Beating the odds: insights from the 2023 Gallup State of the Global Workplace Report

According to the latest, rather bleak, results from the Gallup State of the Global Workplace 2023 Report, employees are stressed, angry and ready to quit.

The Gallup State of the Global Workplace 2023 Report is an annual report that measures employee engagement, wellbeing, and job opportunities around the world. The report is based on surveys of over two million employees globally, looking to represent ‘the collective voice of the global employee’.

Let’s get into the findings:

State of the Global Workplace: employee engagement and workplace stress

Employee engagement metrics have risen meaning employees are more engaged at work. However, simultaneously employees are also reporting feeling more stress:

• The European region has the lowest employee engagement, at just 13%.
• Globally, 31% of managers are engaged, compared with just 20% of individuals.
• Fully remote employees (30%) are more engaged than on-site (21%) and hybrid (24%) employees.
• U.S. and Canada are among the most engaged workers in the world, with 52% of workers reporting stress a lot of the day yesterday.
• However, while a smaller percentage of Europeans are engaged, reported stress is lower, at 39%.
• Stress is also high in East Asia (52%), a region with low employee engagement (17%).
• Stress is higher globally among young workers and those in remote or hybrid work locations.

And in terms of UK-specific stats:

• 19% of UK employees say they feel angry a lot of the day.
• 38% say they feel stress.
• Only 10% of Brits describe themselves as engaged with their jobs.

While exclusively remote and hybrid employees report higher employee engagement, they also report higher stress – which can perhaps be attributed to a less predictable or structured work life. But the results also show that employee engagement has 3.8 times as much influence on employee stress than work location.

In other words, what people are experiencing in their everyday work - their feelings of involvement and enthusiasm – matters more in reducing stress than where they are doing their work.

State of the Global Workplace: younger employees

The workplace is worse for employees under the age of 35 than it was before the pandemic. The Gallup State of the Global Workplace Report found a decline in engagement and employer satisfaction among remote Gen Z and younger millennials. This is a significant change from pre-pandemic years. Since the pandemic, younger workers have declined significantly in feeling cared about and having opportunities to develop – primarily from their manager.

• The percentage of engaged employees under the age of 35 dropped from 2019 to 2022 and actively disengaged employees increased.
• Younger workers are not feeling like someone cares about them, encourages their development or that they have opportunities to learn and grow.
• There was a significant drop in fully remote and hybrid young workers strongly agreeing that someone encourages their development.
• Less than four in 10 young remote or hybrid employees clearly know what is expected of them at work.
• Stress is higher globally among young workers particularly for those in exclusively remote or hybrid work locations.

What do the findings of the Gallup State of the Global Workplace 2023 Report tell us?

When disengaged employees were asked: What would you change about your workplace to make it better? The top answer was to improve culture.

To compare the results:

• 16% of disengaged employees specified wellbeing
• 28% wanted better pay and benefits
• 41% said engagement or culture

When investing in the workforce, organisations should consider the level of service that employees who are stressed, angry or disengaged might be offering their customers. With such deeply discontented employees, the fear is not just that employees may leave but instead that they stay and sabotage success by providing poor service, making mistakes, being inefficient or unproductive, frustrating higher-performing colleagues and slowing down innovation.

What can your business do to beat the odds?

To be successful, organisations need to beat these odds by investing in their culture, employee experience and engagement to outperform their competitors, driving the best customer service, innovation, and productivity in their industry.

• Invest in a comprehensive programme to drive employee engagement and positive culture. Great Place to Work provides an opportunity to benchmark your company data with others and is easy to implement.
• The rise in employee stress emphasises the importance of organisations addressing employee engagement and wellbeing. Start by capturing wellbeing data so you can build a proactive strategy around the findings.
• Only one in three managers is engaged at work. Senior leadership need to address this lack of engagement in their management tier.
• Managers need skills coaching to enable them to have wellbeing conversations to help employees reduce disengagement and burnout. Gallup finds the best habit for successful managers to develop is having one meaningful 15-30 minute conversation per week with each team member.
• Employees want to understand better how their work contributes to the organisation’s purpose. Communication plays a vital role in this, ensuring the whole workforce understands the journey the organisation is on, how it’s doing and where they fit in.

Unlock the potential of your business by cultivating a workplace culture that not only engages your employees but also propels your business forwards. Get in touch to explore how we can help you create a thriving culture that sets your organisation apart. We’re here to guide you every step of the way.