Rethinking what we need from work: Inside Employees' Minds 2022-2023
A guide to employees’ most pressing needs and how your organization can meet them, based on Mercer’s 2022 Inside Employees’ Minds™ study.
As Canadians emerge from the pandemic, the employment landscape continues to pose many challenges. Organizations struggle to decipher these challenges and gain a competitive advantage through attracting and retaining talent. Among the shifting economic outlook and labour market pressures, many Canadian employees are more focused on securing their health and well-being – financial, physical and emotional – than by achievement and climbing the career ladder.
What is keeping employees up at night? Not surprisingly, the top concern for Canadian employees is covering monthly expenses. This is followed by a concern with striking a balance between life and workload, as well as maintaining physical health and fitness.
Economic uncertainty is also weighing on employees. Being able to retire remains a priority for Canadians, while other financial worries – including managing personal debt – rose in the rankings compared to our 2021 study. Organizations that can alleviate some of the stress employees are under will find that they can improve retention and employee productivity. After trending lower in 2021, overall employee commitment in Canada is now on par with the United States. It also varies across industries, income levels and demographics. While, generally, we see that employees are feeling better about work, there has been a shift in employee mindset. Organizations should take note and act on this new lifestyle contract.
Download the full report to discover the six key findings from this year’s Inside Employee Minds™ study and reveal where employers should focus to keep up their end of the lifestyle contract.
As organizations and employees put the pandemic behind them, a new era of employee needs is emerging. With all this change, it’s clear more than ever that employees are not living to work – they’re working to live. For some, especially front-line and low-income employees, that means financial survival. Others, who have their basic financial needs met, are placing increased importance on their lives outside of work. Where does that leave employers? Organizations certainly can’t return to pre-pandemic mindsets. Instead, employers need to embrace a new contract with employees: the lifestyle contract, where people can find sustainable healthy experiences at work.
This study includes over 2,000 employees in Canada and was fielded between August 26 and September 9, 2022.