Mental health challenges created by the COVID-19 pandemic have impacted workers differently depending on their seniority, generation, and location according to a new report by Oracle and Workplace Intelligence, a HR research and advisory firm. The study of more than 12