Working culture for half of employees has deteriorated during the pandemic

Nearly half (42 percent) of employees think the working culture of their organisation has deteriorated during the pandemic. That’s according to research by StaffCircle, which surveyed employees and HR leaders to determine the impact of the pandemic on company culture, engagement and communication. The survey identified the three Cs of COVID – culture, communication and churn – as the key challenges for businesses, with 42 percent of HR leaders saying that churn has increased since the ease of restrictions, and 30 percent of employees more likely to leave jobs post-pandemic.

When it comes to communication, less than half (46 percent) of employees say they have been adequately communicated with during the pandemic. However, when HR leaders were asked whether they adequately communicated with employees, 97 percent said they do it well to some degree. This shows a gap between how HR leaders feel they are communicating with employees and how employees feel about communication in their organisations.

Engaging employees

The survey also revealed that 43 percent of HR leaders feel that employee engagement and motivation towards work since the beginning of the pandemic is less engaged, with 34 percent saying it’s the same as pre-pandemic levels. From an employee perspective, the majority (44 percent) feel less engaged, and a fifth feel the same as before the pandemic.

When asked how they are engaging with employees and how frequently they conduct performance reviews, surprisingly just over one in ten (12 percent) still have 1-2-1 check-ins, once a quarter, and 7 percent have them annually. HR leaders are also struggling with visibility of performance reviews, as 31 percent don’t have the systems in place to give them visibility of 1-2-1s and performance reviews. 18 percent are also still using Word and Excel to log the information from performance reviews, rather than using software and technology to give them insight.

Mark Seemann, founder and CEO of StaffCircle, commented: “Culture and communication are the backbone of an organisation, and this survey highlights the challenges that organisations are facing during the pandemic. Reed Recruitment recently announced that it has seen a 5x increase in remote roles advertised, which shows that remote and hybrid working is here to stay. The issues with culture, comms and churn will only be exacerbated unless they are addressed.”

The survey also asked respondents about their company mission statements and whether their employees know their company mission statement without checking. It found that 79 percent of companies haven’t updated their company mission statement since the pandemic, and 40 percent of employees don’t know their company mission statement. However, when asked how many of their employees know it without checking, 70 percent of HR leaders believe that their employees know their company mission statements.