By Andrea Spade, Director of Organizational Effectiveness at Kelly

When we talk about employee retention, we're really talking about preserving the relationships, knowledge, and experience that power our business. Consistently measuring employee engagement plays a central role in maintaining that connection.

The cost of losing talent goes far beyond recruitment expenses. It includes the time spent finding and training replacements, lost institutional knowledge, and damaged client relationships. With U.S. employee engagement hitting a 10-year low at just 31% in 2024 according to Gallup, organizations can't afford to ignore the connection between engagement and retention.

Why employee retention matters

At Kelly, we view retention as a two-way commitment. We invest heavily in selecting, onboarding, and developing our people. But equally important is ensuring we're retaining people who feel genuinely connected to our purpose.

The time and effort spent attracting the right talent, getting them up to speed, and helping them build client relationships represents a significant investment. When employees stay and thrive, they build experience and relationships that directly affect our ability to not just sustain but grow our business.

True retention means keeping the right people engaged in meaningful work that benefits both them and the organization.

The connection between culture and retention

Recent research on workplace culture and employee retention from SHRM confirms what many of us have observed: workplace culture directly impacts retention. Among employees rating their culture as good or excellent, only 15% are actively seeking new jobs. Contrast that with organizations with poor cultures, where 57% of employees are either job hunting or planning to start looking soon.

The message is clear: Toxic cultures drive turnover, while positive ones foster loyalty.

What makes a culture toxic? According to SHRM, the top reasons employees leave poor workplace environments include poor management (54%), unfair treatment (54%), inadequate pay (54%), lack of empathetic leadership (47%), and insufficient regard for employee well-being (47%).

Measuring what matters

The first step in improving retention is measuring employee engagement effectively. At Kelly, we've evolved our approach from annual comprehensive surveys to more frequent, agile pulse checks.

Our quarterly pulses take five minutes or less to complete and allow us to:

• Explore timely topics relevant to employees
• Access data quickly and act on it promptly
• Maintain flexibility in what we measure
• Track trends over time

Our approach centers on a few consistent metrics combined with flexible content that adapts to current priorities:

Core measurements (every quarter):

• Likelihood to recommend Kelly as an employer
• Employee happiness at work
• Sense of belonging

Flexible content:

• Rotates through several categories (empowerment, clarity, growth, etc.)
• Adapts to timely needs (like gathering feedback on benefits during planning periods)
• Always includes open-ended questions for free-form feedback

With this approach, we maintain a robust 65% participation rate—considered strong for an organization of our size.

Curious how we design these pulse surveys to drive such strong participation and insight? Explore our survey design strategy.

Finding meaning in employee engagement data

Collecting employee engagement metrics represents only half the equation—what you do with them determines their impact. At Kelly, we examine:

• How metrics intersect to tell a larger story
• Where related data points might be influencing each other
• What the collective data reveals about our organization
• How we compare to our own past performance and industry benchmarks

No single metric tells the complete story. Instead, we look for patterns and connections between turnover rates, mobility data, and employee sentiment to gain comprehensive insights.

From engagement insights to impactful action

The antidote to “quiet quitting”—that buzzword describing employees who do the minimum required—is genuine engagement. When people feel invested, included, and that their voice matters, they willingly contribute to organizational success.

Our approach involves:

1. Clear measurement with meaningful benchmarks
2. Transparency in sharing results organization-wide
3. Empowering managers to discuss results with their teams
4. Local action planning through what we call "ACT conversations"
5. Closing the loop by communicating what we're doing based on feedback

Different teams may identify entirely different priorities based on their unique challenges and opportunities. What bubbles up as important to one department might not appear as a priority for the broader organization.

For example, our pulse results helped us identify an opportunity to better connect employees with growth pathways. While we had excellent programs in place, we needed to better communicate how they all worked together. This led to our "Pathways to Growth" initiative that helps employees understand how they fit into the organization, what growth opportunities exist, and how we support their development.

Building a foundation for success

As workplace needs evolve, so must our approaches to engagement and retention. With remote and hybrid work now standard at many organizations, we've found employees value flexibility while craving meaningful connection.

At Kelly, we've embraced remote-first work while actively addressing the connection gap. Our employees prefer remote work flexibility and simultaneously want support in building networks, finding opportunities, and maintaining relationships without daily in-person interaction.

This nuance emerged through our regular listening strategy. By moving beyond annual surveys to more frequent check-ins, we can spot these emerging needs and adapt quickly.

Your people are your best investment

The engagement metrics that truly matter help you understand your people and drive meaningful action. But success starts with measuring employee engagement in a way that drives specific improvements and visible change. For us, that means balancing consistent core measurements with the flexibility to explore timely topics.

When combined with a commitment to transparency and action, this approach creates a virtuous cycle: employees see their feedback matters, participation increases, insights improve, and engagement strengthens.

In today's competitive talent market, organizations that master this cycle gain a significant advantage in retaining their most valuable asset—their people.

If you're ready to move from collecting data to designing surveys that truly spark change, this deeper dive on engagement survey design offers clear steps to get started.