurvey and include enough funds to actually make a difference for employees.

The actions that are taken post-survey depend, to a large extent, on the results fromthe survey. In fact, many organisations see this as the start of a much broader changeprocess. For example, Kent Police in the UK used a survey tool to measure well-beingand then implemented a programme of interventions to drive organisationaldevelopment and improvement (Robertson Cooper, 2008a). In two years, theinterventions led to a 25 percent reduction in sickness absence (equivalent to 18,600sick days saved per year across the workforce of around 6,000 people), as well asimprovements in survey scores when a second survey was administered. An estimateof the average cost of a day’s absence is £78 (CIPD, 2007a), so that equates to a savingof nearly £1.5M per annum for Kent Police.

DiscussionThe integration of employee engagement and psychological well-being into theconstruct of full engagement may provide a practically useful approach to improvingorganisational effectiveness. Research shows that both factors are linked to beneficialorganisation-level outcomes and it is theoretically quite feasible that the combinedeffect of both factors is greater than each one alone. Some initial research evidence

Figure 2.The road to full

engagement

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supports this view and shows that the inclusion of psychological well-being enhancesthe relationships between engagement and beneficial outcomes. The proposition thatpsychological well-being is important in developing sustainable levels of employeeengagement also appears to be consistent with theoretical expectations andbackground research evidence. Individuals with higher levels of psychologicalwell-being behave differently – in ways that would be expected to lead to higher levelsof engagement.

Further research to explore the relationships between engagement andpsychological well-being is required. The interpretation and integration of thisresearch into a coherent body of knowledge will be significantly enhanced ifresearchers and practitioners could move closer to an agreed definition andmeasurement protocol for employee engagement. The conceptualisations andmeasurement of subjective well-being are somewhat clearer and more uniform,although the measurement of well-being at work is still in its relatively early stages ofdevelopment. Empirical work exploring the statistical relationships between items andscales designed to measure both engagement and well-being at work would also beuseful and help to provide a foundation for conceptual and practical progress.

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Further reading

Health and Safety Executive (2008), Self-reportedWork-related Illness in 2006/2007: Results fromThe Labour Force Survey, Health and Safety Executive, London.

Macleod, D. and Brady, C. (2008), The Extra Mile. How to Engage Your People to Win,Prentice-Hall Financial Times, London.

Rahe, R.H., Taylor, C.B., Tolles, R.L., Newhall, L.M., Veach, T.L. and Bryson, S. (2002), “A novelstress and coping workplace program reduces illness and healthcare utilization”,Psychosomatic Medicine, Vol. 64 No. 2, pp. 278-86.

Corresponding authorIvan T. Robertson can be contacted at: ivan.robertson@robertsoncooper.com

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