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INDUSTRY NEWS
Gallup’s State of the Global Workplace 2026: 4 things HR and Reward Leaders Need to Know Right Now.
Posted by
Sam Harris
Chief Marketing Officer (CMO)
As Chief Marketing Officer at Rippl, Sam spearheads marketing strategies that help Rippl find customers who want to enhance employee engagement and organisational culture. Collaborating with leading companies such as easyJet, Volvo, Birmingham Airport, P&O Ferries, and Sport England, Sam has gained deep insights into the complexities of employee engagement. Her extensive experience has molded her knowledge around recognition, reward, and benefit strategies. Known for building motivated, metric-driven teams and leading by example, Sam’s hands-on leadership drives impactful results and innovative solutions both within and beyond Rippl
I know how it goes. Another major report drops, and the intention to read it is there — but time has a habit of getting in the way. So, I went through the full Gallup State of the Global Workplace 2026 report so you don’t have to, and pulled out the four insights I think matter most for the HR and reward teams we work with every day.
The headline isn’t a comfortable one. Overall engagement levels are now at their lowest since 2020, with only 20% of the global workforce actively engaged. That disengagement cost the global economy £10 trillion in 2025. But buried in the data are some really telling signals as to why this is happening, and some clear directions for what we can actually do about it.
Here’s what stood out to me.
1. AI isn’t the problem - engagement is.
Around 65% of employees say AI tools help them be more productive. Yet 89% of businesses report no real productivity gains, and 95% say they’ve seen no impact on profit. So why the gap?
What the data points to, and what I think gets overlooked, is that disengaged employees are far less likely to embrace new ways of working. If someone doesn’t feel valued or connected to where they work, they’re not going to lean into change. They’ll stick to what they know. The technology sitting in front of them barely gets a look in.
Engagement isn’t just a people issue. It’s the thing that determines whether any investment in innovation really lands.
What HR & Reward leaders can do:
Before pushing new tools or ways of working, check in on how your people actually feel. Are they bought in? Do they feel supported? A simple pulse survey can surface a lot. If engagement is low, that’s the lever to pull first because everything else flows from there.
- Run a short engagement pulse survey before your next tech rollout, policy change or implementation in HR
- Build a simple internal comms narrative around why change matters for your team, not just the business
- Discover how HGS UK developed a deep-dive Listening Strategy to transform their people experience grounded in employee feedback
2. Managers are the most undervalued asset.
This one really struck me. Globally, fewer than 1 in 5 managers are engaged, the lowest of any employee group. And when you consider everything being asked of managers right now, leading dispersed teams, driving performance, supporting wellbeing, doing more with less, it’s not hard to see why.
But here’s what Gallup makes plain: managers are the single most important factor in whether engagement initiatives actually work. In the highest performing organisations, 79% of managers are engaged. And employees whose managers actively encourage AI use are 7.4 times more likely to feel it helps them do their best work. That’s a staggering multiplier.
There’s also a newer dynamic worth noting. Managers are increasingly as engaged as their teams. It’s becoming more of a shared experience, which means neglecting manager wellbeing has a ripple effect in both directions.
What HR & Reward leaders can do:
Investing in managers is one of the fastest routes to moving the needle on engagement across your whole organisation.
- Give managers real-time visibility of team engagement trends, not just annual survey results
- Equip them with tools to recognise and reward their teams in the moment, not just at review time
- Create space for managers to flag their own challenges. They need support too.
- Understand how to build a business case for recognition and reward in your business by reading our blog here.
3. Wellbeing is finally being taken seriously (but there’s more to do).
For the first time in three years, overall wellbeing levels are starting to improve, and that’s genuinely positive. More organisations are treating this as a strategic priority rather than a box-ticking exercise.
But stress, anger and sadness remain higher than pre-pandemic levels, and only 34% of employees globally say they’re truly thriving at work. The rest describe themselves as struggling or suffering. There’s still a significant distance to travel.
One of the clearest patterns in the data: when people feel recognised and rewarded, their sense of wellbeing improves, and so does their engagement and loyalty. Recognition and reward aren’t separate from wellbeing. They’re part of it.
What HR & Reward leaders can do:
Wellbeing support needs to be accessible and relevant, not buried in a handbook or locked behind a helpline number. Think about what your people need day to day.
- Audit your current wellbeing offering. How easy is it to access? How many people actually use it?
- Look at how recognition is built into the day-to-day, not just reserved for annual awards
- Explore the most in-demand employee perks to benchmark your current offer against
4. Loneliness isn’t about where people work.
This one surprised me more than any other finding. 22% of employees say they regularly feel lonely at work. And the instinct might be to pin that on remote or hybrid working, but the data doesn’t really support that. The difference between remote employees feeling lonely (24%) and fully on-site employees (18%) is much smaller than you’d expect.
What actually determines whether someone feels lonely is whether they feel connected, seen, and like they belong. Not where they sit. Someone can be in the office every day and feel entirely invisible. Someone remote can feel genuinely part of something.
Proximity isn’t the answer. Culture is.
What HR & Reward leaders can do:
Focus on building connection intentionally, across locations, teams and working patterns.
- Create visible moments of recognition that the whole organisation can see, wherever people work
- Look for ways to celebrate community and shared identity, not just performance
- Ask your people directly: do they feel like they belong? The answer might surprise you.
- Explore how a tailored perks strategy can help remote and dispersed teams feel more connected and valued, read our guide to perks for remote employees
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At Rippl, we’re all about making everyone matter. Our purpose is to unify deskless and decentralised workforces through meaningful employee engagement so every person feels seen, heard and valued. And we have over 20 years’ experience in enabling just this for leading UK and global businesses through a customised blend of recognition, rewards and benefits. Book a 30-minute slot to discover the Rippl effect as we take you on a platform tour of:
- How Rippl can be tailored to your unique business geography, needs and culture
- Our extensive feature suite including multi-level recognition, dynamic reward options, benefits dashboard and wider engagement features
- Desktop and mobile app customisation and branding capability
- Real-time data and analytics reporting to evidence impact and drive strategic decisions
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