{"id":67774,"date":"2026-07-22T10:48:27","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T14:48:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/?p=67774"},"modified":"2026-07-22T10:48:27","modified_gmt":"2026-07-22T14:48:27","slug":"employee-experience-q2-2026-ex-index","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/employee-experience-q2-2026-ex-index\/","title":{"rendered":"The Employee Experience is Splitting in Two"},"content":{"rendered":"

If you asked your employees today whether they’re satisfied with their job, most would probably say yes. But ask what it would actually take for them to walk, and you might not love the answer. That gap between what people report and what’s really going on underneath shows up again and again in this quarter’s data. The findings below are drawn from The Sogolytics Experience Index, Employee Edition, 2Q 2026, our quarterly read on what employees are really telling their employers.<\/p>\n

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Report<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
The teams pulling ahead check every quarter, not once a year. The Q2 2026 EX Index shows where the gaps are.<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
The Gaps Are Already in Your Data. The Question is Whether You’ll Look.<\/div>\n
Download the report<\/i><\/a><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
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Retention Numbers Look Great.\u00a0They’re\u00a0not Telling\u00a0the\u00a0Whole Story.<\/h2>\n
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Start with the headline number and there’s plenty to feel good about. 63% of employees say they’re very likely to stay with their employer over the next year, the highest we’ve seen in three cycles. That’s the kind of stat that makes a retention slide look good in a board meeting. But dig one question deeper, ask those same employees what would change their mind, and nearly half say better pay elsewhere would do it. Intent to stay and immunity to poaching aren’t the same thing. Your retention numbers might be holding steady simply because nothing better has come along yet, not because the relationship is secured.<\/p>\n

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\"Retention<\/p>\n

AI Opinions Are Hardening\u00a0and not Settling<\/h2>\n
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Here’s\u00a0one that might surprise you: employees\u00a0aren’t\u00a0warming up to\u00a0AI,\u00a0they’re\u00a0picking sides. A year ago, 15% called it a waste of\u00a0time,\u00a0and 14% called it extremely useful.\u00a0Both of those numbers have grown since then, to 20% and 18%.\u00a0Meanwhile, the reasonable middle, the people who called it “somewhat useful” or just shrugged and said “neutral,” shrank by\u00a0nearly 9\u00a0points. Almost one in four employees now say AI\u00a0shouldn’t\u00a0be\u00a0used at work\u00a0at all.\u00a0That’s\u00a0not a rounding\u00a0error;\u00a0it’s\u00a0a real, growing group that most AI rollout plans never account for.<\/p>\n

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The Office\u00a0is Back,\u00a0at Least\u00a0for Now<\/h2>\n
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Think your employees are dying to work from home? You might want to check that assumption. When we asked what kind of work arrangement people\u00a0actually want, fully in-office won, by more than double any other single\u00a0option. 57% said 4 or 5 days in the office is their ideal.\u00a0That runs against a lot of what’s been baked into hybrid work policy over the last few years, and it’s worth asking whether your flexibility program is still solving the problem your employees actually have.<\/p>\n

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Anonymity Matters More\u00a0than Employers\u00a0are Delivering\u00a0on\u00a0it<\/h2>\n
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Here’s\u00a0a stat worth sitting\u00a0with:\u00a059% of employees say knowing a survey is anonymous makes them more likely to answer honestly.\u00a0Only 21% are very confident that anonymity is actually honored when you promise it.\u00a0That gap, between what motivates honesty and what employees\u00a0really\u00a0believe, sits right at the center of every feedback program that\u00a0isn’t\u00a0getting the response rates it should.<\/p>\n

