Yes, I am on Twitter (@LassiterBrian), and truth be told: I monitor business and leadership tweets to get a pulse on hot topics for this newsletter (I think they call that trending topics). In any event, I have compiled 16 articles from the last 60 days alone on the topic of employee engagement. More precisely: dangerously low levels of US employee engagement.

Heres why I think this is critically important: you simply cannot have engaged customers without having engaged employees. At least not for long. Organizational excellence begins with having an engaged, competent, empowered workforce they serve your customers (stakeholders, patients, students, whatever); they manage and improve your core processes; they find ways to reduce waste or increase productivity. In short, they run your enterprise.

But they arent happy in fact, about 70% are disengaged, which impacts most organizations outcomes and bottom line

Im going to offer 14 tips for improving employee satisfaction and engagement strategies that leaders and managers at all levels can start using today. But first, I culled through those 16 articles to try to quantify the issue. Heres what I found:

Gallup, the preeminent authority on all things employee engagement, reports that only 30% of US workers are engaged. Yes, that means 70% are NOT engaged. Disengagement appears to be fairly widespread: in all sizes of organizations (though smaller organizations generally have higher engagement levels than larger), in all parts of the US (interestingly, the south and southeast US have slightly higher engagement levels and the Mid-Atlantic, northeast, and northwest US have the worst), in all industries (though manufacturing, service, and transportation appear to have the lowest engagement), and with all ages (though Millennials and Gen Xers have generally lower levels of engagement than Baby Boomers and Traditionalists).

In a word, disengagement is pervasive.

The good news: the trend of low engagement has been somewhat stable the last 13 years, aside from a dip from 2008-11, likely attributed to the recession.

But the bad news: low employee engagement is costing US organizations dearly (all according to Gallup):

In fact, Gallups CEO estimates employee disengagement is costing US organizations about a half a TRILLION (with a T) dollars a year.

For further proof of the financial impact of engagement, Fast Company reports that businesses with higher employee engagement have enjoyed a 4% higher return than the S&P 500: the Parnassus Workplace Fund (comprised mainly of stocks of companies on the 100 Best Companies to Work For) has a 9.63% return from April 2005 to January 2013 versus the S&P 500s 5.53% over the same period. Probably not coincidental.

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Workers Are Mad As Hell: 14 Ways to Increase Employee ...