Employee Engagement is on the Edge of a New Era!
- Trevor Norman
- 5 days ago
- 2 min read
The latest Gallup 'State of the Global Workplace' Employee Engagement report shows the continued negative trend of employee engagement in the UK.
The 2025 report, which has just been released, highlights the lack of engagement within the UK workforce with only 10% of UK employees being engaged.
UK business leaders are failing in their attempts to bridge the gap between engagement and productivity. Our leaders are unable to actively engage their managers sufficiently to motivate and engage their teams.
The data shows manager engagement has dropped from 30% to 27%.
The report outlines this drop being the most significant contributor to not just the negative UK trend, but also globally.
The global engagement level has dropped just for the second time in 12 years, to 21% engaged.
This comes at a time when leaders need to engage their managers and teams more than ever, to help organisations embrace AI into the working environment to maximise the performance potential this can bring.
"70% of team engagement is attributable to the relationship with the line manager." 1
Leaders need to realise that the key to organisation performance and growth lies in how they motivate and develop their line managers and specific focus given to how they can meet the employment expectations and desires of their managers and employees.
Although it is not as simple as just supporting employee expectations, as the dynamic relationship of engagement is a shared responsibility between the organisation's leaders, the line manager relationship and the employee expectations. When these elements are aligned, individuals and teams can thrive.
The days of expecting people just to turn up for work and perform to help meet business objectives and targets, or because they are paid a salary, are long gone.
People want more from the workplace, and from their line manager. They want to be respected and appreciated, and have a voice, otherwise they will continue to feel disconnected and underperform, or look elsewhere to get their expectations met.
Exploring and appreciating how to fulfil individual employee expectations is the key to positively drive engagement and high-performing teams.
The full report is attached to download if you want to read more of the detail.
1.Clifton, J., & Harter, J. K. (2019). It’s the manager: Moving from boss to coach. Gallup Press.
SOURCE: Gallup's State of the Global Workplace 2025 Report. Further studies, reports and resources can be found on the Gallup website.
Trevor is an Area Network Ambassador for Engage for Success. He is a leadership coach and cognitive behavioural therapist and specialises in organisational behavioural analytics and team dynamics, and is a Certified Master NLP Practitioner.
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