Why Employee Engagement Keeps Falling—and What Leaders Can Do About It
Perhaps improving employee engagement begins with changing how we lead.
When Bill Sommers and I began writing our book, Unleashing Potential: How Great Leaders Facilitate Success, we knew employee engagement was a longstanding challenge for organizations. But Gallup's employee engagement research wasn't what inspired us to write the book.
Our motivation came from decades of leadership experience and a shared belief that great leaders create the conditions for others to learn, grow, and succeed.
As we worked on the manuscript, however, we revisited Gallup's research. What we found was troubling.
Gallup's 2025 State of the Global Workplace report revealed that only 21% of employees worldwide were engaged at work. Another 62% were not engaged, while 17% were actively disengaged, employees whose dissatisfaction can undermine the efforts of their engaged coworkers.
More recently, while preparing for a podcast conversation about our book, we decided to look at Gallup's 2026 report.
The news wasn't encouraging.
Global employee engagement had declined again, falling to just 20%. Another 64% were not engaged, and 16% were actively disengaged. Even more concerning, engagement among managers had dropped from 27% to 22%.
The economic implications are staggering. Gallup estimates that low employee engagement costs the global economy approximately $10 trillion annually in lost productivity, equivalent to roughly 9% of global GDP.
Think about that. Only one in five employees worldwide is engaged at work, and the people responsible for leading them are struggling with engagement themselves.
We've been talking about employee engagement, leadership development, and organizational culture for decades. Organizations have invested considerable resources in surveys, training programs, and employee initiatives.
Yet the numbers remain stubbornly low. Which raises a question Bill and I believe deserves more attention: What do leaders need to do differently?
Perhaps We've Been Asking the Wrong Question
When employee engagement scores decline, organizations often respond by looking for ways to improve employee motivation, satisfaction, or commitment.
Those are worthwhile objectives. But perhaps we need to look more closely at the conditions that influence engagement in the first place.
Do employees feel heard? Are they involved in decisions affecting their work? Do they understand how their contributions matter? Are they encouraged to learn, challenge assumptions, and take ownership?
And perhaps most importantly, are leaders demonstrating the behaviors that make these things possible?
Engagement isn't something leaders can demand. It develops in an environment where people feel valued, trusted, challenged, and connected to a meaningful purpose.
Creating that environment requires more than good intentions. It requires changes in leadership behavior.
Three Organizations That Demonstrate the Power of Behavioral Change
In Unleashing Potential, we explore several organizations that achieved remarkable transformations. Three examples—McCormick, Alcoa, and Ford—illustrate an important common thread.
McCormick: Changing How People Work Together
In 1932, Charles P. McCormick inherited a company in crisis. Rather than tightening control, he took a different approach. He raised wages, reduced working hours, and introduced a revolutionary Multiple Management system that invited input from employees at every level.
Over the next 16 years, more than 7,000 employee suggestions flowed into the organization. Many were adopted, leading to innovations in packaging, machinery, and quality control.
McCormick recognized that the people closest to the work often have valuable insights into how to improve it. By involving employees in decisions and encouraging their contributions, he helped create a culture of shared ownership and continuous improvement.
The lesson? People support what they help create. When leaders invite participation and trust people to contribute, they unlock capabilities that traditional command-and-control leadership often leaves untapped.
Alcoa: Changing What Leaders Pay Attention To
When Paul O'Neill became CEO of Alcoa, he surprised investors and executives by making workplace safety his central priority.
O'Neill understood something others did not yet see: When leaders focus on the right behavior, results follow.
He insisted that every injury be reported immediately, anywhere in the company. More importantly, he made it clear that anyone, from a frontline worker to a plant manager, had the authority to stop production if something appeared unsafe.
Responsibility for improvement was no longer confined to executives. It spread throughout the organization.
Employees began identifying problems earlier, improving processes, and sharing solutions. Safety improved dramatically, productivity increased, and Alcoa's market value grew significantly.
What began as a focus on safety became a catalyst for learning, accountability, and operational excellence.
O'Neill didn't simply lead the organization. He created the conditions where leadership multiplied across it.
The lesson? Leadership multiplies when people are trusted to act. When responsibility and authority are shared throughout an organization, thousands of people can contribute to improving results.
Ford: Changing How Leaders Confront Reality
When Alan Mulally arrived at Ford in 2006, the company faced enormous financial and operational challenges.
His Business Plan Review process introduced a disciplined approach to transparency, collaboration, and accountability. Leaders were expected to identify problems openly rather than conceal them.
One of the most important behavioral changes was replacing the instinct to protect oneself with a willingness to acknowledge problems and seek help.
Rather than punishing those who reported difficulties, Mulally encouraged collaboration and collective problem-solving. Leaders learned that identifying a problem wasn't a sign of failure; it was an opportunity to improve.
Ford's subsequent turnaround was remarkable. But equally important was Mulally's ability to change how people worked together.
His success demonstrated a powerful lesson for leaders everywhere: Sustainable results follow when leaders intentionally change how people work together.
Three different organizations. Three different challenges.
Yet in each case, changing leadership behaviors was central to changing organizational results.
These examples don't establish a direct causal relationship with employee engagement scores. They do, however, demonstrate how leadership behaviors can reshape the conditions in which people work and succeed.
What Can Leaders Do Differently?
The encouraging news is that changing leadership behavior doesn't necessarily require a major organizational initiative or new budgets. It can begin with a few intentional changes in how leaders interact with others every day.
1. Ask more and tell less. Rather than immediately providing solutions, ask questions that encourage others to think, contribute, and take ownership.
2. Involve people in decisions. People are more likely to support what they help create. Meaningful involvement builds commitment and often produces better solutions.
3. Replace defensiveness with curiosity. When someone offers a different perspective or identifies a problem, listen to understand rather than immediately defending your position.
4. Focus on feedforward rather than dwelling on the past. Help people identify what they can do differently in the future and provide encouragement and follow-through as they practice new behaviors.
5. Make accountability a shared responsibility. Establish clear expectations, encourage honest conversations, and create an environment where people feel responsible for both their commitments and one another's success.
None of these behaviors is particularly complicated. But consistently practicing them requires humility, discipline, and a willingness to change.
And that may be where the greatest opportunity lies.
The Opportunity in Front of Us
Gallup's findings should concern anyone responsible for leading people. But they should also encourage us to reconsider where we focus our efforts.
Employee engagement is influenced by many factors, including organizational systems, workload, resources, and economic conditions. Leadership behavior is not the only answer.
But it is one of the areas where leaders can make a meaningful difference.
We cannot expect employees to become more engaged simply because we ask them to. We must create an environment in which engagement can flourish.
That begins with examining our own behaviors.
Are we listening? Are we involving others? Are we developing people? Are we creating the trust and accountability necessary for people to do their best work?
In Unleashing Potential, Bill and I return repeatedly to a simple idea: Great leaders don't succeed by having all the answers. They succeed by creating the conditions that allow others to succeed.
Perhaps the next breakthrough in employee engagement won't come from another survey, program, or initiative.
Perhaps it will begin when more leaders ask themselves one important question: What do I need to do differently?
Dan Sitner is co-author, with Bill Sommers, of Unleashing Potential: How Great Leaders Facilitate Success. The book explores practical leadership principles and real-world examples of how leaders can create lasting change by helping others realize their potential.
Sources
Gallup, State of the Global Workplace: 2025 Report.
Gallup, State of the Global Workplace: 2026 Report.
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