“Work is about a search for daily meaning as well as daily bread, for recognition as well as cash, for astonishment rather than torpor, in short for a sort of life rather than a Monday to Friday sort of dying”  Studs Terkel, 1972

I didn’t know Studs Terkel existed until he died in 2009. I certainly didn’t know I had so much in common with him! I have often pitied people who seem to regard work as something to get through and a necessary evil. I’m not like that.

It was actually my husband who read me an obituary of Studs’ life and work as a social historian and commentator in the USA. Terkel wrote several books, one about the Great Depression, and he closely followed the trade union movement in America. And so, when I was researching the fascinating and complex phenomenum of employee engagement, I was surprised and delighted when Studs cropped up again.

Most Of Us Spend So Much of Our Lives Working

I believe that as most of us spend so much of our lives working, we should surely be able to make what we do as fulfilling as possible. I say we, and I guess by that I mean not just the employee, but those of us who manage and run organisations that employ them. I fear that like so many other bandwagons and fads, people jump onto employee engagement as though it is something that can be controlled. It is I belive, a much more “mutual” concept than that. Like a relationship, or communication one person cannot do all it takes to make it happen!  This doesn’t seem to be recognised by many managers, and dare I say consultants operating in the field or organisation development or specifically employee engagement. Engagement isn’t something that you “do to” people.

My interest in employee engagement is from a number of perspectives – I am researching it, writing about it, consulting and coaching in it. However it has become increasingly important to me personally. What is the point of work if it doesn’t achieve anything? In performance terms that means adding value and in personal terms that means providing some kind of fulfilment. The day a job stops providing these I am out of there.