Approaches that Emirates Airline should implement to improve employee engagement after the Covid-

19 Pandemic effect

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1.0 Introduction

Employee engagement is the commitment of people to the organisation. Engagement is an approach

that connects the organisation to the employees and creates their commitment to achieving
organisational goals and objectives. For employees' engagement levels to be realised, they should have
high trust levels to the employers and communicate and show integrity in the business operations.
Employers have the role of developing positive behaviours and attitudes that reinforce engagement with
the employees. Organisations that value engagement has employees who value their work in the
organisation as well. This brings in employees' feeling of pride and loyalty to the organisation, which is
an aspect that contributes to high employee performance. According to research conducted by Deloitte,
among the employees who expect to stay in the organisation are more based on the levels of trust that
they have with the organisation and the nature of communication in the organisation. The graph below
is a representation of the results from Deloitte.

Figure 1:

The research identifies approaches that management and HR at Emirates Airlines should implement to
improve employee engagement in the workplace. This is crucial for all organisations because the Covid-
19 pandemic had a significant impact on the employees in all organisations. There have been adverse
effects on employee well-being, employee involvement, and commitment to the organisation. These
adverse effects have had consequent negative impacts on the organisation, which affects their
organisation engagement. The research, therefore, focuses on determining approaches that promote
employee engagement at Emirates Airlines.

1.1 Stakeholders

The stakeholders involved in promoting employee engagement in the organisation include senior and
line managers, People professionals and employees. The table below is a representation of the interests
of these stakeholders.

Stakeholders Interest to organisation

Managers The senior and line managers in the organisation take responsibility for
identifying the significant changes that should be implemented to help
 improve employee engagement levels. The stakeholders work to
implement changes that will improve engagement levels among all the
employees.
People People professionals have a good interest in determining how well they
professionals will be involved in supporting the employers and the management in
implementing the engagement approaches. The people professionals are
responsible for getting information from the employees to identify the
engagement gaps and pass on the information to the management for
evaluation and implementing change.
Employees Employees’ interest in the engagement issue is significantly high because
they are directly affected by the employers' decisions. The approaches
that the employers implement determine levels of employees’ trust and
loyalty to the organisation. The employees provide information to HR and
management on the issues of concern that may affect their satisfaction
and commitment to the organisation.

2.0 Methodology

This section provides the stages of the research process and provides a comparison of two primary
research methods.

Stages of the research process

The first stage in the research process is developing a clear and precise statement of the research. The
researcher aims to study the statement that should relate to the selected topic study and the aims
developed to complete the study. The second stage of carrying out a study is conducting a literature
review to find out the theory relating to the research topic. The third step is developing the research
questions and identifying problems that the researcher should study. The research questions evaluate
the significant steps that HR should take in developing solutions to the research problems. The fourth
step to conducting research is justifying the study. This evaluates the reasons why the study is essential
at that particular time. For example, the research is essential because of the negative impacts caused by
the Covid-19 pandemic on the employees. Employers in dealing with these negative impacts and
developing the approaches to engaging employees' would be the best action to supporting their well-
being and improved organisational performance. Therefore, the research is justified, as it will be
addressing real-time challenges and problems that might affect the continuity of business operations.
The fifth step is developing the methodology to answering the research questions, where the researcher
differentiates between primary and secondary, and qualitative and quantitative research in analysing
the research problems. The study's level for the study is selected in this study, the data collection
methods and the instrumentation that the researcher will use to analyse the research study. The sixth
step is analysing the data that the researcher collects from the study. The final step is presenting the
research data, making conclusions, and drawing on recommendations to solve the research problems.

Differentiate between survey and focus group primary research methods

Primary research is the method of collecting data from respondents instead of relying on data from
other researchers. There are different primary research methods, and a comparison of the survey and
focus group discussion methods is provided.
Survey research is a quantitative research method where the researcher obtains information from the
respondents. The researcher develops questionnaires that are structured, and the respondents provide
answers to the research questions. The researcher identifies a sample of respondents from a population
and administers the questionnaires either through online platforms, face-to-face or through posting.

Focus group discussion research is a method where the researcher identifies a group of respondents
where they interact, share ideas and opinions and discuss the research problem to develop meaningful
results. The table below provides the advantages and disadvantages of each research method.

