Relationship Between Project Changes, Project Objectives, and Employee Engagement

Lack of employee engagement is detrimental to the success of organizations across industries. Project managers will see a negative impact on project success if they do not focus on engaging their team members throughout the project life cycle. Grounded in House’s path-goal theory, the purpose of this quantitative correlational study was to examine the relationship between project changes, project objectives, and employee engagement. Data were collected using SurveyMonkey to gather online survey responses from 76 project managers working in Indiana. The results of the standard multiple linear regression analysis indicated the full model was not statistically significant in distinguishing the relationship between project changes, project objectives, and employee engagement, with F(2, 73) = 1.127, p = .330, R2 = .030. A key recommendation is for project managers to discuss leadership styles in the project planning process to prioritize employee engagement within the project team. The implications for positive social change include the potential to help project managers and leaders understand the importance of employee engagement and wellbeing, improve project success with regards to social change projects, and improve employee relationships in local communities