The Role of Employee Engagement in Work-Related Outcomes: Dr. Padmakumar Ram

Interdisciplinary Journal of Research in Business
Vol. 1, Issue. 3, March 2011(pp.47-61)
The role of employee engagement in work-related outcomes

Dr. Padmakumar Ram
Director of Experiential Education & Associate Professor,
School of Management, New York Institute of Technology,
Sixth circle - Zahran Street, P.O. Box 840878
Amman 11184, Jordan
E-mail: pram01@nyit.edu
Dr. Gantasala V. Prabhakar

Department Assessment Director & Assistant Professor,
School of Management, New York Institute of Technology,
Sixth circle - Zahran Street, P.O. Box 840878
Amman 11184, Jordan
E-mail: gpradhak@nyit.edu
ABSTRACT:
Engaging employees is one of the top five most important challenges for management, according to a survey of
656 chief executive officers (CEOs) from countries around the world (Wah 1999). Employee engagement has
become a hot topic in recent years among consulting firms and in the popular business press. However,
employee engagement has rarely been studied in the academic literature. In this study we investigated the
antecedents and consequences of employee engagement in Jordanian Industry. A snowball sample of 310
respondents from the Jordanian hotel industry was interviewed using the research instrument. The sample
comprised of employees from different levels of management. The results confirm the relationship between
Employee Engagement and Perceived Organizational Support. The effect of Job Characteristics, Intrinsic and
Extrinsic Rewards, Perceived Supervisor Support, Perceptions of Procedural Justice, Perceptions of
Distributive Justice on Employee Engagement is also confirmed. The hypotheses considered in this study are
supported by the evidence from data collected from a sample of respondents drawn from the hotelindustry in
Jordan.
Keywords: Job Characteristics, Intrinsic and Extrinsic Rewards, Perceived Supervisor Support, Perceptions of
Procedural Justice, Perceptions of Distributive Justice, Employee Engagement
1. INTRODUCTION
Employee engagement is a strategic approach for driving improvement and encouraging organizational change.
Within the U.S workforce, Gallup organizations Gallup Workplace Audit (1992-99) estimates this to cost more
than $300 billion in lost productivity alone. Gallups engagement ratio is a macro-level indicator of an
organizations health that allows executives to track the proportion of engaged to actively disengaged
employees. The average working population ratio of engaged to actively disengaged employees is near 2:1.
Engaging employees requires a year-round focus on changing behaviors, processes, and systems to anticipate
and respond to an organizations needs. High levels of employee engagement occur when employees are
involved with, committed to, enthusiastic, and passionate about their work. Areas of focus include defining the
concept of employee work engagement, how it is measured, how often it occurs, the costs of disengagement, the
business benefits linked to positive engagement, and how workplaces can be changed to encourage engagement.
Employee engagement has become a widely used and popular term (Robinson et al. 2004). However, most of
what has been written about employee engagement can be found in practitioner literature and consulting firms.
As noted by Robinson et al. (2004), there has been surprisingly little academic and empirical research in this
area.
The purpose of this study was to investigate the potential mediating relationship of employee engagement
between job characteristics, perceived extrinsic & intrinsic rewards, perceived procedural justice, perceived
47
distributive justice and perceived supervisor support on the one hand, and job satisfaction, job involvement, and
organizational citizenship behavior on the other.
2. LITERATURE REVIEW
In the academic literature, employee engagement has been defined in different ways. Kahn (1990,p. 694) defines
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 role performances.
Personal disengagement refers to the uncoupling of selves from work roles; in disengagement, people withdraw
and defend themselves physically, cognitively, or emotionally during role performances(p. 694). Thus,
according to Kahn (1990, 1992), engagement means to be psychologically present when occupying and
performing an organizational role. According to the bestselling book, First, Break All the Rules, which first
compiled the results from the Gallup organizations program of research on engagement, fewer than one in
every five workers is actively engaged in their work (Buckingham 1999). Britt, Adler, and Bartone (2001) found
that engagement in meaningful work can lead to perceived benefits from the work. Other research using a
different measure of engagement (i.e. involvement and enthusiasm) has linked it to such variables as employee
turnover, customer satisfactionloyalty, safety, and to some degree, productivity and profitability criteria
(Harter, Schmidt, & Hayes 2002). Thus, there are practical reasons that managers and researchers of
organizations should be concerned with employees engagement in work.
Since then, engagement has been defined more completely as when employees feel positive emotions toward
their work, find their work to be personally meaningful, consider their workload to be manageable, and have
hope about the future of their work (Nelson & Simmons 2003). The findings of studies conducted to create
measurement tools in this area have further refined its definition to include a three-dimensional concept of work
engagement (May, Gilson, & Harter 2004). The three factors include a physical component (e.g., I exert a lot
of energy performing my job), an emotional component (e.g., I really put my heart into my job), and a
cognitive component (e.g., Performing my job is so absorbing that I forget about everything else).Most often
it has been defined as emotional and intellectual commitment to the organization (Baumruk 2004; Richman
2006; Shaw 2005) or the amount of discretionary effort exhibited by employees in their jobs (Frank et al. 2004).
Researchers in burnout define employee engagement as the opposite or positive antithesis of burnout (Maslach
et al. 2001). According to Maslach et al. (2001), engagement is characterized by energy, involvement, and
efficacy, which are the direct opposite of the three burnout dimensions of exhaustion, cynicism, and inefficacy.
Employee engagement predicts employee outcomes, organizational success, and financial performance (Bates
2004; Baumruk 2004; Harter et al. 2002; Richman 2006). However, it has also been reported that employee
engagement is on the decline and there is a deepening disengagement among employees today (Bates 2004;
Richman 2006). About half of all Americans in the workforce, are not fully engaged or they are disengaged,
leading to what has been referred to as an engagement gap (Bates 2004; Johnson 2004; Kowalski 2003).
Based on the review and findings, suggestions are provided for how engagement can be improved through
adopting certain kinds of workplace behavioral practices and how providers of workplace services can take
advantage of these opportunities.
Most efforts to measure engagement have been at the level of the individual worker. These individual-level
scores can be aggregated to measure engagement at the organizational or work group level as well. Leading
international business consulting companies have developed their own proprietary survey tools and processes
for measuring work engagement that address similar themes. One of the most popular approaches in this area
comes from the Gallup Organization (Harter, Schmidt, & Keyes 2003; Harter & Schmidt 2008). Results of this
work have yielded a 12-item Gallup Workplace Audit (Rath 2007; Rath& Conchie 2009; Wagner & Harter
2006). Sample items include There is someone at work who encourages my development. At work, my
opinions seem to count. and This last year, I have had opportunities at work to learn and grow.
Studies by the Gallup Organization showed that about 20% of U.S. employees are disengaged, 54% are neutral
about their work, and 26% are actively engaged (Fleming, Coffman, & Harter 2005).The most comprehensive
studies in this area were done by Towers Perrin in 2003, 2005, and 2007. The results of this study have been
compiled in a book (Gebauer& Lowman 2009). The survey used data collected from more than 85,000
employees from 16 countries. This study found that overall, 24% of employees worldwide were disengaged,
62% of employees were moderately engaged, and only 14% of employees were considered to be highly engaged
(Towers Perrin 2006). This study also showed a wide range between different countries, in the percentage of
their workforce who were highly engaged, with Mexico (40%) and Brazil (31%) being on the high end, the
48
United States (21%) and Canada (17%) in the middle, and Europe (11%) and Asia (7%) at the low end. The
wide range in engagement level across countries suggests that examining cross-cultural differences in employee
engagement is an opportunity for further research.
3. STUDY HYPOTHESES
Fig: 1 The Research Model:
Job
Characteristics
Intrinsic &
Extrinsic Rewards
H1
H2
Perceived
Organizational
Support
H3
Employee
Engagement
H4
H7
Job Satisfaction, Job

