Job Fulfillment in Numbers: How Satisfying Are Our Careers?
Photo by Austin Distel on Unsplash.
Can We Find Meaning and Purpose in Our Work Lives?
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In a previous post, we examined the question of why humans continue to work so hard, despite the enormous economic and technological progress experienced over time, in particular over the last century. We identified 6 possible answers to this question from James Suzman’s book ‘Work, A History of how We Spend Our Time’. Factors like achieving social status, keeping up with peers, rising inequality, and inherited mindsets may explain why we continue to work so hard.
None of these reasons seemed to reassure me that ploughing away at my job 8 hours a day for the foreseeable decades was the best of ideas. On the bright side, though, the author demonstrated in his book that our attachment to work is relatively recent and that for over 95% of human history we displayed very different attitudes towards work. It felt quite comforting to realize that, perhaps, it was not so unorthodox as I had thought to question today’s attachment to our jobs.
Many of us consciously or inadvertently seek meaning through the work that we do, but how successful are our jobs today in actually providing us with it? In this post, we explore insights from Gallup's global employee engagement report to understand job satisfaction worldwide, and try to respond to the following question: Are our jobs truly fulfilling? Let’s look at how well they deliver on job satisfaction and meaning. This report represents largest ongoing effort to track the employee experience in the world. It helps us to understand how employees today feel about their work and their lives.
Key Insights on Global Job Satisfaction and Employee Engagement
The global share of employees that report feeling “engaged” in their workplace is incredibly low (23%), despite slow improvements over the years. As observed in the Figure below, according to Gallup’s report only 23% of global employees felt engaged at work in 2022, broadly defined as employees that find their work meaningful and that feel connected to their team and organization. Surprisingly, despite being at a historical high, global employee engagement has only risen from 12% in 2009 to 23% in 2022 when polling began.
Reported employee engagement over time from Gallup’s 2023 report.
Global Employee Engagement: Regional Differences and Trends
There are differences found across regions, as illustrate in the map below. The best regional performers were South Asia (33%) and the US (31%), while the worst reported employee engagement was found in North Africa (15%) and Europe (13%).
Employers have made efforts to improve working conditions to boost employee satisfaction, since disengaged colleagues hamper their organizations’ productivity. The report estimates the opportunity cost to the global economy of low engagement at a staggering 8.8 trillion USD or about 9% of global GDP.
A critical question is whether these efforts will be enough to solve the deep-rooted issue of employee disengagement or whether a large cause of employee dissatisfaction today has to do with the nature of the jobs themselves, rather than the conditions that can be changed by the employer. The proliferation of “bullshit jobs”, defined as “employment that is so completely pointless, unnecessary, or pernicious that even the employee cannot justify its existence”, was briefly covered in a previous post and may one of the reasons explaining why 77% of global employees are dissatisfied with their job.
Reported employee engagement in 2022 across 160 countries from Gallup’s 2023 report.
Globally, 59% of employees report being disengaged at work, lacking passion and connection to their jobs. These workers are essentially filling a seat and watching the clock. These employees lack passion for their work and feel psychologically disconnected from their organizations. According to the report, these workers don’t take ownership of their work and are more likely to feel stressed and to experience burn out than engaged colleagues.
Finally, the remainder share of the global workforce (18%) were reported as “actively dissengaged”. This group represents employees that take actions that directly harm the organization. Broken trust between employees and organizations often leads to disengagement and a cycle of workplace crises.
Rising Workplace Stress and Its Impact on Employee Well-Being
Employee stress has steadily risen to an all-time high of 44%, highlighting the mental health crisis in the workplace. When asked about their experience “yesterday at work”, nearly half of global workers reported experiencing a lot of stress. Unfortunately, this rising trend in employee stress has been ongoing since Gallup began tracking it over a decade ago (See Figure below). The report does not differentiate though whether this stress originates from the workplace or from external factors in everyday life. The report hints that external factors like inflation may be behind the all time high in 2022. However, even if this were true, this factor alone can hardly explain the steady increase in stress experienced over the last decade.
Stress is at an all time high. Reported employee stress over time from Gallup’s 2023 report.
So, how good are our jobs really at providing us with fulfilment? The data suggests that they are not very good at providing this function. Today, the vast majority of the world goes to work because they have bills to pay–for most, commuting to work each day does not contribute to find fulfilment. Employees feel increasingly stressed and, despite some progress, continue to feel disengaged at the workplace. For most employees, their job is unlikely to be a source of positive energy, recognition, or self worth.
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