The 2024 Gallup State of the Global Workplace report brings worrying developments in employee mental health to the forefront.
The report features annual findings from the world’s largest ongoing study of the employee experience, and this year was drawn from over 128,000 employees worldwide. It explores how employees feel about their work, their wellbeing and their lives - an important predictor of organisational resilience and performance.
This year, for the first time, the report tells us that a global average of 20% of the world’s employees experience daily loneliness (18% in the US & Canada and 14% in Europe), rising to 25% globally for those who work entirely remotely.
Of course, it’s no secret that hybrid and remote working can be controversial, and 1 in 5 people admitting loneliness at work is not a figure we should ignore.
For some, the freedom of the non-commute is delicious. For others, not collaborating with colleagues in person increases feelings of isolation, negativity and a decline in wellbeing.
According to the report, younger workers – individuals aged 35 and under – are even more prone to these feelings...
As well as delving into employee engagement, life evaluation and thoughts about job market, the report also asked respondents about other negative daily emotions (stress, anger and sadness), not just loneliness.
It reveals that managers are more likely to be stressed, angry, sad and lonely than non-managers. We also learn that managers are more likely than non-managers to be looking to leave their current job.
In fact, intent to leave is another of the most worrying topics this year.
Globally, over half of all respondents (52%) say they’re watching for or actively seeking another job. Worse still, this has increased slightly since last year.
The most unsettled regions in terms of job satisfaction appears to be Sub-Saharan Africa (75%), South Asia (58%) and East Asia (54%).
In the US & Canada, the figure for those actively seeking or watching for a new job is a striking 49% and in Europe it’s a less dramatic (but still rather depressing) 32%.
Although both the loneliness question and the intent to leave questions are among some of the newest in this annual survey, they’re a huge concern for organisations in a disruptive, AI-creep era when we need to work harder to keep human beings engaged.
The report reveals that in 2023, global employee engagement stagnated, and overall employee wellbeing declined.
While both measures are at or near record highs, their lack of improvement is notable, as they follow multiple years of steady gains.
The result is that the majority of the world’s employees continue to struggle at work and in life, with direct consequences for organisational productivity.
Gallup estimates that low employee engagement costs the global economy US$8.9 trillion, or 9% of global GDP.
No leader wants their employees to withdraw or to actively plan to leave.
Even the most introverted among us need to feel connected, inspired and motivated by our leaders, managers and colleagues to keep on contributing and give our best.
So given that hybrid and remote working are here to stay, the challenge facing employers is to renew, in a hybrid setting, a sense of connection and shared understanding.
Of course, organisations can provide training and learning for leaders and managers in empathy, psychological safety and active listening, and they can create initiatives that encourage colleagues to meet and share experiences.
One of the most effective group learning opportunities to consider is team awareness (alongside self-awareness) programmes.
They open up a way to create shared understanding and to be more aware of how others in the team approach and react to similar workplace challenges as you.
Exploring how you’re all different in a positive, productive setting can create many lightbulb moments and revelations about why you may struggle to connect with certain individuals or appreciate why they act a certain way.
Isolation only grows if people feel that they are not included, listened to or understood.
But when leaders and teams understand their colleagues better, they have a higher chance of creating conditions for team harmony, productivity, good energy, and crucially, connectedness.
Empathetic leaders create opportunities for team members to connect on subjects that aren’t only about work itself. How much time do you currently give to group conversations where the subject matter is not directly project-related, but is relevant to every individual and can energise everyone in the team?
At Insights, we champion the transformative power of better team awareness and self-awareness on collaboration and company culture, and the positivity that this can bring to teams and organisations.
We believe it makes a world of difference to how people interact with contrasting characters at work. It lays the foundations for empathy, adaptability, and mutual respect.
Organisations find the programme useful to connect their teams better, especially if there have been significant recent changes in the team mix, the team leader, or the team’s purpose or direction.
How a team works together- and how this aligns with how each individual likes to work - has a serious impact on how effectively teams collaborate. We look at how teams communicate, how they prioritise, what motivates them, and what the blockers are to their performance.
Enabling the team to work together in this way acts as a powerful collaboration tool and can give a significant social (as well as professional development) boost to hybrid and remote workers.
It’s relevant at every level, engages the quietest and well as the loudest team members and helps colleagues connect in more meaningful and productive ways with each other. Strong self-awareness increases appreciation for others’ preferences.
As many readers will know, Insights helps employees at all levels do this through the language of colour, creating a shared sense of understanding that increases employee engagement and connection with team members.
When Acrotech Biophrama Inc. needed a cohesive framework to enhance internal and external communication, it turned to Insights Discovery. The journey started with the senior leadership team and was supported by internal champions and regional leaders across several months. Acrotech conducted immersive workshops and training sessions, encouraging employees to embrace their unique strengths and appreciate the diverse perspectives within the organisation. They tell us that those sessions facilitated authentic dialogue and mutual understanding, fostering collaboration, empathy and respect across teams.
The Gallup report reinforces that, if you want to keep your people, you must do something when you know they’re disengaged.
The report delves deep into employee engagement. In relation to many of the wellbeing items they ask about (stress, anger, worry, loneliness), being ‘actively disengaged’ at work is deemed as equivalent to or worse than being unemployed (see our quiet quitters article on the 2023 Gallup report).
In contrast, when employees find their work and work relationships meaningful, employment is associated with high levels of daily enjoyment and low levels of daily negative emotions.
Actively disengaged employees are resentful that their needs are not being met. They often act out their unhappiness. Every day, these workers potentially undermine what their engaged co-workers accomplish. Not great for team spirit or the sense of positive momentum that teams and departments need.
In fact, this year, ‘actively disengaged’ employees — i.e., workers who actively oppose their employer’s goals — comprise 15% of the global workforce.
Compared to their peers, they are more likely to be suffering in their overall wellbeing, less likely to feel respected and less likely to experience daily enjoyment. Perhaps not surprisingly, 54% of actively disengaged workers say they experienced a lot of stress the previous day.
Leaders who build strong and resilient cultures focus on a few things that set them apart from other organizations.
The manager-employee relationship is key to employee engagement.
As Gallup reminds us, the best organisations hire managers with a talent for engaging their teams, and they train their managers into effective coaches who deliver meaningful individual feedback that inspires better future performance.
These managers integrate engagement into every stage of their employee and manager life cycle. They make engagement a business strategy that informs how they hire, onboard, coach and develop talent.
They also integrate it into performance management, goal setting, team meetings and manager-employee conversations. In other words, they make it part of their culture. It’s simply the way they do business.
At Insights we believe that all of these initiatives will be far more effective if leaders and managers take steps to understand what motivates team members and to connect their teams in a group effort to share this understanding.
Having a common language like colour energies can help this conversation significantly in all types and size of organisations.
Read the full Gallup State of the Global Workplace Report here
To download our 3 steps to building a strong team e-book, click here
Highly cohesive teams are committed, hard-working and engaged, and they experience less intra-team conflict. Those are just a few reasons why great teams are fundamental to successful organisations.
Organisations that are formed around great teams have increased employee performance, greater productivity and better problem solving at work.
Insights works with your teams to take their performance from good to great by getting to the heart of what's impacting performance. When great teamwork is central to your organisational culture, business success follows. Learn more about Insights Discovering Team Effectiveness today