Involvement,
Organizational
Citizenship Behavior,
Intention to quit
Perceived
Supervisor Support
H5
Perceptions of
Procedural Justice
H6
Perceptions of
Distributive Justice
49
4. ANTECEDENTS OF EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT

Although there is little empirical research on the factors that predict employee engagement, it is possible to
identify a number of potential antecedents from the different studies conducted.
4.1 Job characteristics:
This is based on Hackman and Oldhams (1980) job characteristics model and, the five core job characteristics
(i.e. skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy, and feedback). Psychological meaningfulness can
be achieved from task characteristics that provide challenging work, variety, allow the use of different skills,
personal discretion, and the opportunity to make important contributions (Kahn 1990, 1992). Jobs that are high
on the core job characteristics provide employees with motivation to be more engaged (Kahn 1992). Job
enrichment was positively related to meaningfulness and meaningfulness mediated the relationship between job
enrichment and engagement ( May et al. 2004) . Maslach et al. (2001) model also suggest the importance of job
characteristics for engagement..Job characteristics, especially feedback and autonomy, have been consistently
related to burnout (Maslach et al. 2001). The Social Exchange Theory (SET) perspective is that employees who
are provided with enriched and challenging jobs will feel obliged to respond with higher levels of engagement.
Therefore, H1 is the following:
H1. Job characteristics will be positively related to employee engagement
4.2 Intrinsic and Extrinsic Rewards:
Extrinsic rewards are the tangible rewards mostly of a financial nature such as pay raises, bonuses, and benefits,
given to employees .They are called extrinsic because they are external to the work itself and others control
their size and whether or not they are granted. Intrinsic rewards are psychological rewards that employees get
from doing meaningful work and performing it well.Extrinsic rewards though significant, play a dominant role
in organizations where work is generally more routine and bureaucratic in nature. Pay is an important
consideration for most workers in accepting a job, and unfair pay can be a strong de-motivating factor.
However, after people have settled down in a job, extrinsic rewards are now less important, as day-to-day
motivation is more strongly driven by intrinsic rewards. Most of todays workers have to self-manage to a
significant degreeto use their intelligence and experience to direct their work activities so as to accomplish
important organizational objectives thereby adding value both to the organization and to the customer.
Kahn (1990) reported that people vary in their engagement as a function of their perceptions of the benefits they
receive from a role. Furthermore, a sense of return on investments can come from external rewards and
recognition in addition to meaningful work. Hence one might expect that employees to be more engaged at
work to the extent that they perceive a greater amount of rewards and recognition for their role performances.
Maslach et al. (2001) have also suggested that while a lack of rewards and recognition can lead to burnout,
appropriate recognition and reward is important for engagement. According to Social Exchange Theory, when
employees receive rewards and recognition from their organization, they will feel obliged to exercise a fair
exchange, by responding with higher levels of engagement. Thus, the second hypothesis is as follows:
H2. Intrinsic and Extrinsic Rewards will be positively related to employee engagement
4.3 Perceived organizational and supervisor support:
According to the Organizational support theory (Eisenberger et al. 1986; Shore & Shore 1995) in order to
determine the organizations readiness to reward increased work effort and to meet socio-emotional needs,
employees develop global beliefs concerning the extent to which the organization values their contributions and
cares about their well-being. Perceived organizational support (POS) is also valued as assurance that assistance
will be available from the organization when it is needed to carry out ones job effectively and to deal with
stressful situations (Georgeet al. 1993).Psychological safety involves a sense of being able to show and employ
the self without negative consequences (Kahn 1992). An important aspect of safety arises from the extent of
care and support employees perceive to be provided by their organization as well as their direct supervisor.
Kahn (1990) found that supportive and trusting interpersonal relationships as well as supportive management
promoted psychological safety. Employees felt safe in work environments that were characterized by openness
and supportiveness. Supportive environments allow members to experiment and to try new things and even fail
without fear of the consequences (Kahn 1990). In their empirical test of Kahns model, May et al. (2004) also
found that supportive supervisor relations was positively related to psychological safety.
Social support is also one of the conditions in the Maslach et al. (2001) model and study by Schaufeli and
Bakker (2004) found that a measure of job resources that includes support from colleagues predicted
50
engagement. A lack of social support has also consistently been found to be related to burnout (Maslach et al.
2001). Two variables that are likely to capture the essence of social support are perceived organizational support
(POS) and perceived supervisor support (PSS). POS refers to a general belief that ones organization values
their contribution and cares about their well-being (Rhoades and Eisenberger 2002). The basic premise of
organizational support research is Social Exchange Theory(SET). According to Saks(2006), a stronger
theoretical rationale for explaining employee engagement can be found in SET. Employees who have higher
POS might become more engaged to their job and organization as part of the reciprocity norm of SET in order
to help the organization reach its objectives (Rhoades et al. 2001). In other words, when employees believe that
their organization is concerned about them and cares about their well-being, they are likely to respond by
attempting to fulfill their obligations to the organization by becoming more engaged. Further, because
employees tend to view their supervisors orientation toward them as indicative of the organizations support
(Rhoades and Eisenberger2002), PSS is also likely to be an important predictor of employee engagement.
Although POS has been found to be related to a number of favorable outcomes like job satisfaction,
organizational commitment, performance, (Rhoades and Eisenberger 2002), no previous study has related it to
employee engagement.In fact, a lack of support from supervisors has been found to be an especially important
factor linked to burnout (Maslach et al. 2001). In addition, first-line supervisors are believed to be especially
important for building engagement and to be the root of employee disengagement (Bates 2004; Frank et al.
2004).
Therefore, H3 and H4 are as follows:
H3. Perceived organizational support (POS) will be positively related to employee engagement.
H4. Perceived supervisor support (PSS) will positively related to employee engagement.
4.4 Distributive and procedural justice:
Research on justice in organizations has been a major interest of researchers for over 30 years (Ambrose 2002).
There are two forms of organizational justice: distributive justice and procedural justice. Distributive justice
deals with the ends achieved (what the decisions are) or the content of fairness, whereas procedural justice is
related to the means used to achieve those ends (how decisions are made) or the process of fairness. It has been
argued that distributive justice predicts satisfaction with the outcome (i.e., pay satisfaction), whereas procedural
justice influences the evaluation of the organization and its authorities (i.e., trust in supervision and
organizational commitment) (Cropanzano&Folger 1991; Sweeney and McFarlin 1993). The safety dimension
identified by Kahn (1990) involves social situations that are predictable and consistent. For organizations, it is
especially important to be predictable and consistent in terms of the distribution of rewards as well as the
procedures used to allocate them. While distributive justice pertains to ones perception of the fairness of
decision outcomes, procedural justice refers to the perceived fairness of the means and processes used to
determine the amount and distribution of resources (Colquitt 2001; Rhoades et al. 2001). Research on fairness in
organizations laid emphasis on procedural fairnessin the late 1980s (Ambrose 2002). A review of organizational
justice research found that justice perceptions are related to organizational outcomes such as job satisfaction,
organizational commitment, organizational citizenship behavior, withdrawal, and performance (Colquitt et al.
2001). When employees have high perceptions of justice in their organization, they are more likely to feel
obliged to also be fair in how they perform their roles through greater levels of engagement. On the other hand,
low perceptions of fairness are likely to cause employees to withdraw and disengage themselves from their work
roles. However, previous research has not tested relationships between fairness perceptions and employee
engagement.. Fairness and justice is also one of the work conditions in the Maslach et al. (2001) engagement
model. A lack of fairness can exacerbate burnout, while positive perceptions of fairness can improve
engagement (Maslach et al. 2001).
Therefore, H5 and H6 are as follows:
H5. Perceptions of procedural justice will be positively related to employee engagement.
H6. Perceptions of distributive justice will be positively related employee engagement.
5. CONSEQUENCES OF EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT
The main reason behind the popularity of employee engagement is that it has positive consequences for
organizations. There is a general belief that there is a connection between employee engagement as an
individual level construct and business results (Harter et al. 2002). Therefore there is reason to expect employee
engagement to be related to individuals attitudes, intentions, and behaviors. Although neither Kahn (1990) nor
May et al. (2004) included outcomes in their studies, Kahn (1992) proposed that engagement leads to both
individual outcomes (i.e. quality of peoples work and their own experiences of doing that work), as well as
51
organizational-level outcomes (i.e. the growth and productivity of organizations). Further, the Maslach et al.
(2001) model considers engagement as a mediating variable for the relationship between the six work conditions
