Developing a measurement scale for employee engagement: a validation study in a South Korean context

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to develop a reliable and valid measurement scale of employee engagement that can be used in human resources departments in any industry field. Design/methodology/approach This study used the measurement development process with three steps. The first step was to generate items for measuring employee engagement. For this reason, the authors proposed an integrated conceptual model based on the results of a literature review and justify the concepts from self-determination theory and person-environment fit theory as the theoretical foundation. The second step was to determine the types of questions suitable for measurement, examining the content validity. Content validity was conducted two times by the group, academic experts and business practitioners. The last step was to examine the exploratory factor analysis (EFA), confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), multi-group analysis and reliability with 352 survey responses from the South Korean business context. Findings Findings of the measurement scale development procedure, i.e. employee engagement, should be managed in a balanced manner in all dimensions, as it is composed of four dimensions (person engagement, work engagement, organization engagement and relation engagement) and 16 sub-factors. Additionally, organization engagement was the major factor among the four dimensions of employee engagement with the highest variance explanation. From the statistical standpoint, the employee engagement scale (EES) is possible to use in any industry field because it demonstrated not only content validity and internal consistency reliability but also the three steps of factor analysis (EFA, CFA and multi-group analysis). Research limitations/implications This survey was conducted with an assistant manager located in Korea. Therefore, it will be necessary to analyze both leader and employee engagement for those who live in foreign countries. The EES is useful to leaders and human resource managers because it is applicable to managing engagement levels of employees and fosters customized training programs. Originality/value This is the first study to develop measurement tools for employee engagement in South Korea. In addition, most studies demonstrated that individual feeling was valued to drive employee engagement. This research, however, proposes an extended concept of employee engagement for four dimensions (person, work, relation and organization) and emphasizes the important relationship between individuals and colleagues in an organization. Based on these results, a theoretically integrated model of employee engagement was developed and a practically valid measurement tool for capturing comprehensive domains of employee engagement was proposed.

A review of the literature on factors affecting organizational engagement of Millennials: Social identity and psychological entitlement perspectives

“…Yet, despite the fact that Millennials have been widely characterized as an entitled generation, the relationship between their entitlement and organizational engagement seems to remain an unexplored area. So et al (2021) developed a measurement scale for employee engagement incorporating self-determination theory and person-environment fit. Their model incorporated four dimensions of employee engagement; person, work, relation and organizational engagement, and they recognized organizational engagement as the most important dimension of employee engagement.…”

“…However, according to Bailey et al (2017) who conducted a systematic review involving 214 studies pertaining to engagement, individual psychological states are the most often cited antecedents of employee engagement. Given that organizational engagement is considered a dimension of employee engagement, the predominantly cited antecedent of employee engagement which is individual psychological states warrants increased scrutiny with respect to organizational engagement (Bailey et al, 2017;Bakker & Albrecht, 2018;Saks, 2006;So et al, 2021).…”

“…Engagement is a work-related attitude which is sometimes conceptualized as a multidimensional construct and typically discussed under positive organizational behaviour (Bailey et al, 2017;Barrick et al, 2015;Robbins & Judge, 2013;Saks, 2006;So et al, 2021). Kahn (1990) conceptualized engagement as a function of three psychological conditions including psychological meaningfulness, psychological safety and psychological availability while Schaufeli et al (2002) conceptualized engagement as the opposite of burnout.…”

“…It is an emerging area of interest in contemporary research literature. According to So et al (2021), organizational engagement is the most important factor among the four dimensions of employee engagement which comprises person, work, relation and organizational engagement. According to Fletcher et al (2020), there is a gap in extant research literature regarding the particular contextual factors pertaining to engagement.…”

The role of ethical leadership on employee commitment to the organization: The mediating role of job satisfaction and job engagement

“…In the corporate field, employees' organizational commitment maintains a correlation between managers and employees. whereas, in the business context, employees' job satisfaction influences their commitment to the organization toward relationships and a sense of belonging (Ramalho Luz et al, 2018;Shrotyia, Dhanda, 2020;So et al, 2021;Treuren , Frankish, 2014;Zaman, Ansari, 2021). Job satisfaction contributes to developing a meaningful and positive relationship and commitment among team members and the company.…”