Employee engagement is how committed and motivated employees feel toward their work and company, which affects their effort, performance, and likelihood to stay.
Engagement is more than satisfaction. An engaged employee cares about the outcome, puts in discretionary effort, and feels connected to the team and the mission. A disengaged one does the minimum and is often already looking elsewhere.
Because engagement is hard to see directly, teams measure it with surveys, eNPS, and regular check-ins, then act on what they find. It tends to rise or fall at key moments in the employee journey, which is why onboarding and manager quality matter so much.