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What\u00a0this Adds Up To<\/h2>\n
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Pull back far enough, and none of this is really about AI, the office, or your surveys specifically.\u00a0It’s\u00a0the same shift showing up in three\u00a0different places: your employees\u00a0aren’t\u00a0taking good intentions on faith anymore. A promise\u00a0has to\u00a0actually hold\u00a0up when\u00a0it’s\u00a0tested. Telling\u00a0people\u00a0feedback is anonymous\u00a0doesn’t\u00a0help much if they\u00a0don’t\u00a0believe you. Calling a policy flexible\u00a0doesn’t\u00a0matter if most of your team never wanted that flexibility in the first place.\u00a0And a strong retention number won’t tell you much once you ask what it would actually take to lose that person.<\/p>\n

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The organizations that pull ahead this year\u00a0won’t\u00a0be the ones with the best policies on paper.\u00a0They’ll\u00a0be the ones willing to check those policies against what employees are\u00a0really\u00a0saying, every quarter, not just once a year. The\u00a0data’s\u00a0already telling you where the gaps are. The only question left is whether\u00a0you’re\u00a0willing to\u00a0look.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you asked your employees today whether they’re satisfied with their job, most would probably say yes. But ask what it would actually take for them to walk, and you might not love the answer. That gap between what people report and what’s really going on underneath shows up again and again in this quarter’s data. The findings below are drawn from The Sogolytics Experience Index, Employee Edition, 2Q 2026, our quarterly read on what employees are really telling their employers. Report The teams pulling ahead check every quarter, not once a year. The Q2 2026 EX Index shows where the gaps are. The Gaps Are Already in Your Data. The Question is Whether You’ll Look. Download the report Retention Numbers Look Great.\u00a0They’re\u00a0not Telling\u00a0the\u00a0Whole Story. Start with the headline number and there’s plenty to feel good about. 63% of employees say they’re very likely to stay with their employer over the next year, the highest we’ve seen in three cycles. That’s the kind of stat that makes a retention slide look good in a board meeting. But dig one question deeper, ask those same employees what would change their mind, and nearly half say better pay elsewhere would do it. Intent to stay and immunity to poaching aren’t the same thing. Your retention numbers might be holding steady simply because nothing better has come along yet, not because the relationship is secured. AI Opinions Are Hardening\u00a0and not Settling Here’s\u00a0one that might surprise you: employees\u00a0aren’t\u00a0warming up to\u00a0AI,\u00a0they’re\u00a0picking sides. A year ago, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":88,"featured_media":67775,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[156],"tags":[386,241,168,810],"yoast_head":"\nEmployee Experience Q2 2026: What Retention Numbers Hide | Sogolytics<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The Q2 2026 EX Index reveals the gap between what employees report and what they really think, on retention, AI, remote work, and survey trust.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/employee-experience-q2-2026-ex-index\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Employee Experience Q2 2026: What Retention Numbers Hide | Sogolytics\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Q2 2026 EX Index reveals the gap between what employees report and what they really think, on retention, AI, remote work, and survey trust.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/employee-experience-q2-2026-ex-index\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Sogolytics Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-07-22T14:48:27+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/GettyImages-2206427664-scaled.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"2560\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1707\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Sarah Faiz\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@sogosurvey\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@sogosurvey\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/employee-experience-q2-2026-ex-index\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/employee-experience-q2-2026-ex-index\/\",\"name\":\"Employee Experience Q2 2026: What Retention Numbers Hide | Sogolytics\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2026-07-22T14:48:27+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-07-22T14:48:27+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/6b0e5f11c8e66d4f395eac78428e863f\"},\"description\":\"The Q2 2026 EX Index reveals the gap between what employees report and what they really think, on retention, AI, remote work, and survey trust.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/employee-experience-q2-2026-ex-index\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/employee-experience-q2-2026-ex-index\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/employee-experience-q2-2026-ex-index\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"The Employee Experience is Splitting in Two\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"Sogolytics Blog\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.sogolytics.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/6b0e5f11c8e66d4f395eac78428e863f\",\"name\":\"Sarah Faiz\",\"description\":\"Sarah is all about pursuing both data and dreams. 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