Benchmarking
The Employee Engagement Benchmarks Q3 2024
Gain valuable insights for measuring your team’s engagement levels, drivers, and eNPS trends with our benchmark data – collated from over 500,000 employee responses from various industries and organisations. This data is from July to September 2024 (Q3 2024).
See the latest benchmarking results for your industry*
*Rolling 12 months ending September 2024
See how similar sized organisations are doing*
*Rolling 12 months ending September 2024
Engagement Index
Hive’s Engagement Index is made up of the responses to 3 core questions measuring Pride, Advocacy and Loyalty across an organisation (measured on a scale of 0 to 10 with a result of 7 and above indicating a positive score).
Compare your organisation’s Engagement index against the benchmark to get a snapshot of how your employees are feeling.
Not sure what your score is? We can help.
The Engagement Index for Q3 2024 has seen a small increase to 7.2, reflecting continued stability in employee engagement. Pride remains solid at 7.8, showing ongoing satisfaction and a sense of accomplishment within the organisation.
Loyalty has edged up to 6.4, signalling slight growth in employee commitment. Advocacy has risen to 7.5, demonstrating even stronger employee willingness to recommend the company. Pride perception is now at 7.8, indicating improved value alignment.
Overall, these metrics point to a consistently positive workplace environment with a focus on continuous improvement and fostering employee loyalty and advocacy.
In Q3, we’re seeing some fascinating trends across different industries.
Housing Associations have been on the rise, ending the quarter at 7.3, showing that consistent efforts to boost employee engagement are paying off. This upward trend is something worth watching. On the flip side, Entertainment and Recreation held steady at 6.8 throughout Q3, but that’s after a significant drop from 7.7 earlier in the year—suggesting something has shifted in this industry.
The Technology sector continued to shine, climbing to 7.9, reflecting its reputation for strong employee engagement and innovation. Meanwhile, smaller organisations (0-250 employees) continued to thrive with a stable engagement score of 7.7, showcasing how nimble, smaller teams often foster a better connection with their employees.
However, larger organisations (5001+ employees) struggled to break past 6.6, showing the persistent challenge of maintaining high engagement levels in larger, more complex environments.
Top 5 engagement themes to emerge from Q3 2024
1. Confidence, Motivation & Communication (Strategic Direction)
2. Autonomy & Empowerment of Meaningful Work
3. Inclusion & Belonging
4. Growth & Development
5. Leadership Behaviours
Top 5 engagement themes to emerge from Q3 2024
1. Confidence, Motivation & Communication (Strategic Direction)
2. Autonomy & Empowerment of Meaningful Work
3. Inclusion & Belonging
4. Growth and Development
5. Leadership Behaviours
Survey Response Rates
This quarter, we’ve introduced a new benchmark for survey response rates, and the past three months have revealed some interesting trends across industries. While Hive considers a 70% response rate to be a solid target, various factors—like summer holidays, working environment and communication strategies—can influence these numbers.
Some key highlights include Professional Services, leading with an impressive 82%, and Housing Associations close behind at 80%, both showing strong engagement. On the other hand, Entertainment and Recreation (23%) and Health (25%) had much lower response rates, which could be due to factors like irregular hours and job stress in those sectors.
Both Retail and Construction performed well, exceeding the 70% benchmark, while Logistics and Transport lagged at 35%, this could be due to the challenges of a dispersed workforce. These trends highlight how industry-specific factors can significantly impact survey participation and overall engagement levels.
employee Net Promoter Score (eNPS)
July - September 2024
(Q3 2024)
Employee Net Promoter Score (eNPS) is an internationally recognised measure of engagement using the question ‘How likely are you to recommend our organisation as a good place to work?’ with detractors, passives and promoters. A positive score means an organisation has more advocates (promoters) than it does detractors. It is measured on a -100 to +100 scale.
What does a good eNPS score look like?
+41 and above is outstanding
+21 to +40 is very good
-10 to +20 is a typical score
-11 and below is a low, concerning score.
In Q3 2024, the employee Net Promoter Score (eNPS) soared to 27, a remarkable 20-point increase, indicating growing employee willingness to recommend their workplace.
The Manufacturing sector led the charge, achieving an eNPS of 15, while Housing Associations also showed improvement, reaching 11.
The Technology sector maintained a strong score of 28, reflecting solid employee satisfaction. With the rise of things like AI, ongoing investments in innovation could have positively impacted success in this industry, and therefore had an impact on the ability to engage and improve the employee experience.
