The influence of work engagement in social workers in England

Social workers help to maintain and improve the lives of children, their families and adult service users in the UK. However, while engagement is shown to be an important determinant of both patient and employee outcomes in related health care professions, the influence of engagement has not been demonstrated in social workers.

To investigate the influence of employee engagement on perceived stress, turnover intentions, job satisfaction and presenteeism.

A cross-sectional survey of members of one English social work organization including measures of engagement (Utrecht Work Engagement Scale), the Perceived Stress Scale and single-item measures of job satisfaction, turnover intentions and presenteeism. T-tests and Mann-Whitney analyses were conducted to investigate differences in these measures in high and low engagement scores.

A total of 1049 responses were analysed; social workers with greater engagement had significantly lower stress and turnover intentions, less presenteeism and greater job satisfaction. Additionally, overall respondents had poor levels of perceived stress, turnover intentions and presenteeism.

Employee engagement is significantly associated with a number of work-related outcomes in social workers in England. However, social workers seem to have high turnover intentions and presenteeism, and greater than average perceived stress.