Executive Podcast #297: Has Employee Engagement Gotten Worse?

Perry Holley:
Welcome to the Maxwell Leadership executive podcast, where our goal is to help you increase your reputation as a leader, increase your ability to influence others, and increase your ability to fully engage your team to deliver remarkable results. Hi, I’m Perry Holley, a Maxwell leadership facilitator and coach.

Chris Goede:
I’m Chris Goede, executive vice president with Maxwell Leadership. Welcome and thank you for joining. As we get started, I’d love for you to visit maxwellleadership.com/podcast. There. You can click on this podcast and fill out a form. One of the things I want to encourage you to do is, as you’re listening to this podcast, these are really mini coaching sessions for you. And one of the fastest growing parts of what we do, based off the request of those around the world, is our coaching business. And we do a lot of one on one at all levels, and organizations do a lot of group coaching.

Chris Goede:
Matter of fact, Perry was on a couple of this week of large companies that have teams that were group coaching and working through. So, man, if that interests you and if we can help you in any way, I’d love for you to fill out that form. Let one of our. Our team members reach out and talk through that with you. Well, today’s topic is, as employee engagement gotten worse, is it possible? Well, that’s what I was saying when I originally read the title. I was like, well, listen, I know where it was at. And I was like all, are you serious? Is it really getting a lot worse? And this is a serious challenge and a leadership issue that we’ve gotta. We gotta continue to talk about.

Chris Goede:
Now, the first thing I think about is, this is great job security for you and I, for those that at least are self aware, that understand, but we pull our data from Gallup. And so they sent out another engagement survey, and. And Perry brought some. Some data that we’re gonna talk a little bit about today. That, man, it really opened my eyes to say, we have got to do some things. And so that, you know, when they are unengaged, they’re. They’re. They’re detached from us.

Chris Goede:
The reason they’re detached is because they don’t have clarity, that they’re not satisfied in what they’re doing. The organization might not be developing them. There’s not a tie to the mission purpose. All those things you’ve probably heard about as bud’s words. And so, um, man, when that is the case, we’re going to have disengaged people. They’re not. They’re going to feel like we don’t care about them. So let’s dive into some of the data, and then let’s.

Chris Goede:
Let’s talk about, man, maybe some solutions.

Perry Holley:
And I be clear, we do teach that engagement, employee engagement, is a leadership issue. You absolutely have to be addressing this. This is from a Gallup survey that was most recent and saying that through 2020, 2021, engagement was tracked at a certain level. By the end of 2023, only 33% of employees were highly engaged, meaning they were involved, enthusiastic, had energy in the workplace, that sort of thing. Unfortunately, as it came into 2024, this has continued, this downward trend, engagements dropping three percentage points and 30% now between full and part time. What I thought was interesting was they started in their survey work. As this kind of plays into our leading multi generational teams, they were looking at how were the different generational constituencies in the workplace affected as a baby boomer, proud to give a strong report that the baby boomers were actually, our engagement had increased. The only thing I can think there was, problems bring me problems we’ll solve, listeners.

Chris Goede:
Okay, you need to know we disagree on this report for you. Well, let’s move to yours.

Perry Holley:
Let’s move to Gen x employees. Christopher, let’s see. Could you explain?

Chris Goede:
Christopher sounds like a baby boomer, like my mom calling me.

Perry Holley:
You have declined 4% from 35% to 31%, which is almost falling off the edge of the table. And then most dramatic decline. And really where I want to go with this conversation today is that our youngest workers, our youngest teammates, the older group of millennials, which would be 1980 to 1990, they look at millennials in two groups, kind of eighties to nineties and nineties to 2000. And if you’re not familiar, we have a lot of podcasts on this. But the difference being that the earlier millennials had a cell phone, the later millennials had a smartphone when the Internet attacked, and it became a whole different engagement tool, and it. The screens got smaller. It got a lot. The nineties millennials had a much different upbringing, and then the youngest of the group, the Gen Zs, have experienced a five point decline in that.

