Can You Be Yourself at Work?
Annual Survey 2023
Can You Be Yourself at Work?
91%
feel that pressures and challenges in home life feed through into work
As companies recognise the need for diverse teams, inclusive and supportive working cultures and flexibility around work patterns and locations, the corporate world is showing growing understanding of peoples’ personal identities and home life experiences, and how these relate to their professional lives.
80%
say that this creates additional stress and anxiety
“Hybrid working has led to more flexibility but longer working hours and more pressure to perform and be productive consistently, with less breathing space or thinking time.”
Our results reveal the extent to which home pressures can impact working life, with 64% of respondents noting that home life pressures and challenges feed through occasionally into working life, whilst for 27% this happens extensively.
Increasing stress and anxiety was the largest negative impact, reported by 80% of respondents, and just under three quarters said that challenges in home life restricted their ability to focus at work.
74%
say it impedes their ability to focus
49%
say it affects their happiness and morale
Encouragingly, many companies recognise this negative consequence and show their support in a variety of ways, from practical policies and third party support programmes, to encouraging culture change through role modelling and story sharing. Over half of respondents ranked their employer as a 4 or a 5 (out of 5) for support with issues and challenges in their home lives. However, recurring issues of differences between policy and practice still emerge.
“Even though my employer is flexible and understanding of my caring responsibilities I feel pressure and negativity from colleagues.”
“I find that with hybrid working, I can more easily adapt to home life events and flex my working day to accommodate in the hope of managing both things more easily.”
“Team culture fosters and encourages conversations about these issues, without judgment”.
Out of a range of home life responsibilities, parenting (43%) and caring (36%) were rated as those which members were happy to discuss at work freely and openly, highlighting the increased prominence of these conversations in the workplace.
However, some topics remain very much off limits, most notably concerns about finances. Only 5% of respondents said they could share worries about financial pressures freely and openly, whilst 59% noted they would ‘never’ or ‘only when absolutely necessary’ talk about these concerns at work.
Fertility and divorce or separation were similarly taboo with close to 30% keeping personal experiences in these areas completely under wraps, followed by menopause at 18%. Surprisingly perhaps - given mental health continues to rise up the organisational wellbeing agenda for many firms - only 14% felt of respondents felt they could raise mental health concerns freely and openly in their workplace, suggesting there is clearly still much more work to do to remove stigma.
43% feel they can talk freely and openly about parenting responsibilities
30% try to conceal financial troubles
£
% 89% 84% 80% 71 % 70% 66% 59% 53% IMPROVEMENT IN INCLUSIVE COMPANY CULTURE
RANK #1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6 #7 #8 RANKING OF
IDENTITY
Sexual orientation
Our questions also asked about company culture relating to the support of people’s individual identities. The results were revealing and generally very positive, particularly with regard to sexual orientation where 87% felt ‘comfortable and open about who I am at work’, followed by race/ ethnicity at 84%. Disability (only 52%) and neurodiversity (44%) scored notably least positively.
Race / ethnicity
Gender identity
Encouragingly, over the past 5 years many respondents identified improvements in corporate culture relating to these areas of personal identity, and particularly sexual orientation (89%), race/ethnicity (84%) and gender identity (80%).
Disability
Louisa Symington-Mills, Founder and CEO of WorkLifeCentral:
Neurodiversity
Family structure
Socio-economic background
“Corporate culture has come a long way: huge progress is revealed here which is very encouraging, especially for parents and carers, and it’s positive that many people feel they can be more open about their sexual identity, ethnicity and gender. However it’s concerning how many facets and challenges of personal / home life continue to be dealt with silently, or are even taboo, in particular divorce/separation, fertility, menopause and financial wellbeing.”
Religion
TOP5 TIPS
What could employers do better?
Our top 5 tips, hand-picked from respondent comments.
Lead by example: more role models at senior levels talking about their experiences relating to personal identity/ home life challenges
Support managers with more awareness and training about different needs people may face; consider making it compulsory for all.
Introduce more flexibility including but not limited to home working. Consider work pattern needs on an individual basis with no repercussions.
Build inclusive networks, protocols and training around religion, race and neurodiversity in particular.
Offer information sessions and one to one support on rarely discussed topics where needed such as: menopause, fertility, financial wellbeing, grief and loss.
Survey Demographics
This survey was undertaken during March 2023. 309 members of WorkLife Central responded, of which 88% are female, 12% are male and 77% either parents, step-parents, carers, or both.
#1 #2 #3 #4 #5