Critical Evaluation of Employee Engagement at Tesco in the UK

This research report provides a critical evaluation of the impact of employee engagement within UK retail firms, using Tesco as a case study. The study begins with an introduction, literature review, and methodology, exploring the concept of employee engagement, its benefits, drivers, and impact on employee performance. The literature review critically assesses employee engagement, its drivers such as job roles, organizational culture, and leadership, and the impact on performance. The methodology section outlines the research philosophy (positivism), design (descriptive/analytical), sampling techniques (non-probability), data collection methods (primary and secondary), and data analysis techniques (quantitative). The expected outcomes include identifying the relationship between employee engagement and job performance, and key factors influencing employee performance, such as recognition, appraisal, promotions, and incentives. The research aims to demonstrate that strategies like rewards and incentives can significantly enhance employee engagement and contribute to increased productivity and profitability. The study utilizes both primary and secondary data sources, including questionnaires, interviews, academic journals, and publications to comprehensively analyze the topic.

Running head: MANAGEMENT
Research Proposal
Critical Evaluation on Effects of Employee Engagement in UK Organizations: A Case
Study of Tesco
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

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Abstract:
The objective of this particular research study is to provide a critical evaluation of the impact of
employee engagement in UK retail firms like Tesco. In the present day retail industry human
resource managers face a number of significant issues. Retaining of employees is believed to
have a key impact on organization. The significant way of enriching an organization with
suitable people lies in keeping people around. It is therefore vital for the employees at every
level to remain rewarded, recruited as well as motivated in a manner that seems relevant to the
roles and capabilities. Thus, engagement of employee represent a key concept that helps in
understanding the quantitative and qualitative nature of relationship between organization and
employees. An engaged employee seem to have a optimistic attitude towards the association and
its values. The concept is not only connected to the organizational strategy but is also related to
the amount of commitment, satisfaction, dedication and motivation that employees have towards
the organization. This particular study commences with an introduction followed by literature
review and methodology.

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Table of Contents
1. Introduction..................................................................................................................................3
1.1 Brief Summary of the Project:...............................................................................................3
1.2 Purpose of the Project:...........................................................................................................3
1.3 Research Objectives:..............................................................................................................4
2. Literature Review:.......................................................................................................................4
2.1 Critical Evaluation of Concept of Employee Engagement....................................................4
2.2 Benefits of Employee Engagement........................................................................................5
2.3 Drivers of Employee Engagement.........................................................................................6
2.4 Critical Evaluation of the Impact of Employee Engagement on Performance Level of
Employees....................................................................................................................................7
3. Methodology:...............................................................................................................................7
3.1 Research Philosophy:.............................................................................................................7
3.2 Research Design.....................................................................................................................8
3.3 Sampling Techniques:............................................................................................................8
3.4 Data Collection Methods:......................................................................................................8
3.5 Data Analysis Technique:......................................................................................................9
4. Research Analysis and Findings:.................................................................................................9
4.1 Desired Outcomes:.................................................................................................................9
References:....................................................................................................................................10

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1. Introduction
1.1 Brief Summary of the Project:
Employee engagement represent policies of the human resource management for
enhancing performance of employees within organization. The human resource management
represents a crucial function irrespective of nature and types of business because of the
functionalities covered for achieving the organizational objectives. The department of human
resource facilitates the employees to not only be qualified but also be capable across and within
the organization. Besides, training put forward by HR has been found to make significant impact
on level of proficiency of employees. As per Du Plessis and Sukumaran (2015)relationship
maintained by management needed to discover healthier ways of achieving success and
employees needed to understand that their achievement lay in the achievement of organization.
Employees seem to accomplish the responsibility only when it is useful or vital to them.
Employee engagement is a key factor that allows workers in achieving the desired goals and
objectives. It is directly connected to the strategy of the firm and depends on commitment,
satisfaction and finding motivation and meaning at the work. Employee engagement thus implies
that the employees are undertaking the additional miles, putting additional efforts than what is
expected in the normal case. Employee engagement seems to ensure efficient and effective
communication between the employer and the employee. This particular research study helps in
providing an insight into the factors that retail firm like Tesco needed to consider for engagement
of employees.
1.2 Purpose of the Project:
The aim of the research is in finding the effects of employee engagement in UK based
organizations especially the retail sector. The retail firm chosen for this purpose is Tesco.

