There has been no disputes about the necessity of development, whether be an organization from the educational or business sector. Beside a number of crucial elements, engagement of all stakeholders, leaders and employees alike, is a determinative prerequisite of success. While companies are paying more and more attention on their employees’ commitment and engagement in the contemporary world of work, less attention has been paid on the world of education in the same context. Having realized this fact, the current project aims to provide a practical tool for school leaders as primary target group, in order to help them become aware of the main mechanisms of engagement. By using the tool, a clear picture of the current engagement status of their organizations’ at employee level will be received, initially. The tool will also cover a methodology and action plan, the implementation of which will likely increase the level of engagement on both personal and organizational level. Individuals will be empowered via regular practical help to be able to actively influence their own engagement level. The project aims to involve approximately 600 participants of different backgrounds in four partner countries (Germany, Hungary, Poland, UK), among them school leaders, teachers, decision makers, HR-specialists, as well as company leaders. To achieve the objectives of the project, initially, a foundation study will be produced summarizing relevant literature on engagement an online questionnaire will be developed according to the latest leadership knowledge and practice. As respondents of the questionnaire, educational professionals will be involved, and based on the results, action planning workshops will be arranged for them. These events will result in actionable conclusions, serving as guidelines of development for organizations. The methodology and process of these workshops will also be disseminated. Professionals interested in personal development, will have the option to receive individual feedback anonymously, and afterwards different contents including short videos, motivating quotations, summaries of articles etc. related to their engagement level on their electronic devices. The IT solutions will contain gamification elements to raise motivation of participants. After a certain time their engagement level will be measured again and some extent of increase will likely be detected, which will also add to growing engagement on organizational level. To enhance links between education and the world of work, inter-sectoral workshops focusing on engagement will be held, in the frames of which representatives of both sectors will have the opportunity to exchange experience and to learn from each other. These events also serve dissemination purposes. Different levels of impact of the project can be identified. The main target groups are teachers (individual level) and schools of different types (organizational level). Individuals and organizations involved, will become familiar with the results of the project throughout the whole process. They all will become aware of the importance of engagement as a development tool both on personal and organizational level. At individual level, we expect that participating teachers, especially those who will be included in the personal development program, will experience that they have the power to influence their own level of engagement and, thus, influence their own career and the quality of their work. At organizational level, leaders of organizations will understand that engagement is a key factor of success of their organization and that they can influence engagement by making and accomplishing an action plan based on the results of a diagnostic tool. Though indirectly, learners of schools, as relevant stakeholders will also benefit from the results of the project on the longer term. More engaged teachers will teach better and will be more committed to develop themselves professionally, which adds to better learners' outcomes. Participants of inter-sectoral workshops from the business side will understand school organizations better and they will be able to find similarities, especially from the aspect of employee engagement.
Engagement & Beyond started in September 2017 as planned. First, a Foundation study (O1) was elaborated based on initial interviews and literature on engagement. The findings of the study were used in different ways during the project. They were useful when developing the other outputs and also when disseminating project results or informing the wider audience about the issue of engagement. The project aimed at developing and making use of a simple, online accessible tool (O2) to help shape a picture of the level of staff engagement in educational institutions. Another aim was to provide a way of how to increase this level in order to ensure a higher level of well-being and improve performance of the school. Increasing the extent of engagement can be achieved on two levels, one is the organisational level and the other is the individual one. The project offers solutions for both levels. After having the results of the engagement questionnaire, different methods are used to make the status of the given organization measurable and easy to interpret. Based upon all that the management of the organisation has an action planning workshop where results are analyzed and decisions on possible measures are made. At the same time, individuals can receive different motivational contents according to their individual results. The contents can be videos, articles, short writings or just citations, for example and all those can also add to their professional development. This part of the system is gamified, meaning that participants, after having clicked on the link of the content, receive a badge. When they provide feedback or share the content with colleagues, they can reach higher levels of rewards. (O4) After a certain time, the questionnaire can be filled in again and results can be compared with the previous ones to see if measurements of the management and individual improvement have an impact on the level of engagement of the organisation. The use of the project results are summarized in a User Manual (O3), which includes data protection and ethics issues while it also describes the objectives and use of the tools and the follow-up activities among others. About 50 institutions and 1500 individuals were reached during the project via different channels.