Stability is an illusion
Global Trends in Employee Engagement 2022
2019
2020
2021
2022
67%
69%
68%
Global Employee Engagement 2019 — 2022 Q1
Although global employee engagement levels in the last three years appear fairly consistent, a deeper dive into quarter-to-quarter results brings to light the true ups and downs of engagement.
The ups and downs of employee engagement.
This variability in employee engagement suggests that fluidity and uncertainty remain, but also that some organizations are experimenting – testing, learning, refining – while others are holding back in the hope that things will go back to “normal”.
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Taking a closer look at the trends will help you identify the right actions and opportunities for your organization.
your moment.
your opportunities.
your organization.
Seize
Identify
Vitalize
Seize your moment: Take this opportunity to vitalize your organization, improve employee engagement and unlock the power of your people and teams.
We can never go back to the old ways of working. The good news: Organizations have a unique opportunity to change what may have been previously unchangeable. This is an Era of Opportunity that provides businesses with an unmatched inflection point in history. It’s time to take a closer look, and proactively reassess, rethink, realign and revitalize your organization, so your people are inspired and engaged to drive long term business success.
73%
65%
62%
71%
— take a closer look
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About Kincentric Kincentric, a Spencer Stuart company, helps organizations unlock the power of people and teams to ignite change and drive better business results. With decades of experience and specialist expertise in areas such as culture; employee engagement; leadership assessment and development; HR and talent advisory; and diversity, equity and inclusion, we use data-driven insights to architect solutions that add value, enhance agility and increase organizational effectiveness. For more information, visit kincentric.com.
©2022 Kincentric, a Spencer Stuart Company. All rights reserved.
@ KincentricCo
Réka Bakos Senior Manager, Research & Campaigns reka.bakos@kincentric.com
Jeff Jolton, Ph.D. Managing Director, Research and Insights jeff.jolton@kincentric.com
Pete Clark EMEA Regional Leader pete.clark@kincentric.com
Stephen Hickey APAC Regional Leader stephen.hickey@kincentric.com
David Perna Americas Regional Leader david.perna@kincentric.com
Contacts
Kincentric Regional Leaders
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Your managers need your support more than ever.
Learn more
One strong employee experience element is not enough.
Change is actually the biggest opportunity of all.
Leadership vision and strategic direction are not clear.
Don’t underestimate the importance of inclusion at work.
Your HR needs bold ideas, not old ideas.
Your talent is craving more attention, recognition and support.
Culture consistency is your missing link.
8x
Employees are
more engaged when senior leaders make them feel excited for the future
50%
Only
of employees feel that their organization has sufficient staffing levels to get work done.
-10
points
decrease in middle manager work-life balance since 2019
8 key trends emerge when you look beneath the surface
4
6
3
2
1
5
7
8
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Attention! Your talent needs it
The truth about inclusion
HR needs bold ideas, not old ideas
Ease the squeeze on managers
Keep the vision visible
Create a culture of consistency
There is No One Magic Solution
Don’t let the change paralyze but inspire
Recognition & career People are working to keep up with demands and working in new ways. There is a growing need among employees to feel their efforts will be acknowledged.
Support to get work done Having a strong enabling infrastructure has strong ramifications for employee retention as well as recognition and career development.
Fair pay
Appropriate recognition
Good future career opportunities
Clear processes and procedures
Sufficient staffing levels
Retention of key people
As employees deal with a changing environment, they want to better understand where they fit into the future of the organization.
Deteriorating staffing and talent retention perception leads to decreasing employee engagement and declining intent to stay.
Improve employee retention. Provide the attention, recognition and support needed to invigorate your talent before it’s too late.
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Two general opportunity areas emerge regarding employee experience.
#
Want to learn more?
Back to trends overview
Read about stay interviews
Read about employee retention practices
58%
56%
52%
59%
54%
Global employee perceptions:
The truth about inclusion lies beneath the surface
Be deliberate in your DEI approach and recognize the complexity of the opportunity.
Inclusion has become important to employees as they evaluate their work experience, strongly impacting their engagement and intent to stay.