and work various outcomes and like burnout, should be related to outcomes such as increased withdrawal, lower
performance, job satisfaction, and commitment (Maslach et al. 2001).
Job satisfaction is a pleasurable or positive emotional state that arises when people appraise their job or job
experiences (Locke 1976). Implicit in Lockes definition is the importance of both affect, or feeling, and
cognition, or thinking. There are a number of reasons to expect engagement to be related to work outcomes. The
experience of engagement has been described as a fulfilling, positive work-related experience and state of mind
(Schaufeli and Bakker 2004; Sonnentag 2003) and has been found to be related to good health and positive work
affect (Sonnentag 2003). These positive experiences and emotions are likely to result in positive work outcomes.
As noted by Schaufeli and Bakker (2004), engaged employees likely have a greater attachment to their
organization and a lower tendency to leave their organization.
Lodahl and Kejner (1965) defined job involvement as the degree to which a person is identified
psychologically with his work or the importance of work in his total self-image. Thus, job involvement results
from a cognitive judgment about the need satisfying abilities of the job. Jobs in this view are tied to ones selfimage. Where there is a high degree of identification with work, the internalization of value judgments about the
goodness or importance of the work serves as a psychological surrogate for the goodness or the importance of
the individual performing the work.. Kahn (1990) suggested that employees demonstrating high job involvement
might be more sensitive to changes in the work environment, especially those that create uncertainty and
ambiguity. Operationalization of job involvement included job identification, participation, and the connection
of job value with self worth (Blau 1985; Rabinowitz& Hall 1977).Engagement is very closely associated with
the existing constructs of job involvement (Brown 1996) and flow (Csikszentmihalyi 1990). Kanungo (1982)
maintained that job involvement is a cognitive or belief state of psychological identification. Engagement
differs from job involvement in that it is concerned more with how the individual employs his/her self during
the performance of his/her job. Furthermore, engagement entails the active use of emotions and behaviors, in
addition to cognitions.
According to SET, when both parties abide by the exchange rules, the result will be a more trusting and loyal
relationship and mutual commitments (Cropanzano and Mitchell 2005). Hence, individuals who are more
engaged are likely to be in more trusting and high-quality relationships with their employer and will, therefore,
be more likely to report more positive attitudes and intentions toward the organization. For example,
engagement has been found to be positively related to organizational commitment and negatively related to
intention to quit, and is believed to also be related to job performance and extra-role behavior (Schaufeli and
Bakker 2004; Sonnentag 2003). Schaufeli and Bakker (2004) found that engagement was negatively related to
turnover intention and mediated the relationship between job resources and turnover intention.
Although little work exists on Kahns conceptualization of the engagement construct, Britt, Adler, and Bartone
(2001) found that engagement in meaningful work can lead to perceived benefits from the work. Other research
using a different measure of engagement (i.e. involvement and enthusiasm) has linked it to such variables as
employee turnover, customer satisfactionloyalty, safety, and to a lesser degree, productivity and profitability
criteria (Harter, Schmidt, & Hayes 2002). Thus, there are practical reasons that managers and researchers of
organizations should be concerned with employees engagement in work.
Farrel and Rusbult (1992) defined turnover as job movement within and across organizational boundaries, as
well as by a variety of cognitive activities that preceded leaving. Empirical evidences suggest that workplace
stressors such as politics causes job dissatisfaction, and in turn turnover or intent to leave the organization (e.g.,
McKenna et al. 1981). Turnover intention refers to employees' thoughts of quitting their present job. Employees
may choose to withdraw either physically or psychologically. One physical form of withdrawal is to quit the job.
However not all employees, are likely to quit. The possible short term option for those with less job mobility is
psychological withdrawal, such as thinking about quitting. Those employees who have high levels of
engagement are not expected to quit, whereas, those disengaged are likely to do so. Organizational citizenship
behavior (OCB) refers to a universal set of behaviors exhibited by employees that are supportive, discretionary,
and go beyond normal job requirements (Organ 1988). It means that the behavior is helpful to the organization,
but not a requirement of formal job description. OCB is a matter of individual choice and failure to exhibit such
behavior is not is not penalized. In subsequent years,, the topic of organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) has
been sufficiently researched (for a review, see Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Paine &Bachrach 2000) and these
behaviors contribute to effective functioning of the organization (Podsakoff, Ahearne&MacKenzie 1997;
Podsakoff&MacKenzie 1994). It has been studied in a diversity of disciplines such as marketing, human
52
resource management, health care and economics (Lievens&Anseel 2004). Several measures and OCB domains
have been developed such as altruism, conscientiousness, loyalty, civic virtue, voice, functional participation,
sportsmanship, courtesy and advocacy participation ( Bateman &Organ 1983; William & Anderson 1991;
VanDyne, Graham &Dienesch 1994). However, there are five categories of OCB that are frequently recognized
in research (LePine, Erev& Johnson 2002) .These are altruism (e.g. helps others who have heavy workloads),
conscientiousness (e.g. is always punctual at work), sportsmanship (e.g. tends to make a mountain out of
molehills), courtesy (e.g. informs you before taking any important actions), and civic virtue (e.g. attends
functions that are not required, but help the organization image).
The majority of OCB research have utilized superior-ratings since self-ratings of OCB are exposed to self
serving bias, that is individuals tend to present themselves in a way that makes them emerge positive (Schnake
1991). However, a growing number of research have utilized self-ratings of OCB such as Carmeli and Freund
(2002) and Kuehn and Al-Busaidi (2002). The use of superior-ratings alone mitigates concern regarding the
problem of common method variance, but a great deal of citizenship behavior may escape the attention of the
superior (Organ &Konovsky 1989). This suggests that measuring employee citizenship behavior from more than
one perspective may provide a broader view on employee OCB. This is also consistent with suggestions by
Allen, Barnard, Rush and Russell (2000). However considering the overall requirements of this study, we have
used self rating measure only. Most OCB studies have been conducted in North America (Farh, Early & Lin
1997). OCB measurement has received comparatively limited attention in other contexts (Paille 2009). Research
on OCB measurement in other cultural context is important since Podsakoff et al. (2000) argue that cultural
context may affect the forms of citizenship behavior observed in organization (e.g., the factor structure) (p. 556).
Therefore the present study aims to contribute to the existing number of studies on OCB by investigating the
dimensions of OCB in a sample of hotel employees. Employees in the hotel industry were selected as the study
context because in the hospitality industry, offering a high level of quality services and increasing operational
efficiency involves extra-role behaviors such as OCB (Getty & Getty 2003). Therefore, it is predicted that
employee engagement will be related to work outcomes as follows:
H7. Employee engagement will be positively related to (a) job satisfaction, (b) job involvement (c)
organizational citizenship behavior, and negatively related to (d) Retention.
Finally, given that the antecedents are expected to predict engagement and engagement predicts the outcomes, it
is possible that engagement mediates the relationship between the antecedents and the consequences. This is
consistent with the Maslach et al. (2001) model and is all the more likely given that most of the antecedents (e.g.
job characteristics, POS, justice perceptions) have been associated with various work outcomes. Furthermore,
several studies have found that engagement mediates the relationship between antecedent variables and
outcomes (Schaufeli and Bakker 2004; Sonnentag 2003). Therefore, the final hypothesis of this study is the
following:
H8. Employee engagement will mediate the relationship between the antecedents and the consequences.
6. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY:
A snowball sample of 310 respondents from the Jordanian hotel industry was interview during their search
instrument. The sample comprises the employees from different levels of management. The demographics for
the sample and descriptive statistics are shown below.
Table 1: Demographics for the Sample and Descriptive Statistics
Respondents
Gender
Male
Female
217
93
Total
MeanAge
310
38.70
Mean Tenure
7.65
A five point Likert scale was employed for the research instrument using seven dimensions that include Job Engagement, Job
Characteristics,Intrinsic and Extrinsic Rewards,Perceived Organizational Support (POS), Perceived Supervisor Support
(PSS),Perceptions of Procedural Justice,Perceptions of Distributive Justice,andEmployee Engagement, Job Satisfaction, Organizational
Commitment, and Organizational Citizenship Behavior (OCB).Thenumberofitemsforeach dimension is shown in Table 5 alongwith
Factor Loadings for each dimension.
53
Table2: Means, Standard Deviations and Correlations Among Study Variables (n=310)
S. No
Variables
1
Job Characteristics
2
Intrinsic and Extrinsic
Rewards
3
Perceived Organizational
Support
4
Perceived Supervisor
Support
5
Perceptions of
Procedural Justice
6
Perceptions of
Distributive Justice
Employee
7
Engagement
8
Job Satisfaction, OC,
Intention to quit, OCB
Mean
2.984
3.013
SD
0.864
0.643
-0.18(**)
2.945
0.910
0.63(**)
0.37(**)
3.071
0.702
0.66(**)
0.15(**)
0.46(**)
3.029
0.841
0.14(**)
0.11(**)
0.32(**)
0.660
0.13(**)
0.14(**)
0.73(**) 0.19(**)
0.60(**)
2.971
0.888
0.55(**)
0.46(**)
0.20(**) 0.65(**)
0.36(**) 0.73(**)
2.968
0.630
0.65(**)
0.78(**)
0.68(**) 0.72(**)
0.65(**) 0.70(**) 0.62(**)
2.970
0.68(**)
Note:** Correlation is significant at0.01levels.

