The Relationship Between Employee Engagement and Human ...

Figure 2: Work stress by level of engagementMost days at work are not at all/somewhat stressfulMost days at work are quite/extremely stressfulTotal59.1%40.9%Level of EngagementHighMediumLow36.9%65.6%75.6%63.1%34.4%24.4%0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%n = 10,123 (across the 16 hospitals)Work stressWe focus on two individual outcomes that measure different aspects of quality of work life. The first isself-reported work stress, using a measure adapted from Statistics Canada’s Canadian CommunityHealth Survey. Respondents were asked: “In the past 12 months, would you say that most days at workwere…not at all stressful, somewhat stressful, quite stressful, or extremely stressful?” Figure 2, above,combines these four response categories into two, showing that 4 in 10 of all respondents experiencemost days as quite or extremely stressful. However, those employees in the high-engagement group arefar less likely to experience stress (24%), especially compared with their coworkers who have lowengagement. Indeed, more than 6 out of 10 low-engagement employees experience most workdays asquite or extremely stressful.These data sets do not reveal how engagement may contribute to stress. However, given theconsiderable costs that stress can impose on employers in the form of increased absenteeism andpresenteeism, experts in the field could further probe such a relationship.Engagement - Human Capital Performance Report8