Less than a third of American workers feel connected at work, Gallup finds: NPR

When Tanvi Sinha first started accounting 17 years ago, she worked from the office every day, even on Saturdays in the busy season.

I enjoyed lunches with colleagues and opportunities to learn just by listening and watching others. Grown professionally, aspires to leadership roles.

Now that her company has made working from the office optional, Sinha wonders if newcomers to the field will ever feel as attached to their work as she did.

“I’m sure their involvement will be impacted,” says Sinha, now an audit director at the accounting firm Matthews, Carter & Boyce in Fairfax, Virginia.

A new report from Gallup finds that large numbers of workers, particularly Gen Zers and young millennials, are not engaged in their jobs. This can make it more difficult for them to climb the career ladder, as well as hurt the overall performance of companies.

Employee engagement has decreased since 2020

Gallup survey Of nearly 67,000 people in 2022 they found that only 32% of workers are engaged in their work compared to 36% in 2020.

The share of workers who are “actively disengaged” has risen since 2020, while the share of workers in the middle — those deemed “disengaged” — has remained roughly the same.

Participation was increasing in the decade prior to the pandemic, in the aftermath of the Great Recession, but is starting to decline in 2021.

Younger workers experienced a greater drop in participation than older workers. Those under the age of 35 reported hearing less and less interest in work. Fewer Gen Zers and young Millennials report having someone at work that encourages their development and reduces opportunities for learning and growth.

“There is a growing disconnect between the employee [and] employer. “You can roughly equate it until employees are a little bit more like gig workers,” says Jim Harter, Gallup’s chief workplace scientist and author of the new report.

Solo work by its very nature does not lend itself to loyalty or long-term relationships between employees and employers. Workers may feel less motivated to put their best foot forward.

“In the context of high-performance customer service, of retaining your best people, that’s an issue,” says Harter.

Having workers who are not actively attached can be extremely detrimental to businesses. Harter says that employees who don’t get most of their needs met in the workplace often share their negativity with other people. This can lower the company’s morale.

Sharing is missing between on-site, hybrid and remote employees

Gallup measures a worker’s level of engagement based on: series of questions Such as: Does the employee understand what is expected of them at work? Do their opinions seem to count? Do they have opportunities to do what they do best? Do they have a best friend at work?

While participation fell across a wide swath of workers, the biggest drops were among what Gallup calls “on-site remote workers” — those who can do their jobs from home but work from the office.

But Harter says there are troubling results among those who are completely remote, too.

More of them fall into the middle category—somewhere between the actively engaged and the not actively engaged—which is Harter’s equivalent Quiet smoking cessation.

Meanwhile, workers across the different categories — on-site, hybrid, and fully remote — experienced a decrease in feeling connected to the mission or purpose of their organizations. Clarity of expectations was also lower across groups.

The percentage of workers who said their company cares about their overall well-being has dropped significantly About 50% early in the pandemic, when many companies rolled out all kinds of accommodations for employees, to half that day.

Some companies understand the importance of mental wellness

with high levels of Quiet smoking cessation And Real smoking cessationStephanie Frias believes, companies have an account.

“I think companies are realizing this is key — for people to feel connected and connected at work,” says Frias, chief personnel officer for Lyra Health. “It’s not just about the work people do. He: how Do you instill meaning in this work? “

Her company provides mental health services to other companies, focusing on individuals and organizations in general, and training managers to notice and respond to acute situations.

With all the disruption caused by the pandemic, what worked in the past won’t necessarily work now, and there’s no empirical evidence, Frias says. Workers today want to engage in work, but in a way that is comfortable and acceptable to their lifestyles.

“It’s going to be a ride and a ride,” she says.

Finding a balance when remote work is most valuable

As a manager at her accounting firm, Sinha has been trying to find the right balance.

You love working from home and know that others do too. But she makes sure to be in the office two or three times a week, sometimes for just a few hours, and encourages her teams to find times when they can be together, too.

“Pick a few days, come to work, mingle with people, talk to people,” she says.

It’s not just about being social. It is about exposure to other parts of the business.

Audit teams used to sit in conference rooms together and go to client sites together, Sinha says, so everyone on the team knew every aspect of the audit. Now you can only work on your part.

“This is not a comprehensive picture,” she says.

Sinha says technology can help, and she uses video conferencing to stay in daily contact with her team members. But there are pitfalls to not seeing people face to face, especially for those who have never worked in an office on a regular basis.

“Some people who were hired during COVID — I mean, I went into work after a long while, and I couldn’t even recognize that was the person,” Sinha recalls laughing, implying that it was bad on her part.

The role of managers has skyrocketed in this pandemic, says Harter, a Gallup scientist. They are the people who can make sure employees know what is expected of them and help employees feel cared for.

“Managers will discover the idiosyncrasies of each person they manage,” he says. “They’re the only ones close enough to do that.”