Introduction

Being an employer entails balancing people management with a hectic schedule and a long to-do list. With a plethora of things going on at all times, it can be difficult to tell if one of your employees are no longer invested in the team or company. And according to a survey by Leena AI in 2022, 23% of Indian employees are not actively engaged.

Learning to recognise symptoms of disengagement is critical because it can take time to identify the causes and develop appropriate action plans. The earlier you pinpoint these signs, the less advanced disengagement will be, which means there will be fewer obstacles to overcome.

Reasons For Employee Disengagement

Employees who are engaged are more productive at work and feel appreciated by management. They work with genuine vitality and find more fulfilment in their everyday tasks.

Employees who are disengaged are more than just unhappy. There are several other indications and effects to be aware of. And, while involvement can fluctuate, we can't expect a disengaged employee to recover on their own. Employers should keep an eye out if they no longer appear to be an active member of the team.

• Deteriorating company culture – 75% of employees feel that their company’s work culture is a key factor driving engagement. If the work environment is aggressive or overly competitive, it can reduce employee morale. Employees will easily become discouraged when they feel that their management doesn’t support employee growth. 
• Feeling underappreciated for contributions – 45% of the employees are disengaged because they feel undervalued by their employers. While employers are enthusiastic about giving feedback, they must ensure that they make the employees feel appreciated. Employees can quickly become demotivated when they feel their work is not valued enough.
• Lack of career development – 42% of employees don’t feel motivated enough at work if their job is not challenging enough. A key component of keeping a position exciting is feeling challenged and progressing. Knowing where employees ought to thrive and strengthen is critical to their career development. The frequency and timeliness of recognition, feedback, and professional development are the most critical aspects. Employees require new challenges in order to feel engaged. Staying in touch with the team and their career development is critical to ensuring that their employees are engaged.
• Communication gap –Working remotely has made communication more difficult than ever. Helping your team feel heard is the first step in addressing a lack of trust, conversation, and collaboration. Provide a committed time and place, such as a one-on-one meeting, for your employees to openly discuss the issues they are facing. Employees should ensure their employees knows they can always reach out to them, and encourage them to communicate with one another.

6 Signs Of Employee Disengagement And How It Affects Your Organisation

Recognizing employee disengagement is crucial since it can lead to poor performance and probably a massive turnover at the slightest push. However, obvious signs of disengaged employees mostly go unnoticed and employee feedback may not be feasible. At such a time, companies can determine disengagement by keeping an eye out for the red flags associated with it.

1. Reduced productivity – One of the most obvious signs of disengagement is a lack of productivity. 50% of the Indian employees have daily worries, which will affect their productivity at work.  The whole team's productivity will drop due to an unproductive team member. It will also affect the team morale. 

2. Poor communication – Disengaged employees who feel that their employers don’t care about their wellbeing will not effectively communicate their ideas.Disengaged employees withdraw from communicating with their team members and managers. It hampers innovation and prevents them from collaborating effectively. Employers should personally counsel such team members and understand the underlying cause for their lack of communication. 

3. Absenteeism – Even though absenteeism is not a direct sign of employee engagement, it should not be ignored altogether. Disengaged employees will not find the motivation to go to work every day. However, when an employee is often absent, the leaders must sit with them and ask what is going on to stop disengagement. 

4. Exhaustion leads to inefficiency -  Employees can become disengaged simply because they are burnt out. They don’t have any more energy to show their full potential at work. This can be due to financial or personal reasons. Employees who are highly productive for a prolonged period may become exhausted. Employers should pay attention to such employees and ensure they organize activities to improve work-life balance and prevent burnout. 

5. Disapproving attitude – When employees are disengaged, they will hamper business innovation. They will not contribute to brainstorming new ideas. They will also find something negative to pinpoint in the ideas of others, thus limiting the free flow of ideas. When managers can identify naysaying employees, they have to take the initiatives to identify the problem and find ways to engage the employees.

6. Negligence and Laxity – Employees who are not interested in improving their performance and feel that they are doing more than enough will not be useful for the organization. Managers should engage employees with surveys and feedback sessions to review performance. Complacency indicates that the employee is not interested in working towards betterment. 

Key Takeaways

According to Gallup study in 2020, only 14% of the Indian employees felt that they were thriving in life, even though they were engaged at work. 46% of the Indian workers reported daily worries and 37% reported that they feel sad. This should encourage employers to focus more on creating custom benefits programs that focus on financial, physical, emotional, social, and mental health of the employees.

Offering tailor-made benefits programs with the option for the employees to choose the perks and benefits they want is the best solution to prevent employee burnout. Such a program will allow the employee to choose the exact benefit and help they need at any given time. 

About Batik

Batik is an employee benefits and perks platform that allows employees to choose custom benefits for employees. You can interact with your employers, identify the exact benefits they need, and partner with Batik to offer the most wanted benefits to keep your workforce engaged. 

Batik takes care of the administrative overhead so that you can provide employee wellness programs for your workforce without any hassle