Workers are getting antsy
I’ll Be Missing You
‘Where have all the workers gone?’, as Peter, Paul and Mary almost sang.
In the UK, we don’t have enough people to do all the jobs because we are caught in a perfect storm trends that is causing the available workforce to shrink for the first time in, well, I don’t know when.
Brexit has caused an outflow of people from the UK workforce, as well as making it a much less attractive destination for EU workers. COVID too caused many foreign workers to return home and they are not returning in anything like the same numbers. In addition, the UK government’s ‘hostile environment’ policy is designed to suppress immigration.
There’s been huge growth in numbers of people who are just too ill to work. This is due to the massive jump in NHS waiting lists for treatment and the emergence of long-COVID as a chronic and disabling condition.
Soaring childcare costs and falling provision have caused a number of working parents to leave the workforce. Why work when the costs of getting someone else to look after your kids takes all your earnings, or even leaves you out of pocket?
These can broadly be said to be UK-specific and have made our situation worse. However, there is a broader trend that is happening across the globe and its effects can be seen at either end of the age spectrum.
At the top end of the workforce we have seen a growth in early retirement. Amongst the 50-65 age bracket, many are mortgage-free, have reasonable retirement plans and some savings. COVID has made them realise they can live on less and still have a good life and they don’t need to subject themselves to the workplace. They can afford to opt-out. (Christine Armstrong covers this in her usual entertaining fashion in her vlog this week
At the other end, Gen Z are deciding they’d rather do their own thing than join the rat race. They’re not prepared to put up with what they see as unreasonable and unfounded demands of management. They feel the usual life goals of owning a property, having a decent pension and even, for some, starting a family are out of reach for them, so they have quite different priorities. (More in the Business Insider piece ‘Gen Z's not lazy — they're just refusing to put up with the toxic work culture that boomers created’)
What unites these two groups is that they’ve decided they are just not playing the game anymore. They see, clear-eyed, that the workplace is crap and they aren’t prepared to tolerate it; that what they get back is much less than they are expected to put in.
These two groups are not lost from the workforce forever. They would return if a) they were able to do so in a way that fitted in with their lifestyle and b) there was less toxicity and the workplace was a more welcoming and accommodating place.
These solutions to these are within the gift of organisations. However, for some, it will require a sea-change in attitudes and in their management culture. This is going to be another area where those that get it right will get a significant competitive advantage.
And those that refuse to change will continue their slow decline into oblivion.
Across The Universe
‘Work isn’t working’ is a somewhat glib phrase but it seems it is true for an increasing number of employees.
The latest Gallup survey in employee engagement has thrown up something that’s rather startling. No, it’s not that engagement remains at a pitiful level. Why should this year be any different?
What is striking is the disengagement is about the same across all age segments. There is negligible difference between the generations.
Makes you wonder who exactly are the winners here? And how long those in the middle, who arguably have less options, are willing to put up with it?
When Two Worlds Collide
My generation saw work as a separate part of our lives. It was very much the 9-5, this separation in time marked by a separation in space. You had go to the office to do your job. ‘Work-life separation’ was an idea, it was the reality.
Over the years (OK, decades), this has changed. Technology has blurred work boundaries, both in time and space. Managers have exploited this by increasing expectations of when you will be accessible and when you can get work done. COVID took the smudgy boundaries that we were left with and rubbed them out completely.
Work is now just another part of our life, and it either intrudes into every other area or is interwoven with every other area, depending on your perspective. I suspect for many it very much feels like intrusion and they would very much like it to be interwoven.
It is this shift that is causing the tensions that we see. This is not really about the future of work, it’s about the future of life (h/t to Chris Herd for that one).
Employees are no longer willing to accept the dominant position that work has taken in their lives. The cost, in terms of wellbeing and thriving, is simply too great and it’s not sustainable.
Where this is driving withdrawal at either end of the workforce, those ‘in the middle’ who don’t have that option are finding other ways to address this, other ways to push back. They are disengaging from work and reducing their effort to something that is more commensurate with the rewards.
The media has dubbed this ‘Quiet quitting’ but it’s just a rational adjustment to the transaction between employers and employees. They’ve realised the deal had become a very poor one for them and they are doing what they can to improve it.
Whilst they can reduce the time and resources they put into work, they can never get the equation entirely back into balance whilst the toxicity of the workplace persists (or even increases). That’s something the employers have to address if they want to have an engaged and productive workforce.
There will always be enough people for good jobs in supportive and nurturing environments. What there’s a shortage of is people willing to do poor quality, poorly rewarded jobs in bad work environments. That’s not a workforce problem, that’s a workplace problem. The only people who can address that is the employers.
Employees want flexibility and the autonomy to establish their own boundaries so that they can integrate work with the rest of their life. New ways of working enable this because they make work location and time independent. They also want a better workplace that enriches rather than detracts from their lives.
It’s the same problems as above and has the same solutions. It about creating a more human-centred approach to work, through new ways of working and a more compassionate and inclusive environment.
The question is not how, it’s who has the will make it happen.
Call Me
I put a post up on LinkedIn a couple of weeks ago asking people to get in touch if they could help me with my research into what people find most crap about work, and in return I’d see if I could give them some useful advice.
I’ve had some cracking conversations as a result. I just want to know what it is that drives people nuts - the boss, the pointless bureaucracy, the endless stream of arse-covering .cc emails you don’t need to see, the plethora of passwords you have to enter every day to do your job - anything.
If you’d like to tell me what you hate, or recount your tales of woe from corporate fantasy land, I’d love to hear from you. Drop me a line at colin@colinnewlyn.com to set up a call, or just pop your comments in the email itself. In return, you get your own slice of my wit and wisdom (or not , as you prefer!)
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