Perry Holley:
So just looking at, in the different constituencies all across the board, except for the baby boomer, who are retiring at 10,000 per day, I think, or something, some big number that they’re leaving the workforce. You’re left with these younger workers, your Gen Y and Gen Z, who. Who are struggling in the workplace. And I just wonder, you know, I’ll bring that forward to give you a couple of thoughts on. You saw the survey as well. But, yeah.

Chris Goede:
So for, for us, let’s talk a little bit about this millennials and the millennial generation and the Gen Z generation and where they’ve seen the greatest decline. And so one of the things that we want to provide for you is the why behind that? What, what is, what is going on there? And that’s dropping that. So here are a couple of things to be aware of that will be very, very impactful on whether or not they’re engaged or not with the team is, hey, are they feeling cared about by someone at work? Right? Do they care for me? We talk a lot about John’s three questions. Right. One of those is, do they care for me? The other thing is, is there opportunities for them to learn, grow and be developed? What is my growth plan? What is my career path look like? And that’s one of the things in some studies that, you know, that we look at and read is that, hey, I think it’s top three now, reasons for people taking jobs or moving away from jobs is that there’s a clear path of what their career trajectory looks like. Are they feeling connected to the mission of the organization? Is there, is there progress happening often and in real time and feedback from their managers? Are they feeling that they have a voice and they’re able to share and their opinion counts? And so this, those things right there confirm exactly why you jumped in for us last year and partnered with Tim Elmore. And we developed a leading multi generational team training and workshop, because this is what we need to understand from each generation we talk about in that training, but we need to understand this for each generation and what they need in the workplace. So let’s.

Chris Goede:
We’ve identified that, obviously your generation for some reason right now.

Perry Holley:
You’re welcome.

Chris Goede:
Remember, it’s just the first quarter. I don’t know if you guys can all year long in 2024, that might be a challenge. But is that, hey, there’s two areas. And so let’s talk about how do we engage those two? Let’s work through these. Um, because a lot of them are in the workforce right now, and we’ll talk about that in just a minute. But let’s talk about that and how do we engage that?

Perry Holley:
And I want to make sure I didn’t, I don’t think I said it at the top, but one thing that came out of this calip survey was hybrid and remote workers are especially hard hit by some of this disengagement and lack of engagement that we’re seeing. So I think as a baby boomer, I continue to be baffled by that. To think are we doing enough? So these six areas that you. That will gallup identify these six areas where the younger generations are struggling. Let’s look at a few of these and say, what could leaders be doing? But also, let’s just throw in a little bit of a spin on if you have a hybrid or remote worker that’s involved in that, are there some strategies we need to address with that? So once you.

Chris Goede:
Yeah, let’s do that. So, let’s start first with this, making sure you understand around the hybrid and the remote side of things. And I’m gonna give you some kind of action items that I think are extremely important. We hear a lot from organizations and leaders that communication is a challenge. Now, that’s without being remote or hybrid. And so what I want to challenge us as leaders and people that are leading people and leading remote teams is that, man, we. We have to double, triple, quadruple down on our communication with them. When you think it’s enough, when you think it’s clear enough, you need to do it again, and you need to connect, and you need to commute with, uh, communicate with them.

Chris Goede:
And. And that goes for not only the vision and the mission and all, but that is on daily task and priorities and making sure that you’re doing that. And so what I would encourage you to do is, as you think about this, is, how do I increase that engagement level with these younger generations, with being remote or even in the office, is. Is what our communication norms. What. What do I expect out of every team member, both communicating up, communicating to their peers, or even communicating to your team? I would also encourage you to. To use technology to foster collaboration with them. And the other thing, too, is they feel oftentimes disconnected.

Chris Goede:
And I talked earlier about they want to know what their growth plan is and how they being developed, man, really try to drive mentorship or partnership in some of the projects and the work that are going on. You could look at this and say, well, Perry could totally handle that, but, you know, Perry could work with Chris on that. And then all of a sudden, you got a little bit more of an engagement and a little bit more collaboration, and I think you’ll see that number being engaged in what they’re working on together just naturally rise.

