Employee engagement among high school teachers: great results or causing burnouts?
Corporate social (ir)responsibility
Team 28
Supervisor: Anne van der Vliet
Dante van der Heijden - 2090612
Anna Postema - 2108639
Anouk Rozendaal - 2103060
, 1. Problem background
Around 1.3 million Dutch people currently experience burnout-related symptoms. This number has
increased compared to the number before the corona crisis (Kliknieuws Veghel, 2022). One-third of total
long-term absenteeism is caused by psychological complaints. Two in a thousand employees are diagnosed
with burnout by the company doctor each year and are then out of work for an average of 279 days
(Accountant, 2022). For employers, this is a major risk partly because of high workload due to tightness in the
labor market (Accountant, 2022). The consequences of burnout symptoms pose a danger to the employee
themselves, the organization and society. Health problems can lead to long-term absenteeism and the cost of
absenteeism from work pressure, work stress or burnout complaints, equals 2.8 billion euros annually (TNO,
2020).
Within the education sector, the burnout symptoms amongst employees continues to rise. The
burnout rate in the education sector is therefore higher than the average of burnouts in the Netherlands, with
teachers suffering most from burnout complaints and management the least (AVS, 2020). More than a quarter
of teachers within the secondary education sector suffer from burnout complaints (AOB, 2022). Long working
hours, an increase in the number of students, and cuts in the secondary education sector have all contributed
to the increasing pressure on teachers. As a result, there are more teacher burnout cases. It presents a problem
for the educational field. The learning environment is impacted when many teachers have burnout complaints
(Harden, 1999).
Employee engagement within secondary education scores average in the entire employee engagement
rankings of all industries. The workload factor is at the very bottom of the secondary education rankings
(Workday, 2022). As a result, it can be concluded that there is room for improvement within employee
engagement within the secondary education sector. High school managers and end users of education (pupils)
can benefit from research about the relationship between employee engagement and the chance of burnout
for high school teachers.
Employee engagement provides value to an organization (Effectory, 2019). Employee engagement is
determined by several factors. These factors are goal setting, meaningful work, management support, peer
relationships, accomplishment, reward, recognition, growth, freedom of opinions, environment, organizational
fit, strategy, autonomy, and workload (Workday, 2022). These factors contribute to employee commitment,
performance, and attendance (Effectory, 2019). In prior research of Bakker, Demerouti, Sanz Vergel (2014)
they describe “burnout and work engagement are important concepts because they predict significant
outcomes for individual employees and for organizations at large.”
, Factors that can affect the relationship between employee engagement and the chance of getting a
burnout are a teacher's years of work experience, external coaching and doing sports. People with more years
of work experience may have a better understanding of the workplace and their own strengths and weaknesses
which can influence feelings of pressure (Penrose, 2021). Employees who experience difficulties at work can
receive assistance from an external coach. These are coaches who are not part of the organization (Steenbrink
& Oude Wolbers, 2017). An important part of your mental health is physical activity. Doing sports reduces
feelings of stress, this may affect your mental wellbeing (Baeten, 2017).
The purpose of this study is to research to what extent employee engagement has a relationship with
the chance of a burnout for a high school teacher and how this relationship depends on (1) years of work
experience (Dimunová and Nagyova, 2012), (2) offering external coaching and (Maij, 2021), (3) doing sports
(ten Have, de Graaf, Monshouwer, 2011). These three moderators can influence the relationship between
employee engagement and the chance of a burnout for a high school teacher.
2. Problem statement and research questions
Against this background, the study’s problem statement is:
To what extent does employee engagement relate to the chance of a burnout for a high school teacher, and
to what extent is the relationship between employee engagement and the chance of a burnout for a high
school teacher affected by (1) years of work experience, (2) offering external coaching (yes/no) and (3) doing
sports (yes/no)?
This study addresses the following research questions:
- To what extent is employee engagement amongst a high school teacher related to the chance of a
burnout for a high school teacher?
- To what extent does the relationship between employee engagement and the chance of a burnout
for a high school teacher depend on the years of work experience?
- To what extent does the relationship between employee engagement and the chance of a burnout
for a high school teacher depend on whether teachers are doing sports (yes/no)?
- To what extent the relationship between employee engagement and the chance of a burnout for a
high school teacher depends on whether teachers get external coaching during their educational
period (yes/no)?