There’s a huge change in employment numbers in recent months, and it has to do with employees leaving the workforce or switching jobs.  This has become so great that it’s been dubbed as "The Great Resignation". In this post, we’re going to dive into this emerging theme of The Great Resignation. This is based on the BBC article entitled “The Great Resignation: How employers drove workers to quit” by Kate Morgan. As I share some key learnings from the article, you'll learn why the Great Resignation is useful to us as Ergonomics Consultants, how we can serve our clients better to address common employee concerns, and how knowing this information helps with service opportunities.

What’s driving workers to quit their jobs?

The Great Resignation is an emerging idea from the pandemic where employees are leaving the workforce or switching jobs in droves. The pandemic has given workers various reasons to change direction, but the decision to leave was mostly based on how their employers treated them during the pandemic. Workers stayed at companies that provided support and chose to leave unsupportive employers and shift to jobs in which they feel like they have better resources and are more cared for. As the pandemic recedes, many workers are re-evaluating what work means to them and how they’re valued. This results in a considerable increase in resignations. 

Let’s take a look at the statistics:

• A Microsoft survey of more than 30,000 global workers showed that 41% of workers were considering quitting or changing professions this year.
• A study by HR software company Personio on the workers in the UK and Ireland showed that 38% of those surveyed planned to quit in the next six months to a year.
• A record of 4 million people quit their jobs in April alone in the US, according to a summary from the Department of Labor (the biggest spike on record).

What do you think is the implication of this change in direction to the employers? Well, the company would need to hire new people from scratch, and this takes time and money. If the company is constantly looking for new people, they’re going to spend more time training new hires than building their business and increasing their revenue. Here’s an important fact: it takes six to nine months to onboard new hires so that they can be fully effective in their roles. 

Although workers have always cared about their working environments, workers expected more from their companies during the pandemic. Employees who may already be teetering on the brink of leaving companies with existing poor company culture during the pre-pandemic saw themselves pushed to a breaking point. This is because many of these companies with poor environments doubled-down on decisions that didn’t support employees such as layoffs, as evidenced by a recent Stanford study. This drove out already dissatisfied workers who survived the layoffs but could clearly see that they’re working in unsupportive environments. 

Data over the years have always shown that the thing people care about the most is how companies treat their employees. This is measured by a number of metrics including what happens if they experience work-related pain and injury, feeling of safety, commitment to equity, and benefits. Many pointed out that workers quit due to burnout and lack of growth opportunities. The Personio study also showed that more than half of the respondents who were planning to quit wanted to do so because of a reduction in benefits, a worsening work-life balance, or a poor workplace culture. The main thing that employers must do is to acknowledge and help alleviate those concerns. Additionally, to have an effective employee culture, companies must have some sort of ergonomics program. 

Service Opportunities

As Ergonomic Professionals, we can help eliminate uncertainty among workers by addressing their concerns. You probably noticed that the term ‘ergonomics’ wasn't literally addressed in the metrics that employees were looking for in their jobs. This is because most companies aren't familiar with the ergonomics jargon, so it's rare that the benefits of ergonomics will be addressed by the literal term 'ergonomics'. However, ergonomics is an important part of safety and health and is often related to that feeling of safety, commitment to equity, and even benefits. As ergonomics consultants looking to get more reach and more revenue, it’s important to keep this in mind. Employers might not explicitly say that they want better ergonomics in their company, or they want to have an amazing Return-to-Work Program. Rather they might tell you that they want to give their employees a good company culture. 

The Great Resignation is bringing meaningful change to workplace culture and the way companies invest in their employees. It has become obligatory for companies to make serious investments in their employees' wages, opportunities, and overall well-being. A lot of employees across the board would take a pay cut to work for a company that’s in line with their values, and I think that’s a really interesting way to position your services. Companies that don’t invest in their employees will not be able to leverage them in a productive manner, and I believe that ergonomics plays a huge role in that. Your knowledge and experience as Ergonomics Consultants are going to be helpful. 

There's a huge need for employers to implement ergonomics in their organizations, but they might not even realize what you're offering is what they need. So it’s important that you fine-tune your messaging in a way that will connect with their needs and values. Some employers don't care if you've worked with hundreds of companies or if you have all these creative, low-cost solutions.  Make sure that you express the value of ergonomics in a way that’s in line with how that person perceives the culture and values in their organization. An effective messaging will convince them to want to learn more about what you’re offering and move forward with you.

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And that’s it! I think this topic is so cool and relevant. I'm going to be making this into an infographic so that I can share it with the members of the Accelerate. If you're interested in getting your hands on this infographic that you can white-label and share as part of your marketing campaigns, then join the Accelerate membership. The Accelerate gives you my signature process and time-saving resources to go from your city's best kept secret to an in-demand Ergonomic Consultant that you've always dreamed of. Just click here to sign up to the waitlist, and you can be first in line when I open the next enrollment in September.