Mass Disengagement - But Are We Surprised?

[Doug Shaw]

The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development’s measure of job satisfaction has dropped from a score of 46 to 37 according to the latest UK Employee Outlook survey of 2,000 staff. More people (42 per cent) reported excessive pressures at work, compared to six months ago (38 per cent), while employees were also more likely to say they have seen increases in stress and conflict at work, as well as bullying by line managers.

Another interesting figure is a rise from 34 to 40 per cent of staff that ideally would like to change jobs. My own experience shows me that workers with scarce skills are already migrating and there is increasing talk of a war for talent as the economy picks up.

Furthermore I've been reading some interesting research published by Right Management which supports this connection. According to their recent global study, ninety-four percent of employees who report that change was not handled well in their organizations are disengaged. They go on to identify nine drivers of successful change which in turn support high levels of engagement.

Feel free to check out the article I've written about this if you want to take a look at the nine drivers plus some comment on them plus a couple of practical things one can do to begin to engage, or re-engage. You can also download the full global study too.

As always I'd love to hear your experiences.

Have a good day - Doug

[Doug Shaw]

Hey Terry thanks for the feedback. I'm building up to a piece on living life through an optical illusion (got a couple of others up my sleeve too, must be something in the water round these parts). The concern beyond the article is that we've seen this before. We know how to make good great, we know how to listen, how to engage, how to stop doing dumb things to customers. Yet still the uninspiring, short term, dull behaviour persists. Are we really that bad @ experiential learning? Surely not - but y'know sometimes I feel like I'm in the Truman Show, he he.

Cheers - Doug

[Terrence Seamon]

Doug,
Excellent blog post with a very concerning message. Thanks for this "wake up call." But will business leaders pay attention? Will they learn? Will they take action?
Terry