Research On Work Attitudes

In the light of the global pandemic and all that it brought with it, at Esprimi we have run a study which has helped to provide valuable insights on the extent to which people have changed the way they work, the way they want to work and what are the primary aspects that attract them to a new employer and what makes them stay.

The results of this study are expected to provide an overview of the local sentiment within the labour market with the aim to empower business leaders with information that will help them to realign themselves in order to remain relevant based on the new reality that businesses are faced with today.

Demographics

This study delves into how the pandemic has influenced working professionals and measures the change in perception and attitudes toward their job. To get a clear picture of the effects of the pandemic, 277 responses were collected from individuals with varied demographic backgrounds, such as age, gender, region, education and occupation. Here’s what the data shows.

The Impact

From the data, it can be seen that the majority of respondents have become accustomed to the new way of working with over 60% of respondents actively looking to keep working under these conditions in the future. Interestingly, there was a slight difference of opinion between the males and the females, with 53.7% of females preferring to work remotely as opposed to the 48.7% of males. Age also seems to be a deciding factor as the 25-34-year-olds vastly preferred working from home compared to the rest of the age groups analysed.

Productivity was also analysed with 47.3% of participants believing they are more productive when working from home rather than in the office, with 24.2% of respondents disagreeing and 28.5% being unsure.

52.9% of the participants have stated that they want more work-life balance and believe they have been working too hard before.

IMPACT OF THE PANDEMIC ON THE PERCEPTION OF WORK

New Priorities

The respondents were asked to mention their top 3 priorities for staying with an employer. Several variables were mentioned such as job security and flexible working arrangements; however, it seemed that money was on the participants’ minds as over 50% of the responses collected mentioned salary and salary increases as their reason for staying with an employer. Remote working followed close behind, with 124 respondents citing it as the main priority of staying with an employer.

Of people cite salary as one of the main priorities of staying with an employer.

Of people cite salary as one of the main priorities of considering with an employer.

Similarly, respondents were asked to mention their top 3 priorities when considering an employer. While several variables such as job security and flexible working arrangements were again considered, salary remained at the top of the list for respondents. Interestingly enough, the actual job description is not even in the top 3 priorities, coming in as the 4th most important factor to consider.

A Socio-Politically Conscious Workforce

A large amount of the respondents seem to be concerned about whether their employer is taking a stand against societal issues, such as climate change, poverty, the gender pay gap and employee training concerning the needs of the future workforce. For example, over 40% of respondents think that their employers are not doing enough to combat climate change. On the other hand, over 60% of respondents believe that their employer is taking proper measures to tackle the gender pay gap.

EVALUATION OF THE EFFORTS OF CURRENT EMPLOYER ON SOCIETAL ISSUES

Work Ethic

Societal issues are increasingly being brought to the forefront of social consciousness and are being discussed and acted upon by more and more people and organisations. This survey aims to answer if these issues are affecting the modern workforce and if employers should keep these issues in mind going forward.

The participants were asked to measure their responses to ethical issues regarding their job and their employer’s response to these issues.

The results were mixed, which seems to indicate a certain level of cognitive dissonance with the respondents due to the complexity of the question. For example, respondents do not want to work at a job that does not represent their stand on particular issues. However, it seems that participants were not likely to leave a job that had a differing opinion on a particular societal issue to them.

WORK ETHIC

Conclusion

It is no secret that the pandemic has uprooted every aspect of our way of life and has led people to reflect and change their work-life habits. It has introduced new concepts, such as remote working/working from home to a lot of people and disrupted every convention of an office job. After 2 years of this new normal, people have become accustomed to these concepts and demand more from their employers, in terms of what the employer is offering for the job and how the employer reacts to certain societal issues.

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