Does organizational identification, being a manager and complexity predict level of engagement?

Abstract: Employee engagement is of great interest for leaders. It is not surprising that leaders seek ways to influence, manage and enhance level of engagement among its employees. Instead of asking directly how engaged their workforce is, leaders often ask questions on related constructs to engagement. The objective of this research is threefold. First is to determine if organizational identification (OID) is a predictor of engagement. Second is to conclude if being a manager with direct reports predicts higher level of engagement versus non-managers. Third is to decide if complexity in an organization has a moderating contextual effect on the relationships between employee engagement, employee OID and the role as a manager with direct reports. This re-search contributes to the established theories by testing a theoretical model with variables not found to be tested empirically together before. Data was collected in a survey with 168 respondents. The validity and reliability of the data was good, upon two multiple regression analyses were completed in order to test three hypotheses. Results show significant support for two of three hypotheses. First, high employee OID predicts high employee engagement (p-value 0,000 significant at 0,05 level). This is a complement to existing literature. Leaders can practically measure OID if they are interested in understanding and predicting level of engagement in their workforce. Second, managers with direct reports predicts higher engagement versus non-managers (p-value 0,021 significant at 0,05 level). This research does not answer why such difference is found, but an analysis is provided from both a manager’s and a subordinate’s view. Third, an employee (manager or non-manager) who spend a high percentage of time in meetings requested/organized by others does not make the relationship between OID and engagement weaker (p-value 0,440 not significant at 0,05 level). This study also indicates that most managers and non-managers spend less than 30% of their work week in meetings requested/organized by someone else. This speaks for a majority of both managers and non-managers are in control over the majority of their time during a working week.