The measurement of employee engagement in government institutions. Risk governance & control: financial markets & institutions.

Abstract

Employee engagement has consistently been rated as one of the top issues on chief executive officers’ lists of priorities and is a main focus of attention of both academics and human resources practitioners. A number of studies focus on employee engagement in the private sector, however there are relatively fewer studies that focus on employee engagement in government institutions. The aim of this study was twofold: Firstly, the validity and reliability of the employee engagement instrument for government institutions were determined. Secondly, it was determined if any significant differences could be detected between the employee engagement levels of the various biographical groups that participated in the survey. A quantitative research study was conducted using a database of a research company. The database in question is made up of 285 000 business people from various industries and sizes of business and who occupy different roles, reflecting the profile of the South African working population. A total of 4 099 employees, of which 427 represented government institutions, completed the employee engagement questionnaire. The results confirmed the validity and reliability of the questionnaire for government institutions, but with a slightly different structure. Some biographical groupings indicated that they experience employee engagement in a significantly different way. The results indicate that the younger employees together with top and senior management experience the highest levels of engagement in government institutions. The significance of these results is that not all biographical groups’ engagement levels can be managed equally.