Employee engagement and work engagement

Abstract

Engagement as a concept is gaining attention in research and management practices. However, there are several types of engagement depending on whether the focus is on work and jobs or companies and organizations. In this paper, we demonstrate the following three points based on comparative analysis of the concepts of work engagement and employee engagement: (a) Both terms are used with the same frequency in academic journals in the field of management, but non-academic sources consistently use “employee engagement,” while medical and nursing articles use “work engagement.” (b) “Work engagement” may be used in this way because the term originated in research of burnout among nurses working in hospitals. (c) While much research does not adequately differentiate the two concepts, they should be treated as distinct concepts due to their distinct origins and the content they measure.

Keywords

• work engagement
• employee engagement