7. Results and Discussion:
Data from 310 questionnaires was entered into SPSS for analysis and the descriptive statistics including
Means and Standard Deviations are tabulated in Table2. Data was also used to determine Pearsons product
moment correlation coefficients and the results in Table2 indicate that the variables are linearly related in
the sample. The negative sign with the coefficient indicates the negative relationship between the
variables. The correlation results indicate that Intrinsic and Extrinsic rewards are negatively correlated to Job
Characteristics (-0.18). It is interesting to note here that Perceived Organizational Support (referred to as POS
in the text) has a strong positive correlation to Job Characteristics. It indicates that respondents earnestly
expect support from the organization to be able to experience meaningfulness on ones job. Interestingly also,
Perceived Supervisor Support (referred to as PSS in the text) is also strongly correlated with Job
Characteristics (+0.66). It also does mean that greater autonomy, timely feedback and other Job
characteristics are related to how supervisors support their employees. Perception of Procedural Justice and
Perception of Distributive Justice have weak correlations with Job Characteristics (+0.14 and +0.13
respectively).
Table 2 also shows strong positive correlation between Employee Engagement and Job Characteristics
(+0.55). Respondents whose Jobs were designed to be using their skill sets, and whose work was significant
in the final outcome experienced stronger affective engagement at work. This particular correlation also is
supportive of our first premise that Job Characteristics have a positive influence on Employee Engagement.
As enunciated under the Job characteristics model, Job Characteristics are positively and strongly correlated
to Job Satisfaction, Organizational Commitment, and Organizational Citizenship Behavior (OCB). The Job
Characteristics Model also enunciates Job Satisfaction, Organizational Commitment, and Organizational
Citizenship Behavior (OCB) as integral outcomes of systematic Job design efforts.
Perceived Organizational Support (POS) is positively correlated to Intrinsic and Extrinsic Rewards (+0.37) as
respondents also believe that equitable reward system is integral to their perception of POS. Also positively
correlated to Intrinsic and Extrinsic Rewards is Perceived Supervisor Support (+0.15), indicating that
supervisor evaluations and recommendations are pivotal in ensuring equitable rewards for performance.
Table 1 also indicates weakly positive correlation between Perceptions of Procedural Justice, Perceptions of
Distributive Justice with Intrinsic and Extrinsic Rewards (0.11 and 0.14 respectively). There is however a
strong positive correlation between Intrinsic and Extrinsic rewards and Employee Engagement (0.46). This
does indicate to the fact that when performance receives its due recognition and share of the pie, employees
are further engaged at work. This correlation is also supportive of our second premise that Intrinsic and
Extrinsic reward will be positively related to Employee Engagement. There is a strong correlation between
Intrinsic and Extrinsic Rewards with Job Satisfaction, Organizational Commitment and Organizational
54
Citizenship Behavior (0.78). A combination of extrinsic rewards to prevent dissatisfaction amongst

