88% of white-collar workers report feeling engaged, and 82% report burnout at least some of the time. Both cannot be a good sign. When you ask why people stay engaged, 67% point to a tight job market and 61% to job insecurity. That is not enthusiasm. It is people staying because leaving feels risky, and it reverses the moment hiring picks up.
If your engagement scores look healthy, it is worth knowing which of the two you are measuring. Last updated September 2026.
| Finding | What it suggests |
|---|---|
| 88% report engagement | Looks good in isolation |
| 67% motivated by a tight job market | External pressure, not commitment |
| 61% cite job insecurity | Fear is doing the work |
| 82% experience burnout | The engagement is not sustainable |
| 93% want role-relevant training | The genuine lever is development |
The Workforce Trends Report from DHR Global surveyed 1,500 white-collar workers worldwide on engagement, burnout, AI and leadership change. The findings are more uncomfortable than the headline number suggests.
Not when you look at what is driving it.
DHR defined engagement as feeling enthusiastic about your work or emotionally invested in team and organisational goals. On that measure, 88% qualify.
But 67% said a tighter job market keeps them engaged, and 61% named job insecurity. Engagement sustained by a fear of leaving looks identical to engagement sustained by commitment, right up until the labour market loosens and it does not.
The practical implication is that engagement scores alone will not tell you which you have. The useful question is not how engaged people feel but why.
Development, more clearly than anything else in the data.
80% said career development opportunities boost their engagement, and 93% said they would be more engaged if their employer offered training relevant to their role. That is close to unanimous, and it is one of the few levers entirely within your control.
Relevance is the operative word. Generic training catalogues do not produce that response. Development connected to the job someone is doing and the one they want next does. More in retaining top talent.
82% experience it at least some of the time, and a third say it directly reduces their engagement.
The causes are not mysterious:
All three are workload problems. Wellbeing programmes and mental health apps sit on top of those causes rather than addressing them, which is why they tend to disappoint.
Younger employees report higher rates. People near retirement feel less pressure to prove anything; those early in their careers and those stepping into leadership for the first time feel considerably more.
Helping and worrying people at the same time.
70% say generative AI tools make them feel more engaged, and 72% report improved productivity. Set against that, over half worry AI threatens their job security. On enthusiasm, 52% are excited, 21% neutral, 17% sceptical and 10% unsure.
That split is not resolved by better tools. It is resolved by being explicit about what the technology is for in your organisation, and what it is not for. Ambiguity is what turns a productivity gain into a source of anxiety.
Half of respondents had a C-suite executive depart in the previous year, and 93% felt the effect.
55% questioned the company's mission afterwards, and 52% reported practical disruption such as delays and unclear ownership. With 74% saying they trust senior leaders, departures land harder than organisations tend to expect.
The more useful finding is that it cuts both ways: 63% said executive turnover actually increased their engagement, where new leadership brought a clear vision. The variable is not whether people leave. It is how quickly the replacement says what they intend to do, and then does it.
Narrowly, and worth being precise about.
Engagement, burnout and leadership are management problems. An Employer of Record does not address them.
What it does affect is the layer underneath: whether people abroad are paid correctly and on time, whether their benefits match local expectations, and whether they are employed to local standards. Get those wrong and no engagement strategy compensates. See employee engagement on distributed teams.
It also removes one common source of burnout on small HR teams: running multi-country compliance with people who were hired to do something else.
We employ people on your behalf across 214 countries and territories, handling contracts, payroll, benefits and compliance. Country requirements are in CountryPedia.
Talk to our team about managing teams across borders.
Yes. High engagement driven by job insecurity looks identical in a survey to engagement driven by commitment, and behaves completely differently once the labour market improves. Ask why people are engaged, not just how engaged they are.
82% report burnout at least some of the time in DHR Global's survey of 1,500 white-collar workers, with a third saying it directly reduces their engagement.
Working too many hours, cited by 58%, followed by heavy workloads at 35% and work-life balance at 34%. All three are workload issues, which is why wellbeing benefits alone rarely shift the numbers.
Both. 70% say generative AI tools increase their engagement and 72% report productivity gains, while over half worry about job security. Clear organisational guidance on what the tools are for matters more than the tools themselves.
93% of those who experienced a C-suite departure felt an impact. 55% questioned the company's mission and 52% reported operational disruption, though 63% said new leadership with a clear vision increased their engagement.
Role-relevant development. 93% said they would be more engaged with training connected to their actual job, which is a stronger consensus than anything else in the data and entirely within an employer's control.