INSIGHTS

Employee Engagement Facts and Stats in the Manufacturing Industry

It’s been estimated that 3 in 4 employees within the manufacturing industry are disengaged at work. And, since the COVID-19 pandemic, the sector has seen significantly high staff absence and turnover rates. So, what is employee satisfaction in the manufacturing industry and how can employers make proactive strides to ensure their teams are happy and engaged at work? We explore just this.

What is employee engagement?

We know that happy people create happy businesses. But, for employees to be engaged at work, they need to feel authentically supported, valued and inspired to reach their potential. However, the manufacturing industry has one of the lowest rates of employee engagement across all sectors with only a third (34%) of employees feeling engaged. The result of this is reduced productivity, poorer retention and weaker commercial outputs.

For businesses to reach their true potential, this relies on meaningfully engaging their people with an authentic strategy in a noisy market. Today, employees are seeking more from their employer – they’re seeking meaning. And the power of true engagement has a domino on the effect on how they deliver the best impact in their work, and in turn, influence wider business outputs.

When meaningfully engaged, employees are not only up to 70% more productive, but deliver higher quality work with less defects and less waste. Not only this, engaged employees in the manufacturing sector can produce up to 86% improved customer satisfaction and 44% enhanced profitability. Plus, in an industry faced with significantly poor employee physical and mental health, those who are engaged are up to 78% less likely to be injured at work.

So, what are the barriers to employee satisfaction in the manufacturing industry? And how can employers unlock their People potential?

Understanding the challenges for employee engagement in manufacturing

Many sector employers face common challenges when it comes to engaging their teams. As an industry with predominantly frontline workforces, bridging the deskless divide is a key barrier for HR teams. A PwC study found less than half (48%) of manufacturing leaders reported to have engaged their frontline workforce. Implementing clear and consistent communication cascades is a challenge for many sector employers, and was one of the primary drivers behind Charlie Bigham’s partnering with Rippl, as they sought to bridge the gap between their dispersed frontline teams to ensure all received a high quality employee experience.

Secondly, absenteeism and staff turnover has been reported as a major challenge for over 30% of sector employers. Latest data highlights a significant issue around employee satisfaction across industry, with less than half of teams reporting to look forward to coming to work, shining light on a sector-wide blindspot that needs urgently addressing.

Another crucial factor includes significantly poorer physical and mental health of employees across the industry. Make UK’s 2024 research report demonstrates work-related sickness to not account for this – more than 80% of total sickness absence has been attributed to working injury or illness. And, whilst employer spend on wellbeing has climbed significantly in the past 3 years, just 27% of employees are utilising the wellbeing benefits provided, suggesting significant disparity between employers’ strategies and employees’ needs. One of Emma Bridgewater’s objectives of partnering with Rippl was to elevate their benefits offer and deliver mobile accessibility to empower their frontline teams.

The communication gap between frontline works and managers

With managers balancing differing ways of working between frontline and desk-based staff, often divided across locations, schedules and team cultures, a communication gap is established where the frontline or dispersed majority receive inconsistent and infrequent support and information – on average only engaging in communication with management teams once or less per month.

As we know, communication is key for teams to feel engaged and part of a shared purpose, so infrequent – or even barely existent – connection with managers and wider parts of the business will significantly damage employee engagement.

The importance of employee feedback

Engaged employees feel seen and heard in their role. However 13% of frontline workers are asked to provide their feedback by managers or senior leaders within the business – despite many being at the front of business operations and having an advantageous perspective on areas for improvement. Plus, research shows of those who are able to provide feedback, less than half felt this was listened to or that meaningful action was taken.

Ensuring employees feel heard in their day-to-day experience as well as wider ideas ensures teams feel on average 4.6x more empowered to perform their best – so manufacturing employers must meaningfully address this blindspot.

Employees don’t feel valued, important or recognised

Research shows employee recognition is significantly lower on the manufacturing frontline, with only 1 in 10 employees believing their employee values them. In fact, Manufacturing is one of the poorest-performing sectors for delivering employee recognition, and as a result, frontline employees feel undervalued and overlooked.

The power of recognition has been long established in enabling employees and businesses to reach their potential, and without this, huge risk is placed upon engagement and retention rates.

Emma Bridgewater

Looking to better connect and empower the teams dispersed across their 7 UK locations, Emma Bridgewater were seeking a solution that streamlined existing HR processes, championed an exceptional recognition and reward culture, and elevated their benefits offer.

Read case study

Charlie Bigham's

With 60% of employees being deskless, Bigham’s needed an employee engagement solution that streamlined both recognition and benefits, whilst reaching all corners of their workforce split between London and Somerset.

Read case study

Solutions to improve employee engagement in manufacturing

So, how can industry employers lead the change in revolutionising workforce satisfaction and engagement?