Perry Holley:
Well, the statistic you said about they don’t feel like someone cares about them at work. I’ve seen some other Gallup work around the importance of friendships in the workplace. If I feel like I have a friend and you think about being remote or hybrid coming and going from the office, I never connect to do that. One thing that came out of this survey that said, are you, you could focus on your managers. That 70% of managers say they’ve not been trained how to manage a hybrid workforce and are increasingly less engaged, burned out and looking for other jobs. I thought, oh my goodness, is that, as you said, is that when people are out in the. And you have the luxury of allowing people not to be in the office generally people like that, but it’s not for everyone. But you need to have a policy.

Perry Holley:
You need to be clear. But your communication comment is big. The one thing that I think rescued me and some of this was really doubling down on the one on one to make sure that I have a scheduled, non negotiable one on one time with every single person on the team. I’m stunned in the number of coaching calls I do where this is not a norm, this is an exception. So are you having the one on one time? Are you speaking with people? Are you connecting with people? Do they know that you know they’re there in that one on one time? Can you do those three things that every follower is asking of you? Do they know you’re trying to help them? Do they know you care about them? Do they know they can trust you? And I just think finding ways to connect through the one on one and let people know, even though you’re not in the office, you’re not seen. You’re seen by me, I see you. And letting them know that you’re connecting, that someone does care about them. They have opportunities to learn and grow.

Perry Holley:
They are connected to the mission and the vision. They know why they’re important. These things start to really stack up in your favor is that people feel like, hey, I want to be here. I want to be on your team.

Chris Goede:
You start off by talking about, hey, let’s focus on the managers. And then you shared a stat that kind of just grabbed me. You’re like, 70% of managers are in essence going to be looking for another job. Well, leadership is contagious.

Perry Holley:
Yeah.

Chris Goede:
And if the managers are that way, what do you think then their team feels or those that are working directly for them? And so we definitely got to start there and make that a priority.

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Chris Goede:
I think the other thing is we have to establish clear expectations for in person office time, right? We talk about the disappointment gap and we talk about that, the fact that that is the gap between what is expected and what is reality. And so we need to make sure that we set that on the front end of what that looks like, especially with our younger team members who, who need to be around for mentoring, for development, for even just kind of like the osmosis, right? Like, what does it feel like to be connected and communicating and having conversations around what we do and our KPI’s and what challenges do we like? There’s just a huge, I believe now, again, to your point, um, we can, you can get creative and do a different way, but not every role, every organization has to have office time all the time. But, man, if there’s got to be some type of blend for it, that I think that will engage them behind the purpose and the mission of what we’re doing and make them understand even further.

Perry Holley:
One thing Gallup suggested was the manager setting a good example by the manager being on site regularly. Now, if you have a situation where managers, I think of you as an example here you travel, you live a long way from the office. You could easily be work at home, but you are present when you’re not traveling on the road. You are present three to four, sometimes five days a week, hardly ever less than four that you’re present and people see you, even though some of us are coming and going in the office, your presence. So you set a good example and then that initiates these team member discussions. You have more authority as you talk about how should we manage this situation. Thinking about, again, people feeling seen, people feeling valued, people feeling that they’re connected to what you’re doing. I’m not going to let distance get in the way of our moving forward.

Chris Goede:
With our relationship when it comes to developing these people and helping them learn and grow. What I want to challenge us to do is to do it a little bit differently, to be creative, not to just have a standard kind of development track. What I want us to do is to look at each individual we talk on here about the fact that everybody needs to be led. Well, everybody needs to be led the way they need to be led. It’s the same thing with development, and they’re going to be different areas, whether it’s because of their strengths or because of their interest or because of what some of their growth goals are. So as you think about that, as you build a development plan, as you help them learn, as you help them grow, get creative, make it personalized to what matters to them. And the only way that can happen is by taking the initiative to engage them and ask the questions, where do you want to grow in this area? What does that look like? And by doing that, I think we can increase that engagement percentage a little bit.