On the downside, the Retail sector faced challenges with an eNPS of -5, highlighting a need for immediate attention. With economic uncertainties and changing consumer behaviours this could impact things like job stability, influencing eNPS.
The Government sector similarly struggled, landing at -15, pointing to significant areas for improvement. A change in government could create an atmosphere of uncertainty and disengagement among employees, which could be the reason for the decline in eNPS.
In terms of organisation size, smaller companies (0-250 employees) topped the chart with an eNPS of 30. This suggests that close-knit teams foster stronger connections which can lead to higher scores like this, while larger organisations (5001+ employees) improved to 9. This increase indicates that efforts to enhance employee advocacy are paying off.
These insights reveal both achievements and challenges across industries, emphasising the necessity of listening to employee feedback to foster a positive workplace culture.
Further analysis from our People Science team
“Free text categories focus on enhancing experience, performance & recognition, and providing suggestions for improvement. Questions around enhancing experience explore how to improve employee satisfaction, engagement, and leadership impact, with popular responses emphasising communication, transparency, development, culture, compensation, and flexible working.
For performance and recognition, questions highlight what contributes to a positive workday, with respect, autonomy, support, collaboration, and leadership confidence being key outcomes. Lastly, suggestions for managing workload and improving service delivery often lead to feedback around IT systems, communication clarity, and resource availability.”
Throughout Q3 numerous free-text questions have been asked to employees so that organisations can deep dive into employees’ thoughts, feelings and opinions surrounding specific topic areas. Of the range of questions asked, the most popular question categories were:
- Enhancing the employee experience
- Performance and recognition
- Providing suggestions for improvement
Enhancing the employee experience
Example questions:
- How might we improve your employee experience here?
- What challenges are you facing at the moment?
- How might senior manager/leaders improve employee experience here?
- What could the Company do to help you to feel a greater sense of job satisfaction & engagement?
Popular themes:
Recognition and workload management
Development and growth
Culture and collaboration
Flexible working and benefits
Performance and recognition
Example questions:
- What makes a good day at work for you?
- In which ways has the company made a positive difference for you?
- What behaviours enable you to do your best work?
- What are the things we are doing really well here?
Popular themes:
Respect
Autonomy
Support
Flexible working
Collaboration and teamwork
Development and growth
Providing suggestions for improvement
Example questions:
- How can the organisation help you to manage your workload more effectively?
- What one thing would you change about your current job?
- What would help you to deliver excellent internal and external customer service?
Popular themes:
IT and digital environment
Workload and resources
Clarity and communication
Development and growth
Further analysis from our People Science team
“Free text categories focus on enhancing experience, performance & recognition, and providing suggestions for improvement. Questions around enhancing experience explore how to improve employee satisfaction, engagement, and leadership impact, with popular responses emphasising communication, transparency, development, culture, compensation, and flexible working. For performance and recognition, questions highlight what contributes to a positive workday, with respect, autonomy, support, collaboration, and leadership confidence being key outcomes. Lastly, suggestions for managing workload and improving service delivery often lead to feedback around IT systems, communication clarity, and resource availability.”
Throughout Q3 numerous free-text questions have been asked to employees so that organisations can deep dive into employees’ thoughts, feelings and opinions surrounding specific topic areas. Of the range of questions asked, the most popular question categories were:
- Enhancing the employee experience
- Performance and recognition
- Providing suggestions for improvement
Enhancing the employee experience
Example questions:
- How might we improve your employee experience here?
- What challenges are you facing at the moment?
- How might senior manager/leaders improve employee experience here?
- What could the Company do to help you to feel a greater sense of job satisfaction & engagement?
Popular themes:
Recognition and workload management
Development and growth
Culture and collaboration
Flexible working and benefits
Performance and recognition
Example questions:
- What makes a good day at work for you?
- In which ways has the company made a positive difference for you?
- What behaviours enable you to do your best work?
- What are the things we are doing really well here?
Popular themes:
Respect
Autonomy
Support
Flexible working
Collaboration and teamwork
Development and growth
Providing suggestions for improvement
Example questions:
- How can the organisation help you to manage your workload more effectively?
- What one thing would you change about your current job?
- What would help you to deliver excellent internal and external customer service?
Popular themes:
IT and digital environment
Workload and resources
Clarity and communication
Development and growth
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