employees with recognition, appreciation, advancement, growth opportunities, and interesting work result in
a committed workforce that is involved and would continue to contribute and stay with the organization.
Perceived Supervisor Support and Perceived Organizational Support are positively related (0.46) as many of
the respondents opine that supervisor support was integral to organizational support along with congenial
working conditions, fair policies and concern for the employees well-being. It is therefore to be observed
that Perceived Organizational Support is also positively and strongly related to Perceptions of Procedural
Justice (0.32) and Perceptions of Distributive Justice (0.73). Perceived Organizational Support also is
positively related to Employee Engagement (0.20) supporting premise three that POS would positively
impact Employee Engagement. Perceived Organizational Support is strongly related to Job Satisfaction,
Organizational Commitment and Organizational Citizenship Behavior (OCB) (0.68).
Perceived Supervisor Support is strongly related to Perceptions of Procedural Justice (0.68) indicating that
supervisors played a major role in ensuring implementation of procedures in a fair and unbiased manner.
However, there seems to be only a weak relation between Perceived Supervisor Support and Perceptions of
Distributive Justice (0.19) indicating supervisors did not have absolute control over distribution of benefits
and rewards and also in ensuring the reach of procedures implemented. Perceived Supervisor Support had a
strong relation to Employee Engagement (0.65) supporting premise four considered for this empirical study.
Also positively related to PSS were Job Satisfaction, Organizational Commitment and OCB (0.72).
The strong correlation was attributed to the importance of supervisor support in keeping employees motivated
and driven toward goal accomplishment. Perceptions of Procedural Justice are related to Employee
Engagement (0.36) supporting premise five and strongly with Job Satisfaction, Organizational Commitment,
and OCB (0.65). Perceptions of Distributive Justice are positively related to Employee Engagement (0.73)
supporting premise six of the study. Table 2 also points out to strong positive correlations for Job
Satisfaction, Organizational Commitment, and OCB with Job Characteristics (0.65), Intrinsic and Extrinsic
Rewards (0.78), Perceived Organizational Support (0.68), and Perceived Supervisor Support (0.72). Strong
correlations between Job Satisfaction, Organizational Commitment, and OCB with Job Characteristics and
Perceptions of Procedural Justice (0.65), Perceptions of Distributive Justice (0.70) and Employee
Engagement (0.62) indicate support of premise seven for the study.
Table 3: Analysis of Variance
Variables
Job Characteristics
Intrinsic and Extrinsic Rewards
Perceived Organizational
Support
Perceived Supervisor
Support
Perceptions of Procedural
Justice
Perceptions of Distributive
Justice
Employee Engagement
Job Satisfaction, OC,
R
0.532
0.548
0.431
R2
0.283
0.301
0.185
Adj.R2
0.279
0.298
0.182
SE
0.622
0.526
0.537
F
107.128
104.456
57.765
Sig
0.000*
0.000*
0.000*
0.623
0.388
0.385
0.591
156.129
0.000*
0.282
0.079
0.075
0.848
22.763
0.000*
0.439
0.192
0.188
0.546
59.984
0.000*
0.547
0.531
0.300
0.281
0.297
0.276
0.525
0.620
103.443
106.789
0.000*
0.000*
Note:*p<0.01
Table3 presents the ANOVA and F-test values that indicate the significance of each variable. The test of
significance for Job Characteristics (2,310)=107.128, p<0.01.The test is also significant for Intrinsic and
Extrinsic Rewards F(2,310)=104.456, p<0.01, Perceived Organizational Support F(2, 310)=57.765, p<0.01,
Perceived Supervisor Support F(2,310) =156.129, p<0.01, Perceptions of Procedural Justice F(2,310) =22.763,
Perceptions of Distributive Justice F(2,310)=59.984, p<0.01, Employee Engagement F(2,310)=103.433, p<0.01
and Job Satisfaction, OC, Intention to quit, and OCBF(2,310) =106.789, p<0.01. Therefore, the Hypothesis H1,
55
H2, H3, H4, H5, H6 and H4 are accepted. F-value of Perceived Organizational Support, Perceptions of
Procedural Justice and Perceptions of Distributive Justice wereless in comparisonto the values for Job
Characteristics, Intrinsic and Extrinsic rewards, Perceived Supervisor Support, Employee Engagement
and Job Satisfaction, Organizational Commitment OC, Intention to quit and Organizational Citizenship
Behavior (OCB).
Table4: Reliability Scores for each Dimension

