Turn up, tune in or drop out - are your people actually engaged?
Hybrid working is now the norm for most recruitment businesses.
However, offices are much less buzzy than they used to be. This is not just because fewer people are present, but also because less business is conducted by phone.
Who would answer an unknown number these days?!
That shift makes genuine team engagement harder to maintain than ever. And beyond some kind of annual survey, how do you really know if your people are engaged - or just clocking in?
The engagement masquerade
It’s easy to mistake activity for engagement. Calls made, meetings booked, tasks logged - these are all tracked as proof of commitment.
This surface-level assessment misses the crucial difference between compliance and enthusiasm. Engaged consultants go beyond the checklist: they solve problems proactively, look for ways to exceed expectations, improve processes and take ownership of outcomes.
Disengaged consultants, by contrast, do only what's required. They comply without curiosity, complete tasks without considering broader business objectives, and avoid stretching themselves.
They turn up, but they don't truly show up.
The disengagement disguise
While we know presence isn’t the same as participation, engagement problems in the workplace of 2025 are much harder to spot. They can easily hide behind more plausible excuses.
The declining quality of candidates can be blamed on market conditions rather than waning consultant effort. Increasing client dissatisfaction can be dismissed as unreasonable expectations rather than an indicator of consultant disengagement.
The clearest indicator is often loss of initiative. Engaged consultants suggest process improvements, chase new business opportunities, and push for better outcomes. When these behaviours fade, engagement has probably already slipped, even if physical presence remains.
Client feedback is another tell. Engaged consultants build stronger relationships and receive more positive feedback. When client satisfaction scores slide, or feedback becomes bland, it often reflects consultant engagement levels rather than market conditions.
As we’ve shared before, the businesses that listen to their people and customers, and act on that input, build real cultural resilience and evolve in ways their clients actually value.
The price of presenteeism
When consultants turn up without truly engaging, the impact extends far beyond obvious productivity measures:
Client retention suffers as relationships become transactional, not strategic.
Consultant turnover increases as disengaged team members either leave or settle into low-effort habits that weaken team culture. The cost of replacing consultants who seemed fine but weren't truly committed can be enormous.
Perhaps most dangerously, disengagement spreads through teams like a virus. High performers often dial down their effort when they see mediocrity being tolerated.
By the time leadership notices, damage to morale, retention, and productivity is often severe - and expensive to reverse.
From compliance to commitment
Fixing engagement starts with understanding what actually motivates consultants. And no, it’s not just pay. Engagement is driven by purpose, autonomy, mastery, and recognition.
The best recruitment businesses provide opportunities for consultants to develop expertise, take ownership of outcomes, and see the direct impact of their work on client success.
Most importantly, they align individual consultant goals with business objectives in ways that create genuine win-win scenarios. Consultants can see how their personal success contributes to broader business outcomes and how business success creates opportunities for their own growth and development.
Keep them coming back for more
The most successful recruitment businesses treat engagement as a strategic capability, not a cultural perk. They measure engagement through business outcomes, not just satisfaction surveys. They invest in engagement initiatives with measurable returns.
We’ve seen great results by just incentivising leaders to take responsibility for engagement in day-to-day conversations, and by shifting management metrics to include contributions that go beyond just revenue to the values and behaviours that owners want to see.
Engagement isn’t a one-off fix. It’s an ongoing cycle of alignment, communication, and mutual investment between the business and its people. Businesses that master it build resilient cultures that can weather market shocks while still keeping consultants committed and clients satisfied.
And the big payoff? Teams who don’t just show up, but instead choose to give their very best.
