Hybrid and remote employees in organizations adopting AI experienced the sharpest declines.
U.S. employee engagement fell to 29% in the third quarter of 2026, its lowest level since 2011 and down two percentage points from the previous quarter. The share of actively disengaged employees rose from 17% to 18%, while 53% were not engaged.
The latest decline was sharpest among remote and hybrid employees, particularly those in organizations that have adopted artificial intelligence. Employees also reported less clarity about what is expected of them at work and were less likely to feel that someone at work cares about them as a person. These findings raise questions about whether communication and manager support are keeping pace with AI integration.
I work at a multinational mega Corp, but not one you’ve probably heard of. I am very disengaged.
For one thing, I’m technically a “contractor”. I have to go to all the meetings, but I don’t technically work for them. They give me the legal minimum of paid time off, but only after I looked up what my rights are and fought them for it. They don’t pay for holidays. They say “have a nice Thanksgiving” and then dock me two days pay.
The pay is insulting. I’m making less than I made ten years ago.
There’s no technical leadership. These people are supposed to be doing python. They don’t know what unit tests are. They barely know how imports work. Trying to change everything is a months long battle and emotion massaging exercise. The people in charge don’t understand or care.
They do love AI though. Lots of AI generated code. They don’t understand it but it looks so slick. Vomit.
So fuck them. I used to go out of my way to fix problems and promote good practices. Not anymore. I hope the upper management and owners suffer.
They’re probably not even renewing contractors past the end of the year anyway.
These people are supposed to be doing python. They don’t know what unit tests are. They barely know how imports work.
Clearly you need to “pivot” to using the latest shiny things, and all will be fixed. Let’s say, an “agentic” “AI architecture” with all new code written in, umm, Rust, yeah that’s it. Problem solved. You’re welcome.
The latest decline was sharpest among remote and hybrid employees
They really will do anything they can to try and force RTO.
So great, make people waste fuel and energy to go to a different place where more energy is wasted in a time when AI datacenters are wasting even more energy. In a time when conservation should be key given how far into climate change we’ve already drifted.
Yeah, when you have executives boasting about increased production and record profits while employees don’t get any raises/promotions, and then the company has massive layoffs leaving the remaining employees with more work and still no raises, that’s kinda what you get.
So telling everyone they had to return to the office after COVID actually did jack shit then?
Right, got it.
This survey shows the biggest drop in engagement among remote workers. This is going to be just another justification for more RTO.
I know I’m old and everything (42 yrs in the work force), but I never once felt that my employer cared about me. I went into work knowing that I was there to make money for the firm, and that’s it. I spend as much time as it takes getting the job done so I can get my paycheck, and that’s it. If I win the lottery, I’m outta there. I don’t know why people ever think that their boss cares about them…?
I think people are looking for respect and reciprocity, not caring, so to speak.
There’s not caring about you and then there’s not caring about you working. I don’t expect my boss to ‘care’ about me but I expect them to care about me being a good cog in their machine.
Employee disengagement is largely driven by inconsistent directive because, if the robot can create enough slop and my boss doesn’t seem to notice, why bother doing more?
42 year old engineer here … my entire career was disengaged
Alienation from one’s work and eventually from society, is an inevitable outcome of capitalism.
Hybrid sucks so much. Its like the worst of both worlds.
I wouldn’t bother being engaged at work with that shit either.
Remote on the other hand, I am much more likely to be engaged, because if I am forced to be in an office, I am going to be interrupted and made to sit in nonsense meetings most of the time.
As for AI, its a terrific time waster, of course you are even removed father from work.
Sounds about right. Rewards seem to have no relation to contributions in my workplace, and I’m guessing I’m not alone. Might as well try to give them as little as possible of yourself. You’ve seen so many people work hard and end up looking like fools for it.
I was one of several people hired to a team that dangled a single promotion in front of us. I had enough self awareness to know I wasn’t in the race but man this one guy did so much brown nosing it was actually embarrassing and ultimately he lost out on it. He totally crashed and disengaged. Painful to watch. You’re right about the rewards: one person got rewarded and the rest of us are taking inflation paycuts every year because there are no raises or bonuses.
We have jobs to survive.
It doesn’t necessarily mean we like them.
So people are beginning to break free of the chains?
My chains were cut by the boss, asshole fired me the other day.
This isn’t what I had in mind.
They need to pay more and hire more for the work and give more profits to the workers. Since they won’t, have to buy your freedom, learn to spend less, earn more, DIY when possible, eat healthy, etc. is all possible, step by step, with agency and autonomy, knowledge is power! Financial independence is possible check Mr. Money Mustache and livingafi blog, among others, you can do better with some help!
It’s kinda crazy to me that it’s this high.