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Employee engagement is a key aspect of an organization since it enhances the output of the retail
sector.
1.3 Research Objectives:
The research objectives includes:
 To critically assess the concept and theoretical framework of employee engagement.
 To critically review a significant association between engagement of employee and job
performance
 To assess the employee engagement and its effect on the employee performance.
 To evaluate ways of emphasizing the techniques of employee engagement in order to
enhance employee performance.
2. Literature Review:
2.1 Critical Evaluation of Employee Engagement Concept
The idea behind employee engagement enables employees in feeling passionate about
their jobs, remain committed to organization and put across discretionary effort in work.
Employee engagement aids the employees in achieving the desired goals and objectives.
According to Bailey (2016), employee engagement represents an area that hugely demands much
focus and attention. But Sarah (2010) stated that this is an area that received little attention. This
was supported by Sparrow and Cooper (2014) who supported the fact that employee engagement
was very much necessary for employee retention within a firm. On the other hand, Cheema,
Akram and Javed (2015) discovered a relation between customer satisfaction and employee
engagement. In fact, there has been major level of confusions and struggles in the terminologies
and the definitions of worker engagement amongst researchers. There are various researchers
who defines the concept of employee engagement with respect to the psychological aspects

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while others define and contradict it in relation to the behavioral aspects. Taneja, Sewell, and
Odom (2015) defined employee engagement as the willingness and ability of employees in
contributing towards the success of the firm. This was also supported by Ariani (2013) when
they explained that the concept of the employee engagement as feeling if commitment of staffs
towards the organization. However, Bedarkar and Pandita ( 2014) puts forward an argument
stating that presence of three crucial behavior in employees seem to constitute the features of the
employee engagement and also identified the three behaviors behind the employee involvement.
2.2 Benefits of Employee Engagement
Employee engagement represents the focal point of present day’s workforce as
companies are looking for enraged employees who would ensure the happiness of customers.
Motivated and engaged workers have higher levels of employee satisfaction that results in
overall growth of the firm. Some of the benefits includes (Robertson, Birch and Cooper 2012):
 Higher Level of Employee Satisfaction: Engaged employees remain quite satisfied with
their position and feel a greater connection towards the company and hence produce
quality work that benefited both the company and the customer.
 Lower Turnover and Higher Level of Retention: Employee engagement help in
retaining the top employees and decrease the turnover rates by ensuring that the team
remains happy.
 Higher Level of Productivity: Engaged employees seem to work faster, stronger and
harder thereby enhancing productivity.
 Enhanced Profitability: Engaged employees seem to produce quality work and thus
happy customers who tend to keep coming back increasing the profitability of the
company.

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 Less Absenteeism and Enhances Loyalty: Engaged employees consider them to be part
of the organization which reduces absenteeism and makes the employee loyal towards the
organization.
2.3 Drivers of Employee Engagement
Employee Engagement has been recognized as the tool which positively influences the
business performance. Organizations with higher scores of engagement experience shows an
increase in Earnings per Share (EPS) while companies with lower scores of engagement has a
lower EPS. There are certain drivers that plays a key role in engaging employees. Some of these
drivers include:
 Job or Work Role: According to Crawford et al. (2013) it is necessary to make the
employees realize the link between their role and the organization. The work culture has
been found to influence intrinsic motivation of employees. Satisfied employees exhibits
motivation that results in engagement of employees.
 Organizational Culture: Singh et al. (2016) put across that an employee is found to be
motivated and engaged in stretching beyond their duty hours if they find work ambience
supportive and enabling
 Recognition and Rewards: It has been found that equal pay in addition to program for
recognition and reward enhances the motivation factor thereby leading to engagement
and commitment.
 Opportunities for Training and Learning: Knowledge and skill is not simply vital for
employees but also acts as a driver towards employee engagement.

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 Leadership Aspect: Popli and Rizvi (2016) put forward that the aspect of leadership
plays a key role in employee engagement within the firm as it instills in them a feeling of
intrinsic motivation.
2.4 Critical Evaluation of the Impact of Employee Engagement on Performance
A detailed study put forward by Anitha (2014) has put across positive influence of
employee engagement on the job performance of the employees. Nasomboon (2014) has put
across similar report where he mentioned in the work that the job performance of the employees
has been hugely influenced through engagement of employees. As put forward by him,
enhancement of job performance is primarily accomplished through the intrinsic motivation.
Engaged employees are the result of the satisfaction and contentment of employees. When
employees are motivated to work, it is reflected through the performance of job. Besides this, the
favorable changes in service climate also account for the improvement and enhancement of the
job. The growth of employee engagement within a firm, their smooth interaction of employees in
firms also help in smoothening climate of the service prevailing in firm. The positive situation is
responsible in convincing employees about performing duties.
3. Methodology:
3.1 Research Philosophy:
There has been different kinds of research philosophies which includes realism,
interpretivism and positivism. As put forward by Vaioleti (2016), positivism leads to in depth
investigation of a study. On the other hand, interpretivism focus on the management function and
activities while realism puts across a mixed approach. For this research study, the philosophy of
positivism will be used since it helps in investigating an issue in a critical and logical manner.

