Story Highlights
- Monthly engagement at 32.5% last month
- Engagement has been at or above 32.0% for five months
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The slightly improved level of employee engagement that persisted in the U.S. workforce in 2015 continued in January. Gallup categorized nearly a third of workers last month -- 32.5% -- as engaged in their jobs. Employee engagement has not fallen below 32.0% since August of last year.
The majority (51.9%) of U.S. employees were "not engaged" in January, and 15.7% were "actively disengaged."
The January 2016 estimate is based on Gallup Daily tracking interviews conducted with 7,215 adults working for an employer. Gallup categorizes workers as "engaged" based on their ratings of key workplace elements that predict important organizational performance outcomes, such as having an opportunity to do what they do best each day, having someone at work who encourages their development and believing their opinions count at work.
Engaged employees are involved in, enthusiastic about and committed to their work. Gallup's extensive research shows that employee engagement is strongly connected to business outcomes essential to an organization's financial success, such as productivity, profitability and customer engagement. Engaged employees drive the innovation, growth and revenue that their companies need.
Bottom Line
In September 2015, monthly employee engagement averages rose to 32.0% and have not since retreated. In the five years Gallup has been measuring it among all U.S. employees, employee engagement had never stayed at or above that figure for more than two consecutive months. Positive gains in employee engagement, however slight, are welcome news to U.S. companies at a time when there is a crisis of engagement.
Survey Methods
Results for this Gallup poll are based on telephone interviews conducted Jan. 1-31, 2016, on the Gallup U.S. Daily survey, with a random sample of 7,215 U.S. adults employed full or part time for an employer, aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. For results based on the total sample of employed adults, the margin of sampling error is ±1.8 percentage points at the 95% confidence level. All reported margins of sampling error include computed design effects for weighting.
Each sample of national adults includes a minimum quota of 60% cellphone respondents and 40% landline respondents, with additional minimum quotas by time zone within region. Landline and cellular telephone numbers are selected using random-digit-dial methods.
Learn more about how the Gallup U.S. Daily works.
