Engagement, a term coined in 1990 by organizational psychologist William A. Kahn, is the exhaustively studied measure of employee involvement in and enthusiasm for their work and workplace. It took another hit last year.
Engagement reaches beyond simple Job Satisfaction; it requires involvement and connection. It reflects an emotional and mental association with the company we work for and the work itself. If you are fully engaged, your job becomes more than a paycheque.
You give your energy and passion willingly. Your heart is in it.
It is, as we have learned over 100 years of research into Job Satisfaction and Engagement, a very elusive goal.
Gallup’s annual State of the Global Workplace 2026 report is widely recognized as the best of its kind in the world. They survey over 100,000 workers across more than 140 countries, representing approximately 95% of the global adult population through sampling, including employees and managers.
Importantly, the report excludes employer-provided data, which can inadvertently (or purposefully!) skew results toward artificially high scores.
The mandate of Gallup’s Survey is to ‘measure, track, and explain the state of employee experience worldwide—especially engagement and wellbeing—and to show how these factors impact organizational performance and the global economy.’
So, how are we doing?
Gallup has just released its findings for 2025, reflecting a second consecutive year of declining Engagement.
The gap between Full Engagement—the dream of employers and employees alike—and what we actually experience—Unengagement, or worse, Active Disengagement—is more than a disconnect. It demands a clearer (though dispiriting) label.
What I call the ‘Engagement Chasm’ cost the global economy a staggering $10 trillion last year—driven by lost productivity, absenteeism, ‘presenteeism’, turnover, and managerial drag.
The survey uncovered sobering truths about our workplaces—truths we must refuse to ignore.
Globally, the data shows:
- 2 in 10 employees are Fully Engaged
- 2 in 10 are Actively Disengaged—meaning they hate their work, their workplace, or both, and actively undermine it
- That leaves 6 in 10 who are Unengaged—largely neutral, not realizing their potential
They are not pulling the organization down—but neither are they helping it rise.
They tread water at work, hoping for something to improve.
Here in North America, the results are comparatively better:
- 3–4 in 10 are Fully Engaged
- 1–2 in 10 are Actively Disengaged
- This leaves 4–6 in 10 Unengaged
Better results, perhaps—but still a failing grade.
Managers represented the largest casualty of the Engagement Chasm in 2025. Managers once enjoyed higher Engagement than their employees, but this year marked a disheartening decline.
Key contributing factors include:
- Organizational flattening
- Larger team sizes
- Cuts to mid-level management (often linked to AI adoption)
As leaders, managers, and employees, we should be deeply concerned by these results.
Less than 1 in 3 employee Engagement represents a real failure in organizational ability to hire, support, and cultivate their most precious resource—people.
If you are an employee, ask your company what strategy they have in place to ensure Engagement is a priority. Learn to take control of your own Engagement if none is supplied to you.
If you are a leader—from manager to executive: push for that plan, or develop your own.
Our talent is the vital ingredient in long-term success, yet it is too often overlooked as our organizations grow, shift, and restructure.
We must prioritize a systemic, strategic, and sustainable approach to developing our people.
We must help them become exceptional at their work—and, at the same time, find meaning and joy in it.
This challenge—closing the gap between potential and performance—is at the heart of the work I do, and the focus of my upcoming book, The Professional Jetpack.
What are you doing to increase Engagement and eliminate Disengagement in your team, department, or organization?