The UK is the eighth happiest workplace in the world, moving up from tenth in 2018 findings, with more than half of workers stating they are happy at work.
This is according to the Workplace Happiness survey set up by Engaging Works which was founded by Lord Mark Price, former government Minister of Trade and managing director of Waitrose. The survey found that 58 per cent of the UK workforce is happy at work with 42 per cent being unhappy. Engaging Works is a company that allows you to track your workplace happiness, assists you with CV writing and matches you with available jobs.
Whilst speaking to HRreview regarding the 42 per cent, Lord Mark Price said:
In order to improve happiness, you need to be able to switch off once you leave the office or finish work. We need to cut down on this ‘always on’ and ‘burnout’ feeling. What people seem to be calling out for is a clear division of their working lives and their personal and social ones.
Millennials have a large desire to separate the two spheres whilst Gen Z seem to want career development.
The list for this year’s countries with the happiest workplaces are:
- Romania
- Belgium
- Italy
- Austria
- The Netherlands
- Germany
- France
- UK
- Jersey
- Ireland
When zooming in on UK findings, it appears the West Midlands is the happiest region for workers at 81 per cent, followed by Yorkshire and the Humber region at 79 per cent and the South East at 78 per cent. London has a happiness rating of 76 per cent, Scotland at 72.5 per cent and Northern Ireland with 76 per cent.
Data showed that 56 per cent of Londoners would like better pay to feel happier at work as well as 23 per cent saying they would feel happier if they felt more empowered. Just under a quarter (23 per cent) of workers in the North East said they would feel happier at work if they felt respected.
A third of workers in Wales would like a four-day week with the same amount of employees in Northern Ireland wanting more holiday to be happy.
Despite the gender pay gap, male and female colleague’s happiness level at work is incredibly similar, as both genders scored 6.42 and 6.41 respectively.
Quite ironically, those who work in healthcare scored poorly in their wellbeing at work with 4.55 out of ten while those in the legal services came first at 7.41.
Despite Brexit dominating the headlines for the past three years, it seems employees’ happiness has not been impacted by this.
Lord Mark Price said:
We have seen pay increases and inflation stay reasonably low, this tends to overshadow Brexit. The UK has not seen what a no-deal Brexit can do to the country yet. I do not think people are carrying the Brexit burden to work.
In order to collate this data, Engaging Works have asked the opinions of over 10,000 employees worldwide since its launch on October 2017. Regional data for the UK was taken from the responses of 2,000 working adults.
Interested in wellbeing in the workplace We recommend the Workplace Wellbeing and Stress Forum 2019.
Darius is the editor of HRreview. He has previously worked as a finance reporter for the Daily Express. He studied his journalism masters at Press Association Training and graduated from the University of York with a degree in History.
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