Everyone's talking about the Gallup 2026 headline — global engagement at 20%. Almost no one is talking about the finding that matters more: manager engagement has fallen 9 points in three years, wiping out nearly half a decade of gains. Female managers dropped 7. Managers under 35 dropped 5. And for the first time in Gallup's tracking history, managers are now less engaged than the individual contributors they lead.

In this episode of Office Therapy, Dr. Brad Shuck breaks down why this is a structural signal, not a people problem — and why the billion-dollar cost of manager disengagement is the product of a measurement error most organizations can actually fix. The difference between satisfaction and engagement. Why training is the wrong response. And four small, no-budget shifts you can make this week to start changing the conditions on your own team — starting with your calendar.