As employers mark National Work Life Week, new figures highlight the scale of the challenge facing organisations trying to create healthier, more sustainable working lives.
More than two million UK workers – around 7% of the workforce – reportedly say they hate their current job, while almost a third (31%) describe themselves as unhappy at work. Meanwhile, 17% say their job causes them almost constant stress and unhappiness.
The scale of the wellbeing challenge
The figures come amid wider concerns about the relationship between work and health. Around 7.2 million people – 22% of the UK workforce – are reported to have poor mental health, while 35% of workers say their work-related stress has increased over the past year.
With National Work Life Week taking place from 5–9 October, HR experts argue that employers need to look beyond standalone wellbeing initiatives and consider whether the way work itself is designed and managed is sustainable.
Ben Gateley, CEO and founder of CharlieHR, says organisations risk missing the underlying causes of poor wellbeing when responsibility is placed primarily on individual employees.
“The biggest mistake businesses can make is putting the responsibility entirely on the employee. If someone is burnt out because they’re constantly overloaded, working late and unable to switch off, giving them access to an app for meditation isn’t going to solve the underlying problem,” he says.
When work becomes difficult to switch off from
The challenge is particularly pertinent as the boundaries between work and home continue to blur. More than two-thirds (68%) of workers reportedly do some work on Sundays, while work-related stress, depression and anxiety account for millions of lost working days.
Gateley argues that employers should instead focus on making work sustainable – including setting realistic expectations around working hours, giving employees clarity over priorities, equipping managers to have meaningful conversations and responding when workloads become unmanageable.
“Stop expecting people to answer emails at 10pm. Don’t reward people for working ridiculous hours. Give people clarity about what actually matters,” he says.
Making work sustainable
National Work Life Week offers employers an opportunity to consider not only what wellbeing support they provide, but the everyday working practices that shape employees’ health and experience of work.
For Gateley, this means moving the conversation away from interventions designed to help employees cope with unsustainable working practices and towards addressing those practices themselves.
“We need to stop thinking that wellbeing is about making people happier at work, and instead focus on something much more basic: making work sustainable.”
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