Disengagement and Low Unemployment - A Toxic Combination

 

As a country, Germany is doing well economically, but there is a problem in the workforce. A large number of employees in Germany are "disengaged" at work.  That means that these employees are not involved in, enthusiastic about or committed to their work, coworkers and workplace. They do not give 100% and may even undermine productivity.

Sounds unfortunate for the disengaged workers, but is there something you can learn from this situation?

As a matter of fact, there is. An economy can be humming along, yet that does not mean that in an organization - your organization - workers are satisfied and engaged. Workers can be suffering from disengagement with its negative consequences on your project. There just seems to be no correlation that suggests peaks in economic measures means happy days in your project. I would caution even that low unemployment may make your life as a project manager worse when workers are disengaged.

Look at Germany for instance. According to Gallup, the annual absenteeism rate in Germany is "67% higher among actively disengaged employees compared with engaged workers." Think about your projects and how absenteeism will slow down work and add to costs.

Even worse, disengaged workers are more likely to be looking for another job. That will create a new problem. The article mentions something that has been covered previously on the Eye on the Workforce blog: studies have shown that costs related to replacing an employee can be as high as 1.5 times the employee's annual salary. In Germany, according to the Bundesagentur für Arbeit (Germany's federal job agency) it took 84 days to fill a vacancy with a qualified employee in 2015, on average. That's 19 more days than it took to fill a vacancy in 2008. You might have already experienced difficulty finding new workers or replacements those who have left.

And here is the factor that multiplies your problem: Disengaged workers are more likely to leave. Gallup found in Germany for example that 87% of engaged employees strongly agreed that they planned to be with their current company three years from now. For actively disengaged workers only 21% strongly agreed that they planned to be with their current company three years from now. More likely to leave - and to leave you in the lurch. Low unemployment can make it even more difficult for you to maintain the productive resources you need in your project.

Employee engagement does not have to do with economics as much as it has to do with management policies. (There are many other articles and posts on employee engagement by me on this site.) If workers are disengaged at your workplace, be prepared for low morale and a schedule will that has to adapt to absenteeism and extended periods of replacing workers.

How has employee disengagement - and perhaps low unemployment - affected your project?