Organizations have spent years investing in office redesigns, workplace technology, and hybrid infrastructure. Yet a fundamental flaw sits beneath all of that spending. Nearly one in four executive leaders has no formal workplace productivity metrics in place or is not aware of any. For organizations serious about measuring workplace performance, that number is a red flag. And for those trying to prove workplace investment ROI, it is where the problem starts.
That finding comes from the State of the Workplace 2026 report published by Worktech Academy in association with SPS Global. Based on a 2026 survey of 679 office workers and executives across eight global markets, the report found that organizations are facing a widening workplace performance gap: a disconnect between what employees need to do their best work and what organizations continue to measure, invest in, and improve.
As Ruth Hynes, Global Project and Development Services Research Lead, at real estate experts JLL, says:
"We assume we've returned to a kind of normal because we're using the same high-level metrics to measure success, but if you dig into what is actually driving those averages, it's very different."
Organizations Need to Rethink What They're Tracking
The workplace productivity metrics most commonly used today were designed for a different era of work. According to the State of the Workplace report, organizations primarily measure output and task completion rates (43%), employee retention and turnover (40%), revenue per employee (32%), and utilization and occupancy data (26%).
These are solid metrics, but don't tell the full story. In fact, some employees do not believe they truly reflect what actually drives performance.
When asked to rate what better captures workplace investment ROI, employees ranked better talent attraction and recruitment success highest, followed by improved client and customer satisfaction scores. Behind that was higher employee engagement and cultural alignment, and increased speed of innovation and decision-making.
Marnix Mali, Director of Real Estate at Booking.com, gave his own assessment:
"You can measure utilization, but what you really want to understand is whether people leave with the same or more energy than when they arrived."
The gap between what leaders measure and what employees value is precisely where workplace investment ROI is lost. Measuring workplace performance through legacy indicators gives organizations a false sense of confidence and a blind spot for the friction that is quietly compounding beneath the surface.
Employees Know Exactly What They Need and Are Not Getting It
One of the more striking findings in the report is how consistent employees are about what enables productive work. Across regions, industries, and seniority levels, the ability to focus without distraction leads at 42%, followed by access to the right tools and technology (37%), access to colleagues and decision-makers (33%), and environments that support both collaboration and concentration (30%).
These are not abstract preferences. They are specific, operational conditions, and many workplaces are still failing to provide them. Twenty-eight percent of employees cite limited flexibility as their biggest frustration. Twenty-three percent flag time wasted finding the right people or resources. A further 23% report difficulty focusing due to noise and interruptions. Twenty percent highlight a lack of available meeting rooms.
That is not a people problem. It is a systems problem, and it will not be visible through workplace productivity metrics that track only output and attendance.
The Confidence Gap Between Leaders and Employees
This is where measuring workplace performance becomes politically uncomfortable. Only around half of employees believe their organization is investing in the right workplace solutions. One in five say they cannot see any return on investment from workplace initiatives affecting their space, tools, or technology.
Yet senior leaders report significantly higher confidence in those same investment decisions than the employees who use those environments daily. The people making decisions feel broadly confident. The people living with those decisions do not.
This hierarchy gap is a direct consequence of measuring workplace performance through top-line indicators that smooth over operational friction. Senior leaders see utilization numbers and task completion rates. Employees experience noise, broken workflows, and wasted time. Without workplace productivity metrics that capture both perspectives, the gap between them is structurally invisible to the people with the authority to close it.
The Retention Risk Hiding in the Data
The consequences of poor workplace investment ROI tracking are not limited to inefficiency. Fifty-three percent of employees say they would consider leaving their job due to an inefficient or frustrating workplace. That figure rises to 66% in the US. In financial services, banking, and insurance, 57% of employees report the same risk.
