Employee morale has dipped fairly low. While I can only speak to limited teams, managers seem either inexperienced or don't genuinely care about their employees' career development and happiness. Some managers are tunnel-visioned into delivering on company goals so they can look good to execs up top, while caring very little about whether the people down below are engaged. There's a huge disconnect between how executives vs. executers view management.
A previous culture engagement survey showed that a very low % of employees on certain teams felt there were avenues to develop themselves and gain new skills, and there hasn't been focused effort to improve this. Culture here involves managers insinuating to their employees that any lack of morale or motivation is a direct fault of the employees themselves. To that point, I say sure, employees can try to be positive, take initiatives to seek out challenges, etc. But if employee roles are defined and positioned to maintain monotonous and never-ending duties, then their opportunities for advancement will be extremely limited despite any attempts to seek out non-core work. This negatively affects morale and makes you wonder about the purpose of your job.
Worse, some managers believe that interesting projects/skills development should be sought out on your own extra time and cannot interfere with your usual day-to-day. If that's the case, then managers and recruiters need to stop overselling these roles as career advancement opportunities or do a better job of hiring for the right levels.