Lead with cohesion.

Frontline and dispersed teams require centralised and accessible communication channels to feel seen and heard in their role. This is particularly important for employees without corporate email addresses. This is where the power of leveraging technology as a force for good comes in – employers can deliver a consistent and cohesive employee experience alongside scale of reach so that every individual is engaged, whether they are desk-based, frontline or dispersed.

Prioritise wellbeing and safety

Engaged employees feel supported to deliver their best both in- and outside of work in a safe working environment. Of course, this includes enabling access to a full range of safety material and equipment. This also should include a comprehensive and tailored benefits offer, which encompasses each pillar of health and wellbeing to meaningfully empower teams and create a people over purpose culture.

Create a purpose-led workplace

Engagement is inspired when employees understand the role they play in the wider business’ culture and mission. Ensuring the business’ values are visible, and are contextualised for all roles, enables each team to work towards a mutually shared goal. Similarly, it inspires teams to progress in their role, learn new skills and develop in their career.

Recognise and reward openly

Recognition, when delivered effectively, is a fundamental element of a connected and engaged workforce. When individuals or teams are recognised openly, this bridges the gap between frontline, corporate and dispersed departments for managers and peers to not only understand wider achievements across the business but congratulate these. Utilising a reward strategy inspires collaboration and incentivises teams to achieve set targets.

Champion employee belonging

A workplace built upon belonging and inclusion will reap the rewards of engaged teams. This is particularly significant for frontline teams who feel overlooked in their value – 79% of deskless workers who feel they belong in their organisation actively plan to stay in their role. Not only does championing belonging through inclusive culture, recognition and benefits retain the best and most diverse talent, but ensures they’re set up to achieve their potential within the business.

Amplify employee voices

Teams who feel heard also feel engaged within the organisation. Particularly those on the frontline in a customer-facing or operations-based role can share key insights and intel from their day-to-day to inform and enhance business processes and performance. Amplifying employee voices can range from quick polling opportunities to longer form surveys or a dedicated ideas hub to spark new ways of thinking.

How Rippl can improve employee engagement

At Rippl, we don’t believe in average employee engagement strategies. That’s why we streamline multi-dimensional features under one roof and into employees’ pockets to keep teams engaged around the clock through:

Personalised recognition, rewards and benefits in your very own employee engagement app that’s fully branded to your business, available in the App Store and Google Play.
Customisable and agile features that can be added or removed in line with your People needs, so your engagement programme always evolves with your business.
Global recognition and reward capability, so your people receive a consistent experience, wherever they are.
Tailored benefits that champion each pillar of employee wellbeing and reflect the unique needs of your teams, so they can be their best both in- and outside of work.
Dynamic wider features including live polls, surveys, an idea management hub, social timeline and competitions to take engagement to the next level.

We specialise in supporting businesses with disconnected and deskless workforces revolutionise their People experience, and have already made waves in employee engagement within the manufacturing industry.

Rippl

Improve Your Employee Engagement with Rippl

See how Rippl can improve your employee engagement . Get in touch to find out more or book a Rippl platform demo today!

Tracking Improvements in employee engagement

Retention.

Of course, a leading indicator of an engaged workforce is a low turnover rate. Once you’ve implemented an effective engagement strategy, ensure this is proactively tracked across all arms of the business to identify the departments or teams with the highest risk of turnover but also track improvement over time to continuously optimise your programme.

Absence.

Another key metric to track improvement in employee engagement is decreased staff absence and sick leave. Similarly, this needs to be benchmarked and tracked across all arms of the business to identify target areas for improvement.

Productivity.

Improved individual and team outputs in terms of targets achieved is another key indicator of effective engagement strategies. Tracking met and exceeded KPIs, as well as new ideas, improved ways of working and customer satisfaction scores gives insight into productivity levels across the business.

Benefits uptake.

When employees make the most of the perks on offer, they become more engaged. That’s because they’re better empowered to achieve their potential at work and feel their wellbeing is supported in- and outside of their role. Tracking benefits page views, engagement and uptake is crucial to understanding which perks are hitting the mark, and identifying those for review.

Employee feedback.

As we’ve explored, feedback and insights are key for truly understanding how engaged and satisfied employees are with their workplace experience, and importantly, identifying priority areas for improvement. Deploying frequent feedback loops with both short- and long-form insights enables businesses to get under the skin of what their teams really need and create an informed engagement strategy.

“We’ve already seen high levels of engagement across the business with non-management colleagues displaying confidence in recognising other colleagues and teams which is a real development for the business.

One of our challenges is to remove barriers and reduce silo working, and through My EB we’re already seeing great recognition across departments which is helping to connect employees and improve their understanding and appreciation of other colleagues and their achievements.”

Onboarding Team, Emma Bridgewater