Dimension
Job Characteristics
Perceived Organizational Support
Perceived Supervisor Support
Perceptions of
Procedural
JusticePerceptions
of Distributive
Justice
Employee
Engagement
Job Satisfaction,
OC, Intention to
quit, OCB
Cronbach Alpha Score obtained

0.81
0.83
0.89
0.86
0.82
Numberof Items
06
10
08
04
07
0.79
04
0.78
05
0.80
20
The internal reliability of dimensions considered for this study was assessed by calculating the Cronbach
Alpha Coefficient. The Cronbach Alpha scores are displayed in Table 4. Job Characteristics comprised of 06
items, Intrinsic and Extrinsic rewards had10 items, Perceived Organizational Support consisted of 8 items,
Perceived Supervisor Support comprised of 4 items, Perceptions of Procedural Justice h a d 7 , Perceptions of
Distributive Justice had 4 items, Employee Engagement had 5 items, and Job Satisfaction, Organizational
Commitment, Intention to quit, and Organizational Citizenship Behavior had 3, 6, 3 and 8 items respectively in
the questionnaire administered to 310 respondents in Jordanian Industry. An analysis of Table 3 reveals
Cronbach Alpha scores higher than 0.6. This confirms that the dimensions employed and the instrument used
for this empirical study was reliable. The overall scores ranged from 0.78 (Employee Engagement) to 0.89
(Perceived Organizational Support).
FACTOR ANALYSIS:
FactorAnalysiswasemployedonthevariablesineachofthetheoreticaldimensionsofthe Questionnaire employed

for this study. The Principal Axis Factoring (PAF) method was used with Varimax Rotation. Table 5 shows
the Rotated Factor Matrix for Factor Analysis. In each case the items reduced to one factor per dimension.
Table 5 indicates the item loadings obtained from the factor analysis. The results confirm the relationship
between E m p l o y e e E n g a g e m e n t a n d Perceived Organizational Support. The effect of Job
Characteristics, Intrinsic and Extrinsic Rewards, Perceived Supervisor Support, Perceptions of Procedural
Justice, Perceptions of Distributive Justice on Employee Engagement is also confirmed. The hypotheses
considered in this study are supported by the evidence from data collected from a sample of respondents
drawn from the industries in Jordan.
56
Table 5: Rotated Factor Matrix Factor Analysis

