For many businesses, boosting engagement has become a major priority. According to recent studies, engagement levels in this country are incredibly low. These tremendous numbers of ambivalent employees negatively affect organizations in terms of lost productivity, lagging innovation, and decreased competitiveness. Getting a workforce to transition from mediocre to engaged takes a lot of hard work, but motivated employees make a big difference in an organization’s bottom line. “The big value for an employer is that when employees are engaged, there’s a ripple effect of benefits that include productivity, employee satisfaction, creative thinking and good communication,” says Scott Dobroski, community expert at Glassdoor. One of the best ways to improve levels of engagement is simply to lead by example, according to Marie Chan, senior director of employee engagement at Siegel+Gale. “If you’re a leader and manager in an organization, the first step would really be to ‘walk the talk,’” she says. “People really learn by example.” Employees want to see commitment from leadership, and leadership’s actions will set the organizational tone.