Many Americans are struggling right now.
Almost 30% of U.S. workers reported feeling a lack of interest,
A quarter said they had trouble focusing, and the same percentage noted that they had experienced
Read more:
All of that paints a fairly bleak picture. However, employers have a role to play in bolstering morale among their staff members through open communication, and by ensuring workers are aware of benefits that can help.
"Overall, if you want to know how employees are doing, just ask your coworkers," says Steven Pratt, the senior medical director for the employer segment within Magellan Health, a managed healthcare company. "Something that's been very consistent is that a lot of people are feeling burned out and feeling stressed."
What's going on
What American workers are feeling right now is actually more nuanced than a significant portion of them feeling down. In addition to reporting a host of negative feelings, 90% of workers said they were at least somewhat, if not very, satisfied overall with their jobs. And, 81% would recommend their place of employment to others, according to the APA research.
But what's driving this contrast? Essentially people are stressed about factors that they can't necessarily fix by getting a different job, says Dennis Stolle, senior director of the Office of Applied Psychology at the APA.
Read more: 3 ways leaders can strengthen their emotional intelligence
"Are you satisfied with your job? Compared with anything else I could be doing, sure," Stolle says, describing the thought process of many American workers.
"But when digging in on what's stressing you out, some of it is economic concerns. Some workers are concerned about their overall compensation not keeping up with inflation. Workers aren't sure they could fix that by changing jobs, but it's still a source of stress related to work," he adds.
Prices are estimated to have grown 3.2% in 2024, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. This comes on top of inflation being more than 4% in 2023, 8% in 2022 and almost 5% in 2021.
Workers are also concerned about having stable employment. Recent data from research firm MarketWatch Guides showed that 70% of employees were preparing to potentially lose their job after the hundreds of thousands of layoffs that have been announced this year. This included saving for a potential layoff and browsing job postings.
Besides economic anxiety, there has also been a rise of conflicts within the workplace as employees adjust to being around each other in person after working remotely during the pandemic, says Dani Kimlinger, CEO of MINES and Associates, an international business psychology firm. She notes that her firm tracks the reasons why clients seek out its services, and there has been a jump in disagreements within the office as a driving factor.
The need for conflict resolution can involve either staff members not getting along or a supervisor and an employee having issues, she adds. Gossip and bullying were also two significant catalysts for negative workplace experiences.
Read more: Whatever challenges employees face, the right work environment can help
"Maybe Matt kind of annoyed me when we were remote but now that I am in the office and I have to hear him in person, it may grind my gears differently," Kimlinger says, giving a fictitious example.
The transition of returning to work from a home office has frustrated workers in another way. About a third of workers surveyed by the APA said they were not working in their preferred location, whether it was in an office, remotely or hybrid. There is often an assumption that most workers would prefer to be remote, but the breakdown is actually more evenly distributed than that. In office, remote and hybrid are each the top preference for roughly a third of workers, the research found. Employees who aren't working in their preferred location "are feeling disconnected in where they are required to work and are having a worse experience," Stolle adds.
Finally, the increased utilization of artificial intelligence is causing stress for employees, with almost half of workers between the ages of 18 and 25 worrying that this technology will make all or some of their job duties obsolete. This figure was 45% for staff members 26 to 43 years old.
Stolle categorizes this as another stressor related to work, but not enough to make someone dislike their job overall or want to leave.
Solutions for the struggle
There are steps that employers can take to help staff members feel more at ease in the workplace. And some of these changes can happen immediately with very little investment in terms of money or resources. For instance, companies should be transparent with workers about the usage of AI, a change that can go a long way in quelling concerns, Stolle says.
Additionally, if a company is mandating a return to the office, management teams should avoid touting this as the best solution for everyone in public statements since it's likely that a significant number of workers will be unhappy with the change.
Companies also need to better train supervisors in how to have conversations with staff members about any stress or anxiety that they are feeling, Pratt says. The APA research found that in general, fewer workers experienced negative feelings, such as emotional exhaustion and difficulty focusing, when they reported being satisfied with their relationship with their manager.
Pratt gave a personal example of when he was on a call with a colleague who was visibly upset. He said he paused the meeting and first "told her to relax," which caused her to laugh. They then took some time to talk about what was bothering her before they continued on with the call.
But supervisors could be hesitant to start those conversations without explicit training on how to handle them.
"You have to be genuine and not try to put on an alternate personality. It has to be based on a personable kind of relationship," Pratt adds.
Another significant component of helping staff members is not only offering an employee assistance program, but ensuring that it is easy to access and that workers know what services are available through it.
Read more: Why 'loud vacationing' should be the next workplace trend
Many offer more than just counseling services and may include coaching, financial planning, legal advice, grief counseling and more. As technology has advanced, many EAPs are also now easier to access through apps on smartphones.
Traditionally, there has been stigma around workers utilizing an EAP, prompting fear that an employer would view the use of these resources negatively. But during COVID-19, many companies began embracing discussions about mental health struggles, alleviating some of this stigma.
It's imperative that companies continue this trend by not only promoting their EAPs, but having their top executives discuss the importance of mental health and well-being in broader terms.
"There is a lot of focus on mental health. People are still talking about it and breaking down the stigma," Kimlinger says.
"We are seeing employers take a more holistic approach to well-being," she adds.
