By Shawn Collins — Leadership Coach, Keynote Speaker, and Founder of EXTEND GROUP & ShawnCollins.com
Gallup’s 2025 Global State of the Workplace report is not just a warning—it’s a cultural reckoning.
Engagement has dropped. Disengagement has hardened. And for the first time since the pandemic, the burden has shifted more aggressively onto managers—especially young and female leaders—who are caught between expectations, ambiguity, and burnout.
“Only 21% of employees are engaged—and the drop is largest among managers.”
This is more than just a stat. It’s a mirror. And most leaders won’t like what they see.
The Engagement Fallacy
Many organizations continue to throw perks, policies, and performance dashboards at what is ultimately a relational deficit. Gallup puts it plainly:
“Managers influence 70% of the variance in team engagement.”
Yet we still fail to equip them with the tools to manage their own energy, let alone lead others with clarity and intention.
Let’s stop blaming strategy when the real crisis is trust. Let’s stop overanalyzing retention when we’ve never actually addressed belonging.
The modern workplace isn’t just distracted—it’s disoriented. And culture is the compass we’ve ignored.
You Can’t Lead What You Don’t Understand
At EXTEND GROUP and ShawnCollins.com, we’ve worked across industries with leaders who are smart, ambitious, and overwhelmed. They’ve read the books. Built the decks. Attended the conferences.
But they still lack a shared leadership language.
- Without one, we see the same patterns:
- Brilliant strategies falling apart in the execution gap
- Teams confused about what success looks like
- Managers who default to pressure instead of people
- Leaders privately exhausted but publicly posturing
Our most popular programs—5 Voices for Teams, Toolkit Sessions, and Altitude Sessions—aren’t successful because they’re clever. They’re successful because they address the relational operating system of leadership: clarity, trust, alignment, and voice.
Gallup’s report tells us what’s broken. Our work builds what comes next.
Culture Can’t Be Handled by HR
The mistake many organizations make is believing that culture can be delegated, protected, or retrofitted. It can’t.
Culture is:
- What leaders say when the pressure is high.
- What gets rewarded when no one’s looking.
- What gets tolerated when everyone is watching.
The greatest cultural threat in 2025 isn’t AI—it’s accidental leadership. It’s letting smart, capable people lead without self-awareness, feedback systems, or a playbook for managing energy, emotion, and engagement.
We don’t need louder leaders. We need clearer ones.
Gallup’s Three Mandates for the Future of Culture
Let’s ground this in what Gallup actually says:
- Train your managers to reduce disengagement. Our 5 Voices Cohorts and Leadership Intensives create self-aware, confident leaders.
- Teach coaching skills that improve performance by up to 28%. Our Toolkit Sessions do exactly that—with proven, visual tools built for real-world use.
- Improve manager wellbeing through continued development. Our XCore and Altitude programs align personal growth with leadership transformation.
These aren’t ideas. They’re the system. And they’re working.
What This Means for Executives and Culture Architects
If you’re in a leadership seat, this moment isn’t about maintaining culture. It’s about resurrecting it.
Because here’s the truth: disengagement doesn’t happen overnight. It happens in the meetings we rush. In the feedback we avoid. In the clarity we assume.
If you’re not actively building a leadership system that:
- Trains the people who influence the experience
- Equips them with tools they actually use
- Measures the signals beyond the metrics
…then your culture isn’t intentional. It’s inherited. And inherited cultures rarely survive transformation.
The Cultural Standard Has Been Lowered. Let’s Raise It.
Culture isn’t the feel-good department. It’s the frontline of performance, loyalty, and longevity. And right now, the workplace is pleading for leaders who:
- See culture as operational
- Lead with clarity, not charisma
- Coach with humility, not hubris
This is the call. It’s not another initiative. It’s the new baseline for relevance.
Bring the Message to Life:
- Book a Keynote that addresses Gallup’s cultural reality
- Train your managers with Toolkit and 5 Voices
- Join the June 2025 Cohorts
This is your chance to do more than survive a culture crisis. It’s a moment to lead with clarity, language, and purpose.
Explore the full Gallup 2025 Global State of the Workplace report here: https://www.gallup.com/workplace
Because leadership without culture isn’t leadership. It’s noise.
Let’s build something better.
