RIP Employee Engagement

There's been a flurry of posts recently about how Employee Engagement has had its day and is about ready to be towed off to the scrapyard along with previous fads like job satisfaction. This is not in itself a surprise, the idea of employee engagement has been gaining ground for about a quarter of a century; long enough for people to find out it is not a miracle cure.

As the number of articles predicting its demise starts to rise, people inevitably start looking for the next panacea; an easy way to get all the ducks on the same page, to mix a metaphor. But, as Marshall Goldsmith points out in the Linkedin  article 'Employee Engagement Isn’t Working. Now What?' it is not at all clear what the next miracle will be.

One theme is appearing more and more frequently - a developing focus on conversations. Take Rebecca Knight's piece in Harvard Business Review, for example. She quotes Elizabeth Saunders, author of How to Invest Your Time Like Money as saying “One-on-ones are one of the most important productivity tools you have as a manager.'  She says this is partly because "from a rapport point of view, they are how you show employees that you value them and care about them.”