FactorMatrix
Dimension
Job Characteristics
Perceived Organizational Support
Perceived Supervisor Support
Perceptions of
Procedural
JusticePerceptions
of Distributive
Justice
Employee
Engagement
Job Satisfaction,
OC, Intention to
Quit, OCB
Factor1
0.912
0.904
0.892
0.869
0.896
0.898
0.916
0.872
The importance of having jobs utilize skill sets, present autonomy and extract work that is significant in organizational
outcomes was emphasized by the respondents under the dimension Job Characteristics. Also quoted by the
respondents as important was Organizational Support in the form of good working conditions, personal development
needs, assistance during crisis situations as being influential in the extent of engagement at the work place. The
respondents also drove home the importance of supervisor support in building a sense of belongingness and
motivating employees. Fairness at the work place was highly appreciated and was seen as crucial to the affective
component of Employee Engagement, Organizational Commitment, Involvement, and Organizational Citizenship
Behavior. Respondents also valued recognition, appreciation, challenging work, growth opportunities along with
equitable pay plans.Together, the presence of these dimensions considered for this study contribute to Employee
Engagement and in turn influencing the extent of Job satisfaction, Organizational Commitment, Intention to continue
with the employer and heightened responsibility toward work related issues
Table 6: Rotated Factor Matrix (Per Dimension) of the Questionnaire
ITEM
1.Job Characteristics
01
02
03
04
05
06
2.Intrinsic and Extrinsic Rewards

07
08
19
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
FACTOR LOADINGS
0.78
0.67
0.65
0.49
0.47
0.45
0.85
0.82
0.81
0.79
0.74
0.15
0.63
0.65
0.76
0.74
3.Perceived Organizational Support
57
17
18
29
20
21
22
23
24
4.Perceived Supervisor Support

25
26
27
28
5.Perceptions of Procedural Justice
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
6. Perceptions of Distributive Justice
36
37
38
39
7.Employee Engagement
40
41
42
43
44
0.85
0.73
0.68
0.54
0.54
0.66
0.72
0.45
0,92
0,87
0,85
0,76
0.91
0.89
0.83
0.82
0.80
0.79
0.72
0.91
0.88
0.80
0.81
0.86
0.83
0.79
0.62
0.77
8. Job Satisfaction, Organizational Commitment,

45
46
47
48
59
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
0.82
0.83
0.79
0.81
0.76
0.89
0.85
0.82
0.77
0.74
0.81
0.88
0.84
0.75
0.78
0.86
0.71
0.76
0.76
0.80
58
8. CONCLUSION:
Finally, a holistic view of employee engagement can be helpful to determine what is working and what is not.
Predictors offers HR a way to better understand what practices and policies in their organization effectively
promote employee motivation, attendance, retention and productivity. By using a matrix of engagement
predictors (organizational process, values, management, role challenge, work/life balance, information,
reward/recognition, work environment and products/services), HR can help the organization better manage
engagement and ultimately foster motivation, productivity and retention. The level of engagement determines
whether people are productive and stay with the organizationor quit and perhaps join the competitors. The
extent to which employees are connected to the organizational strategy and goals, acknowledgment for work
well done, and a culture of learning and development foster high levels of engagement. Without a workplace
environment for employee engagement, turnover will increase and efficiency will decline, leading to low
customer loyalty and decreased stakeholder value. Ultimately, because the cost of poor employee engagement
will be detrimental to organizational success, it is vital for top management to foster positive, effective people
managers along with workplace policies and practices that focus on employee well-being, health and work/life
balance.
REFERENCES:
1.
Alan M. Saks, (2006) "Antecedents and consequences of employee engagement", Journal of

Managerial Psychology, 21 (7), 600 619.
2.
Allen, T.D., Barnard, S., Rush, M.C., & Russell, J.E. A. (2000). Ratings of organizational citizenship
behavior: Does the source make a difference? Human Resource Management Review, 10, 97-115.
3.
Ambrose, M. L. (2002). Contemporary justice research: A new look at familiar questions.

