By: Gordon Barker

With the dramatic change in the global economic environment, organisations need more than ever before to focus on creating an engaging performance environment.
With the dramatic change in the global economic environment, organisations need more than ever before to focus on creating an engaging performance environment for their employees. But how do you create an employee engagement strategy and communicate it effectively? And how can organisations measure the return on investment from employee engagement?

An engaging environment:

Recent research has highlighted HR's lack of strategic authority. A 2008 survey by consultants McKinsey found that 60% of senior managers see HR as 'an administrative department, not a strategic business partner', while TalentDrain's 2008 Employee Retention Survey revealed that 75% of HR departments have no retention strategy in place for their organisation.

Without a compelling strategy or business case, it's no wonder that the HR budget is often one of the first to be cut when the going gets tough. The good news, though, is that the basic value of employee engagement is well established and largely accepted - even by senior managers who recognise that employee-related expenditure is typically an organisation's highest cost.

With the ongoing war for talent, and a fast-approaching global labour shortage, it's important not only to retain employees, but to ensure that they are capable and motivated to deliver high performance.