Engaged employees are more productive, more profitable, more customer-focused, safer, and more likely to withstand temptations to leave.
According to research conducted by The Gallup Organization, there are three types of employees: engaged, not-engaged, and actively disengaged:
Engaged employees "work with passion and feel a profound connection to their company. They drive innovation and move the organization forward."
Employees who are not-engaged "are essentially 'checked out'…sleepwalking through their workday, putting time—but not energy or passion—into their work."
Actively disengaged workers "act out their unhappiness," and "undermine what their engaged workers accomplish."
A further Gallup survey concluded that actively disengaged employees cost UK business somewhere between £39b and £48b per annum, and that 80% of employees in the UK are not engaged at work.
According to the U.S. Employee Engagement Survey, 69% of US workers are either not-engaged or actively disengaged on the job. Approximately $370 billion is lost annually in the US due to lower productivity from actively disengaged workers alone.
But what makes the difference? Why are some people engaged and others are actively disengaged? How can companies ensure that their people are actively engaged? I will offer some views on this in forthcoming posts.
