Engagement Has a Nice Ring

For four years running, more than 80% of U.S. employers rank employee engagement as a strategic priority, according to TalentKeepers’ 2016 Workplace America report.

Employee engagement continues to gain respect as a key strategy for many organizations, according to TalentKeepers’ 2016 Workplace America report, which surveyed more than 880 organizations. For four years running, more than 80% of U.S. employers rank employee engagement as a strategic priority. The number of organizations rating themselves as very effective in engaging employees nearly doubled from 14% in 2015 to 26% in 2016.

Another dramatic increase was “Morale and Culture” as the top thing affected by poor engagement and turnover among employees. This number grew from 50% in 2014 to 72% in 2016, beating out productivity and team performance by a large margin.

In a troubling trend, employee engagement budgets across America have fallen for the third straight year. In 2014, 71% of all employees had some level of funding, but it is now down to 61% in 2016. “However, we do see best-in-class organizations all dedicate some of the highest percentages of their labor and operations budgets to engagement strategies,” notes Craig Taylor, a vice president at Talent- Keepers and the report’s lead author.

From 2011 to 2016, unmanaged attrition has been fueled by “Job and Career” issues; however, also notable is “Leadership,” which has grown steadily for the last four years as a stimulus for turnover. “In 2015, Millennials became the largest cohort in America’s workforce, and 40% of organizations are acknowledging that by providing formal training for leaders on how to manage them,” Taylor says. “This is incredible growth in just two years, up from 25% in 2014.”

For more information, visit: http://www.talentkeepers.com/learning-center/workplaceamerica-research/

Lorri Freifeld
Lorri Freifeld is the editor/publisher of Training magazine. She writes on a number of topics, including talent management, training technology, and leadership development. She spearheads two awards programs: the Training APEX Awards and Emerging Training Leaders. A writer/editor for the last 30 years, she has held editing positions at a variety of publications and holds a Master’s degree in journalism from New York University.