Engagement: The $9 Trillion Question

What the data—and leaders—must confront 

An invitation from the Institute of Directors landed in my inbox with a striking headline: “Do Brits really hate working?” It was impossible to ignore. Curiosity led me to the Gallup State of the Global Workplace report behind the event. I had long sensed that engagement levels were slipping—you could almost feel it in the air—but I was still shocked by the scale of the problem. 
 
Globally, only one in five people describe themselves as engaged at work. In Europe, the figure is roughly one in eight. In the United States, about three in ten. That means four out of five professionals are effectively going through the motions. Gallup estimates the cost of disengagement at around 9 percent of global GDP—nearly USD 9 trillion in lost productivity. These are not HR metrics; they are macro-economic warning lights. 

A Global, Not National, Problem

Although the IoD’s headline singled out the UK, disengagement is not a British issue. It is a leadership issue everywhere. The regional numbers differ, but the story is the same: more and more people view work as something to endure rather than experience. 
 
At the same time, McKinsey Global Institute’s recent study, Out of Balance: What’s Next for Growth, Wealth and Debt?, concludes that the only sustainable route to economic renewal is productivity acceleration—real innovation, not financial engineering. 
 
Here lies the paradox: the world desperately needs productivity growth, yet the human energy that fuels it—motivation, creativity, commitment—is fading. 

What Organisations Are Doing—and Why It’s Not Working

Most companies are trying. The last decade has brought a wave of well-being, flexibility, and inclusion initiatives: mindfulness apps, hybrid policies, purpose statements, and culture champions. Yet engagement barely moves. Why? Because most of these actions target experience rather than structure. 
 
We have communicated values without redesigning work. Real engagement comes from clarity, competence, and connection—knowing what matters, feeling able to deliver it, and seeing that it counts. 
 
Gallup’s data is consistent: the manager determines most of the variance in engagement. Yet first-line leaders remain the most under-supported layer in many organisations—promoted for technical skill, left without coaching, caught between pressure from above and confusion below. Culture lives and dies here. 

What Is Working

A smaller number of organisations are breaking the pattern. They treat engagement as a system, not a campaign: 
 

• They measure it continuously, linking it to real performance indicators. 
• They invest in manager capability as a strategic lever. 
• They balance challenge with support, creating accountability and growth. 

In these environments, everything points in the same direction—leadership behaviour, structure, incentives, communication. People know what winning looks like, and they can see their impact on it. 

Agility, Growth, and Joy—The Conditions for Impact

The organisations that will thrive are those that enable agility, growth, and joy—not as slogans, but as everyday conditions for impact. 
 
Agility means the ability to adapt roles and teams without chaos. It allows individuals to act when they see an opportunity to improve outcomes. 
 
Growth means people feel they are learning and progressing, that their contribution expands their capability and the organisation’s capacity. 
 
Joy might sound soft, but it is the emotional energy that fuels creativity and perseverance. It emerges when people see that their actions genuinely make a difference. 

Creating these conditions is difficult. It requires what I call the Rightness Chain—aligning every link of the organisational system: 

Right objective → right culture → right talent match → right onboarding → right management → right motives → right teams → right training → right facilitation → right organisation → right processes. 
 
The goal is to build an ecosystem of impact where people can turn intent into outcome. When one link fails, the sense of impact dissolves and motivation becomes purely external—temporary at best. 

Why This Matters for Leaders

For boards and senior executives, engagement is not a soft topic. It is a leading indicator of productivity and competitiveness. 
 
When people disengage, innovation slows and the return on capital investment declines. Leadership must therefore reconnect the economic and the human. Productivity is not merely a financial result; it is the output of a functioning human system. Boards that understand this treat engagement as a governance responsibility, not a survey score. 

The Role of Our Profession

From the vantage point of executive search and leadership consulting, I see both sides of the equation. Organisations often seek leaders who can “drive performance,” but performance without engagement is short-lived. The leaders who make a lasting difference are those who create energy and enable impact. 

• Executive Search: Evaluate not only achievements but the wake leaders leave—are their teams more capable and engaged?  
• Assessment: Measure a leader’s ability to clarify purpose, coach effectively, and build trust.  
• Development: Strengthen these behaviours; they are now strategic assets.  
• Organisational Consulting: Align structure and incentives so the system sustains engagement, not drains it. 

This is where executive search and leadership consulting truly converge: at the intersection of talent, culture, and performance. 

What Needs to Change

Many leaders still underestimate the emotional climate of their organisations. They track revenue to the decimal but people’s energy by anecdote. 
 
Imagine if boards monitored engagement as rigorously as cash flow—monthly, by business unit, tied to accountability. Imagine if executive compensation included sustained engagement and development outcomes. 
 
Companies that adopt such discipline become not only fairer workplaces but also more productive, innovative, and resilient. 

Looking Ahead

This paper opens a five-part series exploring how boards and leadership teams can turn disengagement into performance energy: 

1. Do People Still Like Working: What the Data—and Leaders—Must Confront 

2. Why Productivity, Culture, and Leadership Must Reconnect 

3. How Executive Search and Leadership Consulting Must Evolve 

4. What Companies Can Do to Reignite Agility, Growth, and Joy 

5. A Blueprint for Boards: From Disengagement to Sustainable Performance 

At Stanton Chase, we have long believed that leadership is not a position but a system of relationships that determines how energy and impact flow through an organisation. Our work in board assessment, executive search, leadership development, and organisational consulting is built on that conviction. 

Closing Thought

The data may be sobering, but it is also a call to action. People do still want to work—but more than that, they want to make an impact. When leaders design organisations where impact is possible and visible, engagement stops being an HR initiative and becomes the natural outcome of purpose fulfilled. 

About the Author

Çağrı Alkaya is Managing Partner at Stanton Chase London and Global Chair of the Board. With over two decades in executive search, he specializes in C-suite placements across technology, professional services, and financial services. His career spans roles from Coopers & Lybrand’s Business Assurance division to co-founding Oxygen Consultancy before joining Stanton Chase in 2006. He holds an MBA from Yeditepe University and is a certified Co-Active Coach. Çağrı champions the belief that leadership is not a position, but a system of relationships that determines how energy and impact flow through organizations.