Organizational Behavior and Human, 89, 803-812.
4.
Attridge, M. (2009). Measuring and managing employee work engagement: A review of the research
and business literature. Journal of Workplace Behavioral Health, 24, 383-398
5.
Barling, J., Kelloway, E. K., &Frone, M. R. (Eds.). (2005). The handbook of work stress. Newbury
Park, CA: Sage.
6.
Bateman, T.S., & Organ, D.W. (1983). Job satisfaction and the good soldier: The relationship between
affect and employee citizenship. Academy of Management Journal, 26, 587-595.
7.
Bates, S. (2004), Getting engaged, HR Magazine, 49 (2), 44-51.
8.
Baumruk, R. (2004), The missing link: the role of employee engagement in business success,
Workspan,47, 48-52.
9.
Britt, T. W., Adler, A. B., &Bartone, P. T. (2001). Deriving benefits from stressful events: The role of
engagement in meaningful work and hardiness. Journal of Occupational HealthPsychology, 6, 5363.
10. Brown, S. P. (1996). A meta-analysis and review of organizational research on job involvement.
Psychological Bulletin, 120, 235255.
11. Buckingham, M. (1999). First, break all the rules. New York: Simon & Schuster.
12. Carmeli, A., & Freund, A. (2002). The relationship between work and workplace attitudes and
perceived external prestige. Corporate Review, 5, 51-68.
13. Colquitt, J. A. (2001). On the dimensionality of organizational justice: a construct validation of a
measure. Journal of Applied Psychology, 86 (3), 386-400.
59
14. Cropanzano, R., &Folger, R. (1991). Procedural justice and worker motivation. In R. M. Steers & L.
W. Porter (Eds.), Motivation and work behavior (5th ed., pp. 131-143). New York: McGraw-Hill.
15. Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1990). Flow: The psychology of optimal experience. New York: Harper.
16. Eisenberger, R., Huntington, R., Hutchison, S., & Sowa, D. (1986). Perceived organizational support.
Journal of Applied Psychology, 71, 500507.
17. Farh, J.L., Earley, P.C., & Lin, S.C.(1997). Impetus for action: A cultural analysis of justice and
organizational citizenship behavior in Chinese society. Administrative Science Quarterly, 42, 421-444.
18. Farrell, D., &Rusbult, C. E. (1992). Exploring the exit, voice, loyalty and neglect typology: The
influence of job satisfaction, quality of alternatives, and investment size. Special Issue: Research on
Hirschmans Exit, Voice, and Loyalty model. Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal,5,201218
19. Fleming, J. H., Coffman, C., & Harter, J. K. (2005). Manage your human sigma. Harvard Business
Review,83,106114.
20. Frank, F.D., Finnegan, R.P. and Taylor, C.R. (2004), The race for talent: retaining and engaging
workers in the 21st century, Human Resource Planning,27 (3), 12-25.
21. Gebauer, J., & Lowman, D. (2009) Closing the engagement gap: How great companies unlock
employee potential for superior results. New York: Portfolio Penguin.
22. George, J. M., Reed, T. F., Ballard, K. A., Colin, J., & Fielding, J. (1993). Contact with AIDS patients
as a source of work-related distress: Effects of organizational and social support. Academy of
Management Journal,36, 157171.
23. Getty, J.M., & Getty, R.L. (2003). Lodging quality index (LQI): Assessing customers perception of
quality delivery. International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, 15, 94-104.
24. Gonzalez-Roma, V., Schaufeli, W.B., Bakker, A.B. and Lloret, S. (2006), Burnout and work
engagement: independent factors or opposite poles?,Journal of Vocational Behavior, 68, 165-74.
25. Hackman, J.R. and Oldham, G.R. (1980), Work Redesign, Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA.
26. Harter, J. K., & Schmidt, F. L. (2000). Validation of a performance-related and actionable
management tool: A meta-analysis and utility analysis (Gallup Technical Report). Princeton, NJ: The
Gallup Organization.
27. Harter, J. K., & Schmidt, F. L (2008). Conceptual versus empirical distinctions among constructs:
Implications for discriminant validity. Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on
Science and Practice, 1(1), 3639.
28. Harter, J. K., Schmidt, F. L., & Hayes, T. L. (2002). Business-unit-level relationship between employee
satisfaction, employee engagement, and business outcomes: A meta-analysis. Journal of Applied
Psychology, 87, 268279.
29. Harter, J. K., Schmidt, F. L., & Keyes, C. L. M. (2003). Well-being in the workplace and its
relationship to business outcomes: A review of the Gallup studies. In C. L. M. Keyes & J. Haidt
(Eds.), Flourishing: Positive psychology and the life well-lived (pp. 205224). Washington, DC:
American Psychological Association.
30. Johnson, G. (2004), Otherwise engaged, Training,.41 (10), p. 4.
31. Kahn, W.A. (1990), Psychological conditions of personal engagement and disengagement at work,
Academy of Management Journal, 33, 692-724.
32. Kahn, W.A. (1992), To be full there: psychological presence at work, Human Relations,45,321-49.
33. Kanungo, R. N. (1982). Measurement of job and work involvement. Journal of Applied
60
Psychology, 67, 341349.

34. Khalid, S.A., Ali, H., Ismail, M., Rahman, N.A., Kassim, K.M.&Zain, RS.(2009) Organizational
Citizenship Behavior Factor Structure among Employees in Hotel Industry, International Journal of
Psychological Studies,1(1)16-25
35. Kowalski, B. (2003), The engagement gap, Training, 40 (4), p. 62.
36. Kuehn, K.W., & Al-Busaidi, Y. (2002). Citizenship behavior in a non-western context: An examination
of the role of satisfaction, commitment and job characteristics on self-reported organizational
citizenship behavior. InternationalJournal of Commerce & Management, 12, 107-125.
37. Lawler, E. E., III, & Hall, D. T. (1970). Relationship of job characteristics to job involvement,
satisfaction, and intrinsic motivation. Journal of Applied Psychology, 54, 305312.
38. LePine, J.A., Erez, A., & Johnson, D.E. (2002). The nature and dimensionality of OCB: A critical
review and meta-analysis. Journal of Applied Psychology,87,52-65.
39. Lievens, F., &Anseel, F. (2004). Confirmatory factor analysis and invariance of an organizational
citizenship behavior measure across samples in a Dutch-speaking context. Journal of Occupational and
Organizational Psychology, 77, 299-306.
40. Locke, E.A., (1976), The nature and causes of Job Satisfaction. In: M.D. Dunnette (ed), Handbook of
Industrial and Organizational Psychology, Chicago: Rand McNally
41. Lodahl, T. M., &Kejner, M. (1965). The definition and measurement of job involvement. Journal of
Applied Psychology, 49, 24-33.
42. Macey, W., & Schneider, B. (2008). The meaning of employee engagement. Industrial and
Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice, 1(1), 330.
43. Maslach, C., Schaufelli, W.B. and Leiter, M.P. (2001), Job burnout, Annual Review of Psychology,
52, 397-422.
44. May, D.R., Gilson, R.L. and Harter, L.M. (2004), The psychological conditions of meaningfulness,
safety and availability and the engagement of the human spirit at work, Journal of Occupational &
Organizational Psychology,77, 11-37.
45. Organ, D.W. (1988). Organizational Citizenship Behavior:The good soldier syndrome. Lexington,
MA:Lexington Books.
46. Organ, D.W., &Konovsky, M. (1989). Cognitive versus affective determinants of organizational
citizenship behavior. Journal of Applied Psychology, 74,157-164.
61

The Role of Employee Engagement in Work-Related Outcomes: Dr. Padmakumar Ram

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

The Role of Employee Engagement in Work-Related Outcomes: Dr. Padmakumar Ram

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Interdisciplinary Journal of Research in Business

Vol. 1, Issue. 3, March 2011(pp.47-61)