85% of UK businesses feel the pinch of the great resignation

Just 15% of UK businesses say that the ‘great resignation’ had not affected them, with those affected expressing the impact on employee wellbeing, burnout, and workload.

More than one third of senior decision makers (36%),  see retaining key staff as the biggest HR challenge this year, and the same number see recruitment as the top priority according to new research from specialist consultancy Barnett Waddingham.

As the workplace adjusted to the pandemic, 59% of businesses say that employee dissatisfaction with their organisation’s flexible or hybrid working policy was one of the main reasons for resignations over the last year.

This has also impacted the ability of employers to recruit and retain staff. 32% said they’d struggled to attract new talent as a direct result of the great resignation, and 31% had trouble retaining their staff.

A massive 59% of businesses attribute employee dissatisfaction with the organisation’s flexible or hybrid working policy as one of the main reasons for resignations over the last year; just 23% said it was not.

So how widespread has the shift to hybrid working been as a result?

According to the research, very. 84% of businesses have embraced a hybrid working model, with 21% always having a hybrid working model, and 22% having introduced one before the pandemic.

More than a quarter of businesses (27%) introduced one post-Covid, and 13% are currently trialling one.

Some companies have not shifted to a hybrid working model, for a variety of reasons. 3% of all firms said they’d trialled it, but it hadn’t worked for them, and 6% said it was not applicable for anyone in their organisation. A further 5% said they were considering it for the future.

Of course, the shift does come with a cost to businesses. 77% of businesses who have shifted to a hybrid working model said the technology costs had been high, and 72% said the same of hardware costs.

David Collington, principal at Barnett Waddingham, comments: “In the wake of the biggest shake up of workplace norms since the industrial revolution, organisations are scrabbling to keep up with the speed of change.

“Control has shifted from the employer to the employee, and with that businesses have had to step up their game at every stage of the lifecycle, from attraction and recruitment through to retention.

“Beer fridges and ping pong are not enough; the most effective businesses are making real structural changes to try to win the race for talent.

“In the eyes of many employees, hybrid working has moved from a luxury to a bare minimum.

“For C-suites and HR departments, effort now needs to be focused on making hybrid working work for all; balancing team cohesion and training with flexibility and freedom.

“Crucially, if you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it. Businesses need to be tracking employee sentiment and beliefs before they can deliver effective change.”