Perry Holley:
The last one that I was taken by the Gallup survey said that they don’t feel that their opinions count. And I thought, isn’t that, speaking as a baby boomer, isn’t that just like us to say, I’ll tell you what you think. Just sit back and I’ll tell you how to think instead. I was really taken when we did the course on leading in a multi generational workforce, Tim Elmore talking about, what is the value that these youngers bring? And I think if you want a place to start would be as a team, determine those for you. What is it that they bring? If you need some, I can make some recommendations on things. You could read Tim Elmore’s book on new kind of diversity is a great place to start. But just the sections on Gen Z to say they’re very entrepreneurial, they’re very. They’re the most leadership driven generation in a generation.

Perry Holley:
They have more desire for leadership than any of the previous ones. They have a number of great attributes and qualities that they bring, but we overlook that because, oh, they’re young and they’re snowflakes, and they’re whatever we’re telling ourselves that is not true. We need to change that to a positive narrative. And the last thing I’ll say is that one thing that really affected me was I had a leader challenge me once about Perry, what do you think? And I was a younger at that time. He was the older, and I caved. I said, well, I think what you think, boss. What do you think? Then I got a little snicker around the table. He didn’t think that was funny.

Perry Holley:
And he taught me a life lesson, which was, you should always have a point of view when you come to a meeting with a title of the meeting, have a point of view, have thought about it. But leader one thing you can do is insist that everybody on your team, from young to old, have a point of view. Tell those young people, I need you thinking about this. I need to know what you think about this. What would you do if you were me, if you were leading this? How would you do that? Get them talking, get them contributing. Let them know you care. Are you going to do everything they say? Of course not. You’re not going to do anything anybody said.

Perry Holley:
However, you may get a different point of view. You may get something you didn’t thought about. And they do come with a different. Come from a different mindset, and I think it’s positive. And I’m noticing that they have a lot of creative ideas. They can put. They can hack things. They see ways around things.

Perry Holley:
They know how to put technology to work. You and I just got a lesson between takes around a technology thing that we thought, oh, my gosh, we both looked at each other at the same time. We never heard of that. But young Jake gave us a lesson on doing that. So I think there’s a lot about engagement here, but once you wrap it up.

Chris Goede:
Yeah, there’s a ton more that we could talk about that. And Perry is really behind taking Tim’s content and making it so relevant to organizations. And so there’s a lot more behind that. But we really just got to focus on how do we make them feel valued, how do we increase their engagement and a level. And it’s so important for the success of any mission or purpose and organization is going after. It’s so important right now. But even more importantly, and you mentioned this in the future, because the. That those generations, the millennials and the Gen Zs, they comprise of 46% of the workforce, and it is increasing daily, just like you talked about, your generation stepping away.

Chris Goede:
Right. They are covering that gap. And so we’ve got to figure this out. We’ve got to figure this out. And so if you don’t, they’re not like your generation, where they just stick around and work through it. They’re going to leave. They’re like, I’m good. I’m out.

Chris Goede:
Right? It’s kind of like maybe, what? You know, Baskin Robbins, the 32 flavors of ice cream. Hey, I’m gonna go do this. I’m gonna go do that. I’m gonna go do this. And so, I hope just a couple of things that we shared today, you’ll have a different perspective on. You’ll think a little bit different as you begin leading multi generational team members. And by doing that, we believe that you’ll retain talent and it’ll drive better business results.

Perry Holley:
And I don’t know if we said it or not, but the baby boomers are killing it. Thanks Chris. And a reminder. If you’d like to know more about our offerings or get that learner guide, see our other in our podcast, family of offerings. Do all that at Maxwell Leadership. You can also leave us a comment or a question there. We love hearing from you. Very grateful you’d spend this time with us.

Perry Holley:
That’s all today from the Maxwell Leadership executive podcast.

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