Employee Engagement from the Viewpoint of Highly Engaged University Employees

Abstract

The purpose of this qualitative descriptive study was to investigate how highly engaged employees in a large staff group at a large public U.S. university describe how their experiences influenced their perceptions of meaningfulness, psychological safety, psychological availability, and employee engagement. In response to many calls to fully operationalize Kahn’s theory of personal engagement and disengagement, each psychological condition was explored individually and the factors that most influenced overall engagement were also examined. To further understand the phenomenon, interviews were conducted with 16 non-faculty staff and a focus group was conducted with a subset of those who were interviewed. Through reflexive thematic analysis, five study themes were identified: employee individual factors (with three subthemes of employee traits or behaviors; identity(ies); and relationships); interpersonal risk tolerance; the job itself; leader traits, behaviors, or style; and organizational culture. This study found that meaningfulness was influenced by employee traits or behaviors, employee identities, the job itself, and leader traits, behaviors, or style. Psychological safety was influenced by employee relationships, interpersonal risk tolerance, and leader traits, behaviors, or style. Additionally, it was found that psychological availability was impacted by employee traits or behaviors and leader traits, behaviors, or style. Employee engagement was influenced by employee traits or behaviors, leader traits, behaviors, or style, and organizational culture. These findings build upon existing theoretical concepts and recommendations for future research are presented.