Most companies in a capitalistic society want their employees to put forth their best effort. They want them to feel enthusiastic about coming to work and doing their best every day. No CEO wants a company populated by employees who shuffle to work and drag their feet around. That’s why we measure engagement, and why we measure it by asking, on a seven-point scale, the level of enthusiasm employees feel about coming to work and doing their best every day (the scale endpoints are “very low” and “very high.” We define “highly engaged” employees as those who rated themselves as enthusiastic and looking forward to doing their best a 6 or a 7 on the seven-point scale).
So, how are organizations doing at maintaining highly engaged employees? To find out, we took a look at our extensive benchmark database.
Two percent of clients had at least 70% of employees who said they were highly engaged; 17% of clients had between 60% and 70% of employees who are highly engaged. Those are strong percentages. At those organizations, the lion’s share of employees are firmly in the CEO’s corner.
On the other hand, a small percentage of employers appear to be setting themselves up for more problems than they already have. Ten percent of employers had less than 40% highly-engaged employees. In those cases, more employees are not rowing the boat than are rowing with management. Four percent of employers had less than 30% highly-engaged employees. Imagine working at a place where more than two out of three people aren’t very enthusiastic about coming to work and doing their best every day. Imagine how that makes employees who are engaged feel.
Most employers are in the middle, with between 40% and 60% of highly-engaged employees. They have much work to do, but they are much better off than some employers.
Clearly, there is work to be done for most employers to increase employee engagement levels. The solutions vary from employer to employer. If you want your employees to be more engaged, you first have to find out what is keeping them from being engaged. We can do that for you.