It is important, as with other discussions in the course related to voice, involvement and participation, that the individual employee is not regarded as passive, simply to be ‘made’ engaged.
It is suggested that trust has a critical role to play here: ‘put simply, without trust engagement cannot exist’ (Macey et al., 2009, p. 46). Cummings and Bromiley (1996) define trust in the following way:
Trust (is) defined as an individual’s belief or a common belief among a group of individuals that another individual or group a) makes good-faith efforts to behave in accordance with any commitments both explicit or implicit, b) is honest in whatever negotiations preceded such commitments, and c) does not take excessive advantage of another even when the opportunity is available. The rationale for this definition of trust rests on the socially embedded, subjective, and optimistic nature of most interactions within and between organisations that involve trust. Much of organisational interaction rests strongly on these three characteristics and thus makes trust so centrally important.
(Cummings and Bromiley, 1996, pp. 303–5)
Trust can therefore be understood as a ‘belief that another party will be fair, reliable and competent, and in consequence, the trustor becomes vulnerable to the trustee’ (Alfes et al., 2012, p. 409). Both individual and group trust matter in organisations and are embedded within understandings of climate and culture. Organisational culture impacts the extent to which employees trust the organisation while climate impacts trust at group and team level.
Underpinning the value of trust is the importance of effective cooperation in organisational life. In the simplest of terms, trust is key because it enables cooperation (Tyler, 2003). While cooperation has always been important in organisations, emerging trends in organisational dynamics have pushed this to the foreground. Changes in the nature of work have made ‘old’ styles of securing cooperation more difficult to maintain. Additionally, the nature of cooperation has changed; there is now a greater emphasis on more ‘voluntary forms of cooperation’ which can be more difficult to achieve (Tyler, 2003, p. 557). Old style ‘command and control’ strategies for securing motivation are no longer considered sufficient against the backdrop of organisational changes.
Processes of globalisation, flexibilisation of labour relations, continuous change and the virtualisation of organisational forms, mean that the relations between people have become looser and behaviours are less easy to monitor. Within firms, hierarchical relationships are being replaced by lateral relationships (e.g. matrix structures and teamwork) further emphasising a growing need for voluntary cooperation, ‘extra-role behaviours’, or in other words, employee engagement (Bijlsma and Koopman, 2003, p. 543). Underpinning the heightened need for cooperation and engagement however, is the fundamental issue of trust.
What then is the relationship between trust and employee engagement? The following activity explores the role of trust in creating an engaged workforce.
About 60 minutes
In this activity we ask you to access the ACAS website and read the article Placing trust in employee engagement (ACAS, 2012). In the article, the relationship between trust and engagement is explored. The author of the article reviews relevant evidence and considers the role of trust in creating an engaged workforce. As you go through the article, make a note of how and why trust needs to be nurtured, developed and embedded within a variety of relationships. To achieve engagement, then answer the following questions:
While discussing how notions of organisational climate and more broadly culture are implicated in the achievement of employee engagement, it is worth highlighting a common criticism, which is that research and investigation into the phenomenon of employee engagement has been predominantly conducted in European and American contexts (Truss et al., 2014). This issue will be explored in Activity 5.
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