Nearly half the workforce fearful at work

A recent survey of 4,400 UK companies by HR specialists, The Curve Group, has established that 45% of employees are less likely to put their head above the parapet at work for fear of losing their jobs. The Employee Engagement Survey also found that one in every four organisations are not looking at ways to keep their top talent and engaging their staff.

According to the research, employees that are fearing loss of their job have become more risk averse, think only in the short term, do what they need to do and stop being as proactive or innovative.

Lyndsey Simpson, Co-owner of The Curve Group comments on the findings; “This move to survival mode is a known shift coming out of a recession but it does have major repercussions for organisations including lower levels of performance, especially from survivors of a redundancy process and managers using a short-term, reactive management style.”

Employers are looking at this worrying trend though with 42% citing employee engagement as its number one people challenge and 75% of companies have conducted a recent survey and know the opinions of their staff. Practices taken on by employers who are looking at employee engagement have included:

• Re-invigorating talent management programmes
• Running climate surveys to ‘temperature check’ employees’ current feelings and views
• Providing coaching and training support to line managers on how to adapt their management style to a more longer-term leadership approach
• Changing performance management systems to include behavioural objectives and a two-way feedback approach
• Creating schemes for making employees feel valued
• Improving internal communications and providing clarity around employees’ and line manager roles and how they contribute to the organisations success

The remaining 25% of companies surveyed said that they would be looking into employee engagement in the next 6-12 months.