People in business know the foundation for success is a large, stable and ever-growing base of loyal customers – customers who stay with us no matter what cut-price competitors promise. Customers who reward us – with their repeat and referral business and their glowing reviews – for delivering products and services they can trust. `who stay with us even when we make mistakes, because they trust us to recover brilliantly.
This idealized state of affairs can only happen if employees throughout your company or organization are fully engaged in their work – meaning they feel respected; they believe their opinions count; they feel a positive emotional connection with the company; they see the connection between their personal work and its impact on customers and company, or clients and stakeholders in the non-profit sector.
Engagement is the key word
But there’s a problem. In its 2024 annual survey of almost two hundred thousand North American workers the Gallup organization found that only 23% are engaged at work. The majority – roughly 62% – are simply “putting in time” or (“quiet quitting,” as it’s known these days), while the remaining 15% are “actively disengaged,” meaning they tend to be miserable at work, and do all they can to undermine you as leader and the company as a whole. They have ‘fired the boss’ so to speak, but stayed on the payroll. They don’t notice when equipment is failing. They start rumors. They mock the boss. They ‘forget’ instructions. They try to influence co-workers negatively. And, of course, they make it difficult for you to deliver the results expected of you as leader.
Here is the way Gallup describes their three levels of engagement:
- Engaged: highly involved in and enthusiastic about their work and workplace
- Not engaged: psychologically unattached to their work and company
- Actively disengaged: resentful that their needs aren’t being met and acting out their unhappiness
Imagine 62% of a workforce on automatic pilot
Hopefully your company or team is an exception to this gut-wrenching rule of mediocrity. Imagine over 60% of an entire workforce working just hard enough to get by – but tuned out…just trading time for money as I put it. (Imagine the effect on the smallest of businesses: in a workforce of four people, what would happen if fully half were disengaged. What if even one was ‘actively disengaged?’
So much for theory. Now let’s do a reality check: If Gallup interviewed your team members would any fit in the 60% minimum effort category? If so your organization (theoretically speaking again) is perfectly normal – but at what cost? What about the ‘actively disengaged’ category? Hopefully no one on your team fits that bleak description. But be honest. Do you ever go home from work and tell everyone, “You wouldn’t believe what he or she did today!” If you regale the folks at home repeatedly with stories of this person’s monstrous behavior, that’s a pretty good indication that you have someone who is ‘actively disengaged’ on your payroll – and in your life. Augh.
If you can relate in any way to that bleak scenario here are two questions to consider:
- When that team member was first hired – let’s say this was before your time as supervisor – they were full of enthusiasm and raved about the company. Now they’re not. What happened? Was it the first time their old boss asked for an opinion then ignored it completely? Or the first time they were shut down in a meeting? Or treated unfairly when they needed time off to go to their kid’s school play? Any or all of the above? Other?
- Question 2: You may not have caused the problem in this imaginary scenario, but you’re challenged with fixing it, so the second question is, “How do you get ‘em back?”
Is there a magic bullet?
While Gallup stresses that there is no quick fix for the overall engagement conundrum, there are things that an individual leader can do – immediately – to start taking corrective action. At the top of my list – over many years – was my recommendation to leaders that they schedule one-on-one ‘fresh-start’ meetings with disgruntled team members. Tell them you want to reset the relationship, and listen – really listen – to the issues that concern them, and look seriously for ways to deal with them. The goal is to free both of you from the baggage you’ve been carrying and establish a productive working relationship going forward. I think of this strategy as something of a magic bullet because it can achieve a number of goals that Gallup describes as essential – it addresses their resentment; shows respect; demonstrates care and can begin to rebuild trust as you follow-through and provide feedback – and it can do all this swiftly and often at little or no cost.
Forget history. Just forget it!
These meetings will only be productive if we are prepared to focus on the present and the future, not the past. We need to recognize that the problem is rarely the person – it’s usually their resentment that their issues have not been taken seriously. (As you’ve heard me say many times in these posts, we have to attack the problem not the person).
Here’s an example from my files:
Situation: A team member had a gripe about a continuously failing piece of equipment. They brought it up with their supervisor who promptly dismissed it saying there was no budget. The team member brought it up repeatedly, much to the chagrin of the supervisor, who repeated again and again, “No budget.” Then the team member began to notice other things that needed attention and in short order the supervisor began to tell the folks at home “You wouldn’t believe what they did today,” and away we went. The stand-off deepened as team members took sides; attention was hijacked, affecting quality of work – and the supervisor had a hard time meeting targets for production, and standards for quality and safety.
Solution: The supervisor held a one-on-one ‘fresh start’ meeting with the team member. He apologized for dismissing her concerns and said he wanted to discuss possibilities for a resolution of the initial equipment repair problem. After a few minutes of brainstorming and discussion, they agreed that there was no way there was going to be budget in that year for the replacement. But. They also agreed that it was worth pursuing, and they agreed to collaborate in building a business case for doing the work – a proposal that the supervisor could present to senior management – either to try to get it approved as a budget exception for this year – or at least make sure it would be included in the following year’s budget.
Disposition: Senior management responded with enough budget to fund a temporary fix for that year and committed to including a full fix in the following year’s budget.
Case closed. Possibilities open. If this example resonates with you, write down all the benefits that you think would have flowed to this supervisor for making that effort – instead of waving it off as usual. You may convince yourself to give it a try.
Your call to action
How can you know the level of engagement and disengagement in your workplace or team? Gallup is on a mission to help you find out. They have developed a set of 12 questions (below) they use every year in their engagement surveys and they share these with us at no charge (they also offer a paid version that gets into more detail).
This week I encourage you to use their 12 questions to conduct a mental exercise. Rate each member of your team by guesstimating how they would likely answer each question. Then rate each person using the following scale:
“The Gallup Q12 survey scores engagement using a 5-point scale (from 1=Strongly Disagree, to 5=Strongly Agree), with engagement categories based on the average score of the 12 questions: engaged (4.5 or higher), not engaged (3.5 to 4.4), and actively disengaged (3.4 or lower).”
Special note: I don’t recommend that you conduct actual interviews, as we are neither knowledgeable nor objective enough to do this effectively. Also, please note that I’ve added a word or two to some of the survey questions for clarity. You can see the original list at bit.ly/3RAnFau where you will also find a lot more background on the topic.
Here is the list of Gallup’s survey questions with my edits:
Q00. Overall Satisfaction
Q01. Know What’s Expected of Them
Q02. They Have the Resources They Need
Q03. They are Doing What They Do Best
Q04. They Receive Recognition and Appreciation
Q05. Someone Cares About Them at Work
Q06. Someone Encourages Their Development
Q07. Their Opinions Count at Work
Q08. They Share a Sense of Mission/Purpose
Q09. They are Committed to Quality Work
Q10. They Have a Best Friend at Work
Q11. They Talk About Progress
Q12. They are Learning and Growing
Next week I’ll offer you a list of actions any business or organization can take to earn higher levels of engagement among your team members. Stay tuned?
Neil