Organizations must increase efforts to improve inclusion in the workplace by exploring specific employee sentiment data around inclusive behaviors that show the variability of differences in the employee experience.
Read more about how to approach DEI
Engagement when key inclusion behaviors are present
Intent to stay when key inclusion behaviors are present
8.4x
higher
4.8x
previous trend
Engagement when leaders make people feel excited about the future
Engagement when employees feel leadership is providing a clear direction for the future
6.5x
Findings show that significant changes in HR processes will be needed, putting people at the center.
Be bold, human-centric and laser-focused on the employee experience when it comes to talent management.
What worked before may not serve the needs of the organization in the current environment.
55%
of employees globally say that people/HR practices create a positive work environment
Read about new ways to approach talent management
Trends over the last year underscore that mid-level managers are feeling more pressure and “squeeze” than before – even more so among female managers.
Ease the burden – make sure expectations of managers are kept reasonable, clear priorities are set, and continuous support and development is provided.
As a result, managers feel underappreciated and underpaid and have declining perception about adequate opportunities to work on assignments to gain new skills.
Decreasing manager engagement
Declining managerial intent to stay
Deteriorating manager work-life balance
-4pts
drop
-6pts
-10pts
Read about how to ease the squeeze on managers
From cloudy to clarity. Keep the vision visible
The gains we saw in 2020 in senior leaders clearly explaining how companies will deliver on their strategies are now eroding. Once critical events start to wane, senior leaders often revert to old patterns of behavior, losing the benefit of the increased visibility on energizing, vitalizing and engaging their people.
Double down on efforts to communicate the vision and strategic direction.
Read about how to keep the vision visible
Leadership sets the tone and the priorities that engage employees. Our research shows that senior leadership communication and presence are more critical to driving engagement than any specific manager behavior.
Create a culture of consistency or suffer the inconsistency
Workplace culture needs to promote a more consistent employee experience – it’s not enough to just share values, you must show them actively in practices across the organization.
Cultivate a company culture that sustains a consistent experience for all employees.
of employees globally feel that their organization’s values are demonstrated
Many of the strongest relationships driving this perception are tied to senior leadership behaviors. This tells us that organizations can create consistent employee experiences through intentional leadership communications and actions.
Read more about the importance of culture
Read more about intentional culture activation
There is no one magic solution
Having one strong employee experience element is not enough to create high engagement. Organizations need to ensure that key employee experience elements are working consistently well to improve employee engagement.
Use employee listening and strategic employee experience design to help you identify priority areas and sustain the elements you are doing well.
Read about effective employee listening approaches
Read about pulsing
10%
21%
24%
33%
40%
43%
70%
61%
82%
89%
77%
96%
90%
Employee engagement
Intent to stay
0
Number of active experience elements
68% Global engagement
63% Global intent to stay
Only when 5 or more employee experience elements (e.g., recognition, development, effective staffing, leadership vision) exist simultaneously do engagement and intent to stay increase to above average performance.
We are still in a rapidly changing time – which may be the new normal. This volatility, however, means there is fluidity and agility – a period of experimentation and trying new things which makes this the “Era of Opportunity.”
Shift your focus from “everything is out of control” to understanding what you can control and what does make a difference in your organization, and lean in on actions in these areas.
of employees globally feel that their organization is developing a workforce that adapts well to change
60%
Read about effective change management
reka.bakos@kincentric.com
jeff.jolton@kincentric.com
pete.clark@kincentric.com
stephen.hickey@kincentric.com
david.perna@kincentric.com
Take this opportunity to vitalize your organization, improve employee engagement and unlock the power of your people and teams.
We can never go back to the old ways of working. The good news: organizations have a unique opportunity to change what may have been previously unchangeable. This is an Era of Opportunity that provides businesses with an unmatched inflection point in history. It’s time to take a closer look, and proactively reassess, rethink, realign and revitalize your organization, so your people are inspired and engaged to drive long-term business success.
Seize your moment:
Réka Bakos
Research & Campaigns, Senior Manager
Research & Insights, Managing Director
Jeff Jolton, Ph.D.
APAC Regional Leader
Stephen Hickey
Pete Clark
EMEA Regional Leader
Americas Regional Leader
David Perna
