Many workplaces today are in the unprecedented position of having five generationsworking together, side-by-side. While the exact definition of each generation may vary slightly, any office or workplace today could include members from the traditionalists (born 1927-1945), baby boomers (1946-1964), Generation X (1965-1980), millennials/Generation Y (1981-1996) and Generation Z (those born in 1997 or later).
While most would agree that generalizations like generational buckets are helpful only to a point, multigenerational workforces challenge employers to meet a broad range of needs and expectations. Making the matter more complicated: Typical full-time and part-time positions are now being augmented with gig economy roles such as freelance, contract and temporary employment options.
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When you pair this complex and diverse workforce with the growing competition to attract and retain top talent, it’s easy to see why culture and work environment have become a key focus for employers looking to gain a strategic advantage.
The price of a disengaged workforce
According to Deloitte University Press’s Global Human Capital Trends 2016 report, “employee engagement is a headline issue throughout business and HR.” Fully 85 percent of survey respondents ranked engagement as a top priority, yet only 46 percent reported that they were prepared to address engagement challenges.
For all the attention being paid to the topic, employee engagement has remained fairly static, at around 30 percent since 2014, and has not experienced large year-over-year improvements in Gallup’s 15-year history of measuring and tracking the metric.
In fact, according to Gallup, almost 20 percent of U.S. workers are “actively disengaged” employees, those likely to undermine coworkers and sabotage projects. Perhaps worse, most U.S. workers -- 51 percent -- continue to fall into the “not engaged” category. While these employees do not typically negatively affect business performance, they tend to do the minimum asked of them and are not likely to go the extra mile for clients or customers.
Overall, Gallup reports that disengagement costs the U.S. around $500 billion annually.

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