Primary research method Advantage Disadvantage

Survey  The process of  Less interactive
analysing data is  Respondents may
accessible. provide misleading
 Less expensive answers.
 The researcher can  Possibilities of
easily follow up on respondents providing
respondents. dishonest answers.
 Researchers can  Failure of respondents
benchmark results to answer some
against previous questions.
data.
 Data is collected
from a large sample.
Focus group discussion  Highly interactive  It takes much time to
 The researcher can collect research data
observe the  More costly compared
respondents while to survey research.
engaging in their  Researcher experiences
discussions. difficulty in analysing
data.
 Data is collected from a
small sample that the
researcher can have
access to.

Literature review

Relating Employee engagement and other HR practices

Budrienė and Diskienė (2020) research tend to relate recruitment and employee engagement. The
authors that that to have an engaged workforce, HR and managers should focus on employing people
with the right skills to support organisational goals. Employees who are engaged have good relationships
with each other and with their employers. They are more satisfied, happy, better involved in work, loyal
and more productive. The authors relate employee engagement and HRM practices by examining the role
of individuals and organisations in promoting employee engagement. The authors argue that when
employees are motivated and satisfied in their places of work, they become more involved in their work
and are considered highly productive. Similar to the views of these authors are the views of Ahakwa et
al. (2021), who argue that HR is responsible for creating a more engaged workforce to ensure that the
employers respect workers' contribution to the organisations. Employers should also communicate with
employees and exchange information appropriately to ensure that they provide the best environment
for employee stability. These are attributes effectively implemented by people professionals involved in
ensuring that people learn and become fully engaged in the workplace.
Budrienė and Diskienė (2020) used a secondary research method to analyse information from other
researchers on the relationship between employee engagement and HRM practices. The advantages of
secondary research are that the research takes less time to complete, there is no direct relation to
respondents, and the results are qualitative. The disadvantages are that some of the sources or research
used may not be valid or credible. In addition, the information may not be updated, and content may not
relate to the research idea or idea.

Emirates Airlines should look into the views of Budrienė and Diskienė (2020) to ensure that they identify
the correct information relevant to making sure that they improve employees' engagement levels. This
means that the company is responsible for evaluating the HRM practices and functions towards ensuring
that the HR influences engagements among the employees.

Employee engagement and the environment

In a study conducted by Ababneh (2021), the author intended to determine the organisational changes
and how these influences employee engagement in the workplace. The author focused on
environmental initiatives and the interrelation with HR practices. The authors sought to explain how
green activities influence employee behaviours and other organisational operations and activities.
Employers perceive environmental initiatives as a psychological green climate that employees should be
committed to, which illuminates the psychological employee engagement attribute that constructs
employee involvement at work. The results from the research indicate that the employee green
behaviours are associated with green HR practices that the organisations implement by engaging the
employees in the environmental initiatives.

Ababneh (2021) conducted survey research to examine the environmental issues and concepts and their
impact on employee engagement. Out of the total population of 1560 employees, 376 respondents
were selected using the purposive sampling technique. The advantage of the survey is that the
researcher identifies respondents who have insight on the issue of discussion, and thus chances of
getting credible quantitative information are high.

Emirates airline management should look into the results from the study conducted by Ababneh (2021)
and relate the environmental initiatives to the new initiatives brought about to help people manage the
Covid-19 pandemic. When the employers engage employees in the new initiatives and regulations of
managing the Covid-19 pandemic, the employees will handle the pressure in a much better way. Instead
of realising negative impacts from these, the employees become part of solving the challenges that
minimise their engagement levels.

Employee engagement and turnover intentions

Sandhya and Sulphey (2020), in a study, sought to explore the influences of employee engagement.
Psychological empowerment and psychological contract on employees’ decision to leave work. Turnover
is the rate at which employees leave their places of work. The study revealed positive relationships
between psychological empowerment and psychological contract to the employees’ engagement. The
study consequently revealed that employee engagement influences people’s capabilities to leave their
workplace. Organisational leaders take responsibility to find out the actions they should take to retain
the employees. Employee retention is an attribute that highly determines the nature of people
involvement and commitment to the organisation. High employee retention rates result in high
productivity and performance, which also significantly contribute to employee motivation and loyalty to
the organisation. Ashraf and Siddiqui (2020) support this argument that taking into consideration the
issue of employee well-being is fundamental to retaining employees in the organisation. Psychologically
involving the employees is an attribute that results in improved job satisfaction, enhancing the
development of positive work control in the organisation.

