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Archived: Increase the percentage of employees who report they are engaged in the workplace

Why is Employee Engagement a priority?

When employees are engaged at their agency, they feel a deeper connection with the work they do. Engaged employees tend to believe that the work they do has an impact on coworkers and the agency they work for. Increased opportunities for learning and growing along with proper alignment of skills contribute significantly to job satisfaction and employees promoting their agency as a great place to work.

How are we doing?

In 2017, approximately 47,000 state employees provided answers to questions in the statewide Employee Engagement Survey relating to the Employee Engagement indicator.

  • Q1) “I have the opportunity to give input on decisions affecting my work” received a percent positive score of 62 percent.
  • Q3) “I know how my work contributes to the goals of my agency” received a percent positive score of 82 percent.
  • Q5) “I have opportunities at work to learn and grow” received a percent positive score of 63 percent.
  • Q11) “A spirit of cooperation and teamwork exists in my work group” received a percent positive score of 72 percent.
  • Q15) “I am encouraged to come up with better ways of doing things” received a percent positive score of 57 percent.
  • Q18) “At my job, I have the opportunity to make good use of my skills” received a percent positive score of 72 percent.

These six scores averaged together provide a current Employee Engagement score of 68 percent.

What are we working on?

Results Washington, Office of Financial Management, and state agencies are working together on the following statewide improvement strategies:

  • Monitoring and improving the HR Employee Engagement Toolkit. Launched in May 2015 to build and support HR’s capacity to help improve employee engagement, State HR, with oversight from the HR Development Working Committee, will work with agency partners to improve this product based on user feedback
  • Offering Lean training's in problem solving and coaching . These include classes offered through the Lean Transformation office,monthly lean advisers meetings, and consulting to maintain alignment with Lean thinking. Individual agencies are offering learning opportunities in Lean and sharing resources
  • Develop and implement statewide strategies to support employee innovation with the goal of access to resources and information aimed at creating a culture that supports employee problem solving and innovation
  • Develop and implement statewide strategies to support employee innovation

Leaders and staff within each agency are also continually working to identify, implement and assess internal strategies to improve the overall employee experience.