Discover five employee engagement trends in Australia
The majority of Australians feel engaged at work, but employee satisfaction levels are in decline and tracking below global averages. Is it time to reset the employee experience in your organisation?
Employees no longer want to work for a company, they want to work with one. They’re looking for a more human approach to work – a partnership where their values are acknowledged and they can be their authentic selves.
Australian HR leaders have told us enhancing employee experience is their number one priority, and 81% of Australian employers are focusing their benefits programs on employee attraction, retention and engagement. Engagement surveys are an important tool in identifying the success of those initiatives, along with areas for improvement.
Mercer has been gathering employee engagement insights for over 50 years. Looking at the five-year trend of engagement data in Australia and the Asia-Pacific (APAC), including employee engagement surveys conducted across 86 Australian organisations, we can see the growing importance of aligning employee experience (EX) and employee value propositions (EVP) to drive employee engagement.
Driving employee engagement
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Employee value proposition (EVP): the promise
The tangible and intangible parts of the deal that differentiate you as an employer. -
Employee experience (EX): the lived story
The intersection of your employee expectations, work environment, and events that shape their journey within the organisation. -
Employee engagement: how they feel
A measure of how energised employees feel at work and the extent to which they feel passionate about what the organisation stands for, along with their willingness to drive success.
Here are five trends employers should pay attention to when shaping their strategies across these three areas.
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Low talent retention rates pose a risk to organisationsAfter sustained engagement during the challenges of working through a pandemic, Australian employees are a little less motivated – and less likely to recommend their company as a place to work. Only 64% said they would choose to stay with their company if offered the same benefits and pay elsewhere, down from 70% in 2019. Plus, Australian employees are less satisfied overall (71%) compared with those around the world (75%). With Mercer data showing voluntary turnover hit 10.2% in the first half of 2023, low engagement can pose a considerable talent risk.
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Australia’s engagement scores are below global averagesThree-quarters of Australian employees say they’re engaged at work – a little less than the global average (77%) and APAC average (76%), and down a percentage point on the previous year. However, Australians are still a little more engaged than their colleagues in Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan.
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Employee-manager relationships are a growing challengeLooking at five-year data, the three areas needing more work all relate to their immediate manager according to employees. We saw a 10 percentage point drop in positive responses to ‘my immediate manager values diverse ideas and perspectives’ and an 8 point drop in ‘my immediate manager is accessible to me when needed.’ This may also be a side-effect of the permanent shift to hybrid work.
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Career development can be a lever for engagementAustralian employees tell us the number one lever their managers can pull to boost engagement is helping them feel they can reach their full potential at the company. They want to feel their career goals can be met, and feel valued as an employee. But only 40% agree they have the opportunity for advancement – a significant 27 percentage points lower than their peers in APAC.
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Positive signs for trust and inclusion
In good news, 84% of Australian employees are motivated to go beyond expectations, and 88% agree their company actively supports diversity in the workplace – up 6 percentage points on last year. 82% are proud to work for their company, a figure that has been sustained since 2019.
They are also more likely to see their immediate managers communicate effectively with the team, and they believe different views and perspectives are being valued at work.
It’s also important to note a growing proportion of Australian employees say management is using employee survey results constructively. This shows just how important frequent employee listening exercises are for continually improving your EVP – your promise to your people – and employees’ everyday experience at work.