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3.2 Research Design:
There are three types of research design which includes exploratory, explanatory and
analytical or descriptive. Exploratory research design helps in understanding concept at the
initial stage while the explanatory research explains the relationship amongst the two variables
considered (Flick 2015). Thus, this particular research will take into consideration descriptive or
the analytical design as it will help in providing a detailed insight into the existing concepts and
theories of the study.
3.3 Sampling Techniques:
There have been two types of techniques adopted in sampling which includes probability
and non-probability sampling. The probability sampling comprises of random, stratified and the
systematic factors where the samples possess equal chances of selection. While in non-
probability sampling the chances of selection remains restricted to the specific samples. The
present study will use non-probability sampling as it allows the researcher to collect information
from a selected group of employees in Tesco who acts as the representative for entire firm
instead of considering all employees.
3.4 Data Collection Methods:
The present study will collect data from both the primary and the secondary sources. The
primary sources of data will be collected through questionnaire survey or interview. This results
in the collection of valid and reliable data directly from the respondents involved. The secondary
data on the other hand is derived through academic journals, website, publications, articles,
books and magazine in regard to employee engagement and job performance.

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3.5 Data Analysis Technique:
The techniques for data analysis are either quantitative or qualitative. This study carries
out a quantitative data analysis by transforming collected data into percentage and numeric for
gaining a comprehensive analysis of data (Treiman 2014). The data then gets converted into
graphs and charts for presenting a pictorial or graphical presentation of same. For undertaking
data analysis, 50 employees of Tesco will be requested to be part of the survey which will also
include 3 human resource manager.
4. Analysis and Findings:
4.1 Desired Outcomes:
The research is expected to draw a relationship between employee engagement and job
performance. It also expected to draw insight to effective factors that influenced employee
performance. Some of the significant identified factors being recognition, appraisal, promotions,
incentives and the socio cultural background. The research is expected show that although Tesco
has various strategies adopted by management factors likes rewards, incentives and promotions
to the deserving employees makes them feel special and more engaged which can finally
contribute to additional productivity and profitability.

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References:
Anitha, J., 2014. Determinants of employee engagement and their impact on employee
performance. International journal of productivity and performance management.
Ariani, D.W., 2013. The relationship between employee engagement, organizational citizenship
behavior, and counterproductive work behavior. International Journal of Business
Administration, 4(2), p.46.
Bailey, C., 2016. Employee engagement: do practitioners care what academics have to say–and
should they?. Human Resource Management Review, p.100589.
Bedarkar, M. and Pandita, D., 2014. A study on the drivers of employee engagement impacting
employee performance. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 133, pp.106-115.
Cheema, S., Akram, A. and Javed, F., 2015. Employee engagement and visionary leadership:
Impact on customer and employee satisfaction. Journal of Business Studies Quarterly, 7(2),
p.139.
Crawford, E.R., Rich, B.L., Buckman, B. and Bergeron, J., 2013. The antecedents and drivers of
employee engagement. In Employee engagement in theory and practice (pp. 71-95). Routledge.
Du Plessis, A. and Sukumaran, S., 2015. The role of HRM in leadership development, talent
retention, knowledge management and employee engagement.
Flick, U., 2015. Introducing research methodology: A beginner's guide to doing a research
project.Sage.

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Nasomboon, B., 2014. The relationship among leadership commitment, organizational
performance, and employee engagement. International Business Research, 7(9), p.77.
Popli, S. and Rizvi, I.A., 2016. Drivers of employee engagement: The role of leadership
style. Global Business Review, 17(4), pp.965-979.
Robertson, I.T., Birch, A.J. and Cooper, C.L., 2012. Job and work attitudes, engagement and
employee performance. Leadership & Organization Development Journal.
Sarah, C. 2010. “ The Essential Guide to Employee Engagement: Better Business Performance
through Staff Satisfaction”. Kogan Page Publishers
Singh, S.K., Burgess, T.F., Heap, J. and Al Mehrzi, N., 2016. Competing through employee
engagement: a proposed framework. International Journal of Productivity and Performance
Management.
Sparrow, P. and Cooper, C., 2014. Organizational effectiveness, people and performance: new
challenges, new research agendas. Journal of Organizational Effectiveness: People and
Performance.
Taneja, S., Sewell, S.S. and Odom, R.Y., 2015. A culture of employee engagement: A strategic
perspective for global managers. Journal of Business Strategy.
Treiman, D.J., 2014. Quantitative data analysis: Doing social research to test ideas. John Wiley
& Sons.
Vaioleti, T.M., 2016. Talanoa research methodology: A developing position on Pacific
research. Waikato Journal of Education, 12(1).

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