The State of Employee Engagement
Improving employee engagement is a popular topic on our blog, and for good reason. While employee engagement is slowly rising in the United States, it is still only at 34%. Luckily the number of actively disengaged employees has dropped to its lowest number since 2000 at 13%. However, that means 53% of employees are not engaged. Gallup describes these employees as “generally satisfied but are not cognitively and emotionally connected to their work and workplace; they will usually show up to work and do the minimum required but will quickly leave their company for a slightly better offer.” While engaged employees are more productive, their benefit to the organization is counteracted by employees who are not engaged or actively disengaged.
Employee Engagement and Wellness
Corporate wellness programs are absolutely necessary when it comes to improving the employee engagement percentages listed above. This is because employee engagement and employee wellness go hand-in-hand. Alan Kohll, founder and president of TotalWellness, said it best: “When an employee is happy with their job, it positively affects their health. When an employee is healthy and feeling their best mentally and physically, they’ll feel happier in the workplace.” Wellness programs that are incorporated properly create a positive, wellness culture as well as a sense of community among employees. They allow employees to connect over their wellness goals, push each other in wellness challenges, and support each other on their wellness journeys. This not only improves their health, but also their work relationships. When you combine healthy employees and positive work relationships, you see increased employee engagement, improved job satisfaction, and enhanced office morale.
Employee Engagement and Wellness: The Numbers
- According to this Gallup study, teams who score in the top 20% in engagement have a 41% reduction in absenteeism and 59% less turnover.
- A different Gallup study found that organizations with high employee engagement saw improved customer engagement, higher productivity, better retention, fewer accidents, and 21% higher profitability. They also found that engaged workers are the ones who reported better health outcomes.
- A report by the American Psychological Association found that employees were more likely to recommend an organization that supported wellness initiatives as a good place to work over organizations that did not support wellness initiatives (89% vs 17%).
- According to this survey by Virgin Pulse, 85% of organizations say their wellness programs support employee engagement and 42% reported that improving employee engagement was a top reason for implementing a wellness program.
- This Gallup report found that employees who are both engaged and exhibit high well-being are 30% more likely not to miss any workdays because of poor health in any given month and are 27% more likely to report “excellent” performance in their own job at work.
For more information and more statistics, visit this Forbes article!
