Employee engagement starts with impact: how leaders can help

Do your employees see the difference their work makes? Do they see the impact to the customer?

People can spend an entire day answering emails, completing tasks, and meeting deadlines without seeing how their efforts affect a customer or colleague. When they aren’t able to see the impact of their work, they lose sight of why the work matters.

Gallup’s State of the Global Workplace: 2026 report highlights the scale of the problem. Only 20% of employees worldwide were engaged at work in 2025. Gallup estimates that low engagement costs the global economy $10 trillion in lost productivity each year.

As leaders, we need to ask ourselves what we're doing to help people stay connected to their work. One place to start is helping employees understand why their work matters. Harvard Business Review (HBR) suggests that seeing the impact of our work can support engagement, innovation, and productivity.

All work comes back to the customer in some way. For example, in my time at Amazon, we’d think about how an effort to build efficiency through process saves time. In saving time, we reduce costs, and those cost savings are passed on to the customer. We’re always focused on the end customer, going so far as to save an empty chair at the conference table representing the customer.

So, how can you help employees see the value of their work?

Connect everyday tasks to real outcomes

Think about the last time you asked an employee for an update. Did you just focus on what they had completed and what needed to be done? Or did you take some time to talk about what the work they did made possible?

Both matter. But when every conversation just centres on tasks and deadlines, employees can lose sight of the people who benefit from their efforts.

Consider a team that processes customer service requests. Its members may measure success by how many cases they close each day. But each case represents someone who needs a problem solved. Helping the team see that connection gives the work a clearer purpose.

You can start by asking a few simple questions: What do our customers (internal or external) value? How does the work we’re doing impact that? What difference will it make when we get this right?

Make these questions part of your regular conversations. You don't need to turn every meeting into a discussion about purpose. Ensuring your team understands the big impact they are making will continue to build momentum and engagement.

Recognize their contribution to the result

Explaining why work matters is a good start, but showing people the results makes the connection more concrete.

Share customer feedback with the teams who contributed to it. Tell people when their work has solved a problem or made an experience better. Don't assume employees know what happened after they completed their part.

Recognition matters, too. A quick thank you is always welcome, but specific recognition goes further. Tell someone what they did well and why it mattered. For example, instead of simply praising a team for meeting a deadline, explain how their preparation helped a client make an important decision. Here at Cadence, we call this method of feedback: What-Why-How. Start with what they did and be specific. Then talk about why this matters to you, and then how this makes a larger impact.

Research cited by HBR found that employees who felt their managers recognized them positively were 40% more engaged than those who didn’t. When you recognise a contribution, you help people see the value of what they’re doing. This also reinforces the behaviours you want to see more often.

Offer managers the support they need

Managers have a significant influence on how employees experience work. They set expectations, help people work through challenges, and explain changes that affect the team.

But managers need support, too. Gallup found that manager engagement fell from 31% in 2022 to 22% in 2025. We can't expect managers to keep their teams engaged if they don't have the time or support to manage their own responsibilities.

This becomes especially important during periods of change. Gallup's report found that, in a U.S. workforce survey, employees whose managers actively supported AI adoption were 8.7 times more likely to say AI had transformed their work. They were also 7.4 times more likely to say AI gave them greater opportunity to do what they do best.

Think about what that means when you introduce a new tool or change how your organization works. Employees first need to understand why a new tool or change is needed. Then they need to understand what exactly is changing, and how we will implement it. Managers need to be ready to have those conversations, so give them the information and development they need to guide their teams. Make time for them to raise concerns and discuss their own challenges. Supporting managers is an integral part of supporting everyone who reports to them.

Give employees a voice

People want to know their contribution matters. They also want some say in how they do their jobs.

Ask employees for ideas when a process isn't working. Involve them in decisions that affect their responsibilities. Give them ownership of tasks where they can make decisions and talk with them about the skills they want to develop.

Of course, you won't be able to offer complete flexibility in every role. But you can be clear about where people have room to make decisions and take responsibility.

You may also discover that what looks like disengagement has another cause. An employee may be frustrated by unclear expectations, limited opportunities, or competing priorities. You won't know unless you ask.

Pay attention to workload and wellbeing

Gallup's report found that 50% of employees in the U.S. and Canada experienced daily stress, while 19% reported loneliness.

You can't remove every source of pressure, but you can look at what's happening within your team. Are priorities clear? Is the workload manageable? Do people feel comfortable raising concerns? Do they have the support they need to do their jobs well?

These aren't complicated questions, but they require you to listen to the answers and act on what you hear. Regular conversations can help you spot problems early and show employees that you take their experience seriously.

Start with the conversations you're already having

You don't need to launch a new program to start improving engagement. Instead, look at the conversations you're already having with your team.

When you discuss priorities, explain why they matter. When someone does good work, tell them what difference it made. When you introduce a change, make time for questions. And when you ask employees how things are going, listen to what they tell you. These small interactions help people feel seen and understand their impact to the customer.

The question is simple: do your employees understand who benefits from their work and why their contribution matters? If the answer is unclear, start there. You may find that a few changes in how you communicate, recognize contributions, and support your team can make a meaningful difference.

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