How Do You Know You Have a Belonging Problem?

Research continues to affirm what many of us intuitively know: A strong sense of belonging is a powerful force for organizational success. Companies that foster belonging experience significantly higher levels of employee engagement, retention, and performance.

Despite growing awareness, many organizations still struggle to identify and address the systemic barriers that undermine belonging. Surveys and culture assessments can provide useful data—but often fall short of uncovering the underlying factors that diminish trust, inclusion, and psychological safety. And when issues are surfaced, few interventions are truly built to create sustainable culture change.

The short answer? You know you have a belonging problem if you have a talent and succession-management problem. However, let’s get underneath what that means.

Understand why belonging fails to gain traction

Organizations often take steps to understand their culture and employee experience—running engagement surveys, holding focus groups, or reviewing a breadth of data they collect through their systems. But these efforts may not always highlight the most critical issues or produce actionable solutions. Without the right guidance and tools, these good intentions risk becoming surface-level gestures.

For leaders navigating the evolving talent landscape, it’s essential to recognize that belonging needs be embedded in the lived experience of employees—supported by insight, guided by leadership, reinforced by systems, and tied to business strategy.

Learn the signs you might have a belonging problem

Many belonging challenges show up subtly at first. Leaders may notice certain teams struggling with collaboration, a slowdown in innovation, or increasing employee burnout. Others may experience stalled leadership pipelines, high degrees of perfectionism, or a pervasive sense of disengagement across the organization.

Common warning signs include:

• Employees operating in silos and prioritizing individual goals over team or enterprise success.
• Disengaged or uninspired talent.
• Burnout, overwhelm, or a sense of disconnection.
• Leadership-pipeline stagnation and gaps.
• Complacency or perfectionism driving fear of failure.
• Lack of innovation or risk-taking.
• Inability to solve difficult challenges, debate problems, or have productive conflict.

These are not isolated issues—they’re often symptoms of a deeper belonging deficit. When employees feel excluded from meaningful and impactful feedback or disconnected from decision-making, or they perceive talent decisions are based on bias or subjectivity, they begin to withdraw. Over time, this erodes morale, hampers performance, and diminishes the culture.

Adopt insight-driven solutions for sustainable change

At RHR, we help leaders diagnose the root causes of belonging challenges and implement solutions that truly move the needle. Our approach starts with data—because knowing you have a belonging problem isn’t enough. You have to understand where and why it’s occurring. It’s not enough to have a lot of data about your people; you have to be able to generate insight and impactful solutions from that data.

Our research-backed frameworks and tools provide objective insight into your organization’s cultural landscape. Whether it’s through our Culture of Belonging Survey, leadership impact assessments, or talent audits, we help you identify the issues that matter most—and design targeted interventions that lead to measurable, sustainable impact.

For example, a large financial-services firm used our Culture of Belonging Survey to articulate a compelling cultural vision and launch tailored development programs. A Fortune 5 company leveraged our belonging assessment to uncover critical leadership capabilities needed to diversify and strengthen its succession pipeline. These organizations didn’t just talk about belonging—they operationalized it.

Make belonging real

Belonging underpins performance, innovation, well-being, and trust. And yet it’s often misunderstood or under resourced. Leaders can’t afford to treat belonging as someone else’s issue or a one-off initiative. It’s a strategic lever that must be woven into the fabric of your culture.

Through our diagnostics and advisory partnerships, RHR supports organizations in:

• Assessing talent management and performance programs, processes, and systems.
• Building collaboration and interpersonal capabilities in the top layers of the organization.
• Diagnosing issues related to psychological safety, trust, and workplace toxicity.
• Developing facilitation capabilities in leadership.
• Evaluating leaders on their impact and behaviors.
• Aligning executives on success metrics, culture goals, and owners of the culture.
• Pinpointing and addressing culture and talent roadblocks.
• Distilling the two or three critical leadership behaviors needed to shift culture.

In our work with clients, our goal is not just to address symptoms but also to strengthen the cultural foundation of the organization overall so it supports both high performance and human connection.

If your organization is experiencing any warning signs of a lack of belonging—or if you’re simply ready to make belonging a real competitive advantage—we’re here to help. Reach out to RHR to begin a conversation about building a culture where everyone feels seen, valued, and empowered to contribute.

–Myongii Shephard