This was an integrative review aimed at investigating how employee engagement has been discussed in the selected areas, to analyse and  identify the current state of employee engagement research in the HRD field and propose recommendations for HRD scholars and practitioners.  

The study found that a wide range of factors including job resources (e.g. learning opportunities, supervisor support); support for participation in HR practices; training perception; servant leadership; transformational leadership and meaningful work all predicted engagement. The study also found that employee engagement was associated with positive work role behaviours; decreased turnover intentions; organisational knowledge creation; organisational citizenship behaviours. 

This was a systematic review and meta-analysis of work engagment interventions. Its aim was to synthesise the evidence available on employee engagement interventions and establish the extent to which employee engagement interventions are effective and if so, which type of intervention would have the greatest impact. The types of interventions used included;  personal resource building; job resource building; leadership training; health promotion.

Their meta-analysis demonstrated that a positive, small, significant effect on work engagement and its three sub-copoments, vigour, dedication and absorption. This effect was observed across a range of countries, organisational settings, industries and participant characteristics,
suggesting generalisability and thus the benefit of work engagement interventions to organisations globally. A moderator analysis did not reveal a significant effect of intervention type on the effectiveness of work engagement
interventions, suggesting that success is not affected by the focus of the intervention.  Low effect size could partly be due to small sample sizes of the studies included  and issues with compliance, response and attrition rates. 

The aim of this study was to investigate the relationships between certain job resources (autonomy, supervisory coaching, performance feedback), personal resources (organisational-based self-esteem, self-efficacy, optimism) and work engagement and to see whether they were reciprocal over time. 

It was found that job (autonomy, coaching, feedback, development) and the personal resources self-efficacy, organizational-based self-esteem, and optimism T1 positively related to work engagement T2. Conversely, engagement T1 significantly correlated to personal resources at T2. The authors also suggested that there are reciprocal cycles operating here, where job resources, personal resources and work engagement are dynamic psychological processes. In other words, job and personal resources are mutually related with work engagement, but also with each other. 

To investigate how daily fluctuations in job resources (autonomy, supervisory coaching, performance feedback) are related to employee's levels of personal resources (organisational-based self-esteem, self-efficacy, optimism), work engagement and financial returns.

It was found that job resources coincide with self-esteem, optimism, and self-efficacy and may contribute to day-level of work engagement. Additionally, there was evidence for a lagged effect of previous days' coaching on next days' work engagement through next day's optimism. Day-level coaching had a direct positive relationship with day-level work engagement, which in turn predicted daily financial returns. However, personal resources did not play a role in explaining financial returns. 

This was a study which was designed to investigate the effects of an individual oriented positive
psychology intervention on positive emotions, self-efficacy, and work engagement. This intervention was a self-administered online programme and contained the following components; Happiness assignments, Goal setting assignments, Resource building assignments

The self-enhancement group (the intervention condition) showed a stronger increase in positive emotions and self-efficacy compared to the control group, but overall not on engagement. When further analysis was conducted, it turned out that effects on engagement were found when taking participants’ initial levels of work engagement prior to the intervention into account. Splitting up the self-enhancement (intervention) and self-monitoring (control) groups in low, medium and high on initial work engagement scores, it showed that participants in the intervention group with low initial scores on work engagement scores did increase significantly in work engagement, and that the corresponding subgroup in the self-monitoring group did not. This finding confirms that the positive activities that were initiated by the online intervention were more beneficial for those who were expected to gain from it most.

The aim of this study was to  evaluate the effect of a skill-mix programme intervention on work engagement in home visiting nurses in a Japanese sample. The intervention drew on the JD-R model as the framework and sought to provide the nurses with resources in that non-nursing assistants were employed at the agency who could assist home visiting nurses if requested. The assistants could help nurses with personal care or medical treatment. They could also help with trivial tasks, in that they could do them instead of home visiting nurses which would provide the nurses with more time for care. It was hypothesised that this could help nurses provide quality care, which in turn lead to nurses being more satisfied with the care they provided and received more positive feedback from their clients. 

Evidence presented implied that there was no significant difference in work engagement pre and post the intervention in the intervention group, but there was a significant decline for the control group. The authors suggested that the intervention had buffered against a loss of engagement.

"The study was aimed at refining and extending the job demands-resources model with theory regarding the appraisal of stressors to account for inconsistencies in relationships between demands and engagement. 

The study found some interesting relationships. Consistent with the JD-R model, resources had a stronger relationship with engagement (β=0.34) than they have with Burnout (β=-0.24). What this study highlighted, was the difference between challenge demands and hindrance demands. 

Challenge demands were  found to have an energising effect, as supported by the positive relationship to Engagement (β=0.21), whereas hindrance demands had a negative relationship with Engagement (β=-0.19). Challenge tend to be appraised as stressful demands that have the potential to promote mastery, personal growth, or future gains. Examples of challenges included demands such as a high workload, time pressure, and high levels of job responsibility. Employees tend to perceive these demands as opportunities to learn, achieve, and demonstrate the type of competence that tends to get rewarded. Hindrances tend to be appraised as stressful demands that have the potential to thwart personal growth, learning, and goal attainment. Examples of hindrances include demands such as role conflict, role ambiguity, organisational politics, red tape, and hassles. Employees tend to perceive these demands as constraints, barriers, or roadblocks that unnecessarily hinder their progress toward goal attainment and rewards that accrue as a result of being evaluated as an effective performer."

The aim of this paper was to conduct an extensive review of the empirical and conceptual studies which examined the relationship between leadership and employee engagement. 16 empirical and four conceptual studies were included. 

The findings suggested that the following leadership styles had been explored in relation to employee engagement: transformational leadership; authentic leadership; ethical leadership; charismatic leadership and various forms of leadership styles. Among these different leadership styles, the one which had been most extensively explored was transformational leadership. As the authors pointed out, many studies found that transformational leadership did have a positive relationship with employee engagement at the individual level. It appears as if employees become more engaged when transformational leadership is demonstrated through boosting their optimism, responsibility, meaningfulness and innovative behaviour. 

Authentic, charismatic and ethical leadership styles were said to contribute to role clarification, organisational culture, empowerment, identification with supervisor and psychological ownership which was found to lead to higher employee engagement.

"The aim of this study was to examine the the daily influence of transformational leadership, contingent reward, and active management-by-exception (MBE active) on followers’ daily work engagement. 

Multilevel regression analyses revealed that, after controlling for followers’ work engagement the previous day, cadets were more engaged on days that their leader showed more transformational leadership and provided contingent reward. MBE active was unrelated to followers’ work engagement. As predicted, transformational leadership and contingent reward contributed to a more favourable work environment (more autonomy and support), while MBE active resulted in a less favourable work environment (less autonomy) for the cadets.

The authors pointed out some important implications to be considered; a) Day to day fluctuations in leadership behaviour has an impact on employee engagement. On days when leaders express primarily transformational leadership, followed by transactional leadership and did no management by exception (monitor direct reports for mistakes), employee engagement was at its highest; b) Because leaders may not always be aware of how their behaviour affects followers, it may prove useful to provide leaders with feedback about their behaviour. Feedback can be used to create development plans; c) Transformational leadership behaviours are particularly important in populations with low employee engagement."