Employee Engagement Toward Need Satisfaction in Flexible Work Arrangement: Insights from Malaysia’s IT Professionals

Abstract

There has been a change in the modern workplace brought about by the increasing popularity of flexible work arrangements (FWA), which are being implemented by organisations with the intention of enhancing employee engagement and need satisfaction. Despite this, research on FWA is still in the process of being developed, particularly regarding the mechanisms that drive the relationship between employee engagement and need satisfaction. In the context of flexible work arrangements, the purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between employee engagement and the satisfaction of their needs. For this study, quantitative questionnaires that were validated using the Fuzzy Delphi approach were distributed to IT professionals working in Malaysia's information technology and communication  industry. The structural equation modelling technique known as partial least squares was utilised in this study by SmartPLS. Z-score normalisation was applied to our 337 data, and Jamovi and Python code were used to perform the screening. According to the findings of the study, there is a positive correlation between employee engagement and need satisfaction. We also found that there were significant relationships between need fulfilment and other aspects of employee engagement, with gender serving as a moderating factor. This was discovered with multi-group analysis. Our findings contribute to the existing body of research on FWA by providing an explanation of the mechanisms that describe the connection between employee engagement and need satisfaction. The findings of this study are significant for ICT industry that want to increase employee engagement and productivity in an environment that allows for FWA. These findings highlight the importance of catering to the requirements of employees and cultivating a supportive atmosphere in the workplace.