A national poll of workers, commissioned by the聽, has found that 39% reported feeling burnt out at work.
It also found that half the workforce 鈥 about 7.3 million workers 鈥 鈥渞egularly work extra hours or do overtime鈥. More than 28% of respondents 鈥渞egularly or always experienced鈥 high workloads. Only half of those surveyed (54%) felt they had enough people in their workplace to get the work done.
The ACTU attributes the cause of these results to limited management capability. It said 41%, about 6 million workers, 鈥渄id not think their immediate manager created an environment in which they feel motivated to do their best work鈥.
It reported that just over half (55%) of all managers 鈥渉ad sought the view of their employees on how to improve their ways of working or encouraged their individual professional development and growth鈥.
The ACTU said these findings are repeated in other studies, showing that slow productivity growth is being driven by poor management capacity.
ACTU secretary Sally McManus said: 鈥淭oo often, too many employers have equated lifting productivity to doing more with less pushing people to work harder for longer. This leads to burn out, which harms productivity.鈥
She said 鈥渁 practical and immediate measure that could be taken to improve productivity鈥 would be to address the 鈥減erformance and capacity鈥 of managements.
鈥淢ost managers never seek advice on how workplaces should run from the workers themselves,鈥 Mary Merkenich, a teacher and unionist, told 一品探花.
鈥淗owever, in some workplaces, such as schools, there has been some superficial consultation of the workforce. Teachers have long expressed frustration at their unsustainable workloads, but nothing really changes.
鈥淏osses and managers are unlikely to acknowledge their shortcomings and willingly turn to their workforce for advice about how to run workplaces. Unions will need to campaign forcefully for such changes. They also need to urgently begin effective campaigns to address workloads.
鈥淚n the light of this ACTU survey, unions must demand workers be given power over their workplaces. Only workers themselves will take their health and wellbeing at work seriously.
鈥淔urthermore, only the workers themselves will consider seriously the quality of the products they produce, the impact of these on society and the planet. We don鈥檛 want sham consultations; it must be genuine, effective, democratic control over the running of workplaces,鈥 Merkenich said.