Engaging Generation Y Employees Essay

The ability of employees to combine their commitment to the organization and the organization’s values and to work hand in hand with the other team members creating a comfortable work place that lifts up their morale to competently perform their duties is referred to as employee engagement (Bullivant 2005). These efforts enable employees to make decisions that cater for the success of the organization creating a strong bond between the employees and the organization. The virtue of self confidence and trust to the organization is developed as employees categorize themselves, as core members of the organization. Assets and resources provided by the organization are efficiently used and taken care of in an attempt of securing the future of the organization. Although employee engagement has been studied for a long period of time, its implementation seems difficult as the concept behind it has not been fully understood by employees and employers. The attempt of including employee engagement into the education curriculum has also not been successful (Bullivant 2005). The change in industrial relations has lead to the increased need of organizations to recruit an engaged workforce that assures the development of the organization. The upcoming generation Y that occupies about 40 % of the employment sector in Europe has raised concerns in their performance capability (Bullivant 2005). Employers complain about their inquisitive attitude towards the workplace culture which is not replicated into their work output. To overcome this hurdle generation Y has devised motivational schemes that help them to form an engaged workforce. A change in the order of preference between the public sectors and the private sectors is evident in this generation as a higher percentage has been employed in the public sectors comparing with the percentage of generation X and boom that are employed in the public sector (Townsend & Gebhardt 2007). Generation Y attributes job stability in the public sectors as the security of employment is enhanced. Generation Y comprises individuals that are still growing financially and require stability in employment to enable them fulfil their needs. Generation Y also associates public sectors with the ability of enhancing good employment relationship that links the employer to the employees by providing a balance between work and the personal life of the generation. In the public sectors opportunities for career development training are unending and are also provided outside work hours resulting to a quick progression of employees, because of the fairly well defined career path. This organizational culture attracts generation Y to work in the public sector, fully formulating an engaged workforce (Cook 2008). A plethora of campaigns wants the inclusion of generation Y into political activities thus increasing the desire of the generation towards politics. Public sectors provide opportunities that advocate for the development of the community to improve their welfare by improving the economic status (Milner 2000). This prevails an opportunity for the generation to actively be involved with the community and thus create better opportunities of winning their votes during political rallies. Also the recognition of their views by third party organizations results to a good development of their reputation especially since they are the future generation. Public sectors offer an attractive sum of money in their entry points thus encouraging generation Y to be fully engaged in the fundamental functions of the sector which leads to the growth of the sector and increase in the profit margins (Terry 2000). Problem statement The economy of Europe has seen its better taste in the 21st century as it has steadily grown, however due to the economic stability that the world is facing Business Secretary John Hutton of Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) has announced a review on the importance of employee engagement in the performance capability of British organizations (BERR 2008). The role undertaken by the public sector which mainly comprises the government and local authority departments in engaging generation Y employees aged between 27 years and below needs to recognize the generation as valuable assets to the organizations. The public sector needs to invest more on the generation by devising mechanisms which will advocate creation of an engaged workforce that will be more beneficial towards the performance of the sector. Therefore, this proposal will formulate strategies that will engage generation Y employees in public sector and recommendations of the evaluation criterion to be used (BERR 2008). Significance of the study (practical and ethical issue) Organizations that strive to invest in their employees so as to improve their skills and engagement usually have big profit margins which depicts a positive growth of the organization. Therefore this study is congruent in fulfilling the research objectives depicted in the problem statement as it will advocate for the establishment of business environments that will encourage employee engagement. This will help the public sector to view the employees as valuable assets thus creating an employment relationship that is long lasting. Hence this study will identify strategic measures to be implemented during employee engagement processes to help improve the productivity level of the British sector. The study will also explain the benefits British industry will attain in regards to the UK business competitiveness which depicts a progression career path for the employees. The study advocates for the abolishment of trade regulation and market barriers that affect the capability of the public sectors to stipulate policies which would help them ensure employee engagement. The study also encourages adoption of the practice by outlining the achievements of employee engagement. The study will also correlate employment engagement with business ethical behaviour that are in accordance to human, economic and social norms through the use of compliance programs that help to implement the stipulated government policies and regulations to govern the behaviour of team members in organizations. Literature review Statistics show that employee engagement creates a workforce that works with passion as it find a profound connection to the organization it is working for, resulting to the accomplishment of the organization’s policies which include the mission, vision, goals and objectives. The functions of the organization, customer service, and cost of production and marketing processes are advocated by the personal growth and unification of the common goal because of employee engagement (Bullivant 2005). A flexible organization culture that involves inclusion of team members in decision making, training programs to improve the competence of the team members and the incentive pay systems are supported by incorporation of employee engagement (Bullivant 2005). Organizations that advocate employee engagement have the advantage of retaining their employees as approximately 13% are likely to seek other employment opportunities (Milner 2000). Therefore, the need for government departments to review the importance of employee engagement in the performance capability of British organizations has increased (Bullivant 2005). To enable the public sector to engage generation Y employees they should re-evaluate their work culture to help improve employment relationship that exists between the sector and its employees. This will help the managers of the sector to value the rights of the employees and devise strategies that will lead to the respect and provision of their rights such as sick offs and company infringements. This will enable employee engagement to prevail, as the employees will connect with the managers of the sector improving their correlation (Tamara 2008). Management communication will help to spell out the functions of each team members and regularly evaluate the performance of the organization in regards to the work output of each employee. Trust and integrity will prevail as the team members will freely air their comments and grievances to a listening ear, thus helping the development of employee engagement (Fitz-Enz 2009). This will help the sector to effectively distribute their duties in accordance to the capability of generation Y thus improving their work performance. An instance where the team members will look after the welfare of the others will crop up as team work will be depicted. Through management communication the managers of the sector will be able to recognize the effort of the team members rewarding them accordingly through provision of benefits and promotion schemes which will lead to career development. This will result to retention of the dynamic generation Y employees who will take pride in the sector and thus maximize their capabilities to also develop the sector (Cheese, Thomas & Craig 2008). Offering training programs that will help the employees to understand the sector’s vision, ethics and improve their competence should be among the strategies the mangers of the public sector will use to engage generation Y employees. These programs will help the employees to increase their self confidence and knowledge thus adhering to the ethical codes stipulated by the policies of the public sector (Johnson & CIPD 2004). The managers of the sector will also attend training programs that will help them to learn strategies, values and tactics that will help them in the engagement of generation Y employees into the public sector. This will further increase the credibility of the sector as employment engagement will improve the reputation of the sector thus marketing it. The sector will also increase its scope of customers and thus strive in the stiff competition presented by the private sector (Pinnington, Macklin & Campbell 2007). Research design The research methodology used in this study will measure on the generality and applicability of engaging generation Y employees in the public sector to improve the British industry. Action research that identifies the problem of this study in the existing business practice will be used, as solutions that will be immediately incorporated into the business plan and organization culture of the public sector will result. The study will also rely on the historical perspective of the study problem to help determine the success and failures of previous attempt in engaging generation Y employees in the public sector. The scope of the research will be controlled by the information availed by library and field research. The information collected will be ordered in a descriptive manner to effectively elaborate issues that correlate with the study problems.