Sandhya and Sulphey (2020) conducted a cross-sectional quantitative study on a sample of 392
respondents. The advantage of the cross-sectional study is that it is relatively quick for the researcher to
complete the study. The study is slightly inexpensive and captures specific point information. Data
collected from the research can be used for different researches, and the findings are meant to
eliminate assumptions and create new theories. The disadvantages of a cross-sectional study are that
the researcher cannot analyse behaviour over a long period. In cases where conflict of interests, the
researcher may experience challenges evaluating the population of the study.

The insight from the author on relating employee engagement to turnover will be helpful to the
management at Emirates Airlines. Management and people professionals should look into the concept
of employee retention to secure alternatives meant to prevent people from leaving the organisation.
This is most important, especially after the Covid-19 pandemic, where employee well-being and lack of
work-life balance affect the commitment and involvement of employees in the organisation. These
attributes may result in people seeking employment in other organisations. In order to avoid this and
reduce turnover rate, management and HR has to act on promoting engagement levels among the
organisational employees.

Conclusion

Promoting employee engagement is a role that people professionals play by incorporating all other HR
functions and practices to support developing a workforce that positively relates to the organisation. HR
is, therefore, responsible for implementing all practical HR approaches as a way of creating a workforce
that relates to the values of the organisation. Engaging employee is an aspect that contributes to a good
understanding of the various issues that connect employees to other initiatives in the organisation.
Employers and people professionals are keen to support the employees to understand the need for
these initiatives and ensure that they develop engagement approaches to support employees through
the adaptation process to the initiatives. Approaches to improve employee engagement result in
significant actions to support change in how the organisation and employers relate. Reduced turnover
increases employee retention, which enhances increased commitment and improved employee
performances at work.

Recommendations

The first recommendation is that Emirates Airlines invest in developing HR professionals to have a good
understanding of how to influence employees and improve engagement levels. Training People
professionals helps them understand the organisational values and work to instil the same in the
employees to improve their levels of engagement to the organisation. Therefore, investing in HR is
investing in the organisation. More people professionals would learn of the behaviours, knowledge, and
skills they would use to make the employees happier, involved, and committed

The second recommendation is that employers should look for mediators who would promote the
engagement approaches. The mediators may be from within or outside the organisation. The
responsibility of the mediators is to convince the employees why they should be committed to new
initiatives that support their development in the workplace, provide support to managing employees'
emotional, behavioural and cognitive well-being. The likelihood of recording positive outcomes from the
influences of the mediators are high, and this would support the new approaches through which
employee engagement is promoted in the workplace.

The final recommendation is for people professionals to develop a workplace environment where
people can feel engaged. This is achieved when communication among organisational stakeholders is
enhanced. The organisation may also invest in well-being to provide psychological, physical and
emotional support to employees. Well-being programs are provided to employees to ensure that their
status and conditions are well looked after. In addition, the employers should be able to recognise the
excellent work and effort by the employees. The consequent factor is employee empowerment, which
guides the professionals to achieve individual and organisational success. This kind of support to
promoting employee engagement helps employees pull through the challenges employees experience
because of the Covid-19 pandemic.
References:
Ababneh, O.M.A. (2021) How do green HRM practices affect employees' green behaviours? The role of
employee engagement and personality attributes. Journal of Environmental Planning and
Management, 64(7), 1204-1226.

Ahakwa, I., Yang, J., Tackie, EA and Atingabili, S. (2021) The Influence of Employee Engagement, Work
Environment and Job Satisfaction on Organizational Commitment and Performance of
Employees: A Sampling Weights in PLS path Modelling. SEISENSE Journal of
Management, 4(3), 34-62.

Ashraf, T. and Siddiqui, D.A. (2020) The Impact of Employee Engagement on Employee Retention: The
Role of Psychological Capital, Control at Work, General Well-Being, and Job Satisfaction. Control
at Work, General Well-Being, and Job Satisfaction (August 29, 2020).

Budrienė, D. and Diskienė, D. (2020) Employee engagement: types, levels and relationship with practice
of HRM. Malaysian e-commerce journal, 4(2), 42-47.

Gifford, J. and Young, J. (2021) Employee engagement and motivation, available at

https://www.cipd.co.uk/knowledge/fundamentals/relations/engagement/factsheet
Sandhya, S. and Sulphey, M.M. (2020) Influence of empowerment, psychological contract and employee
engagement on voluntary turnover intentions. International Journal of Productivity and
Performance Management.

Vance, R. J. (2006) Employee engagement and commitment, available from https://www.shrm.org/hr-

today/trends-and-forecasting/special-reports-and-expert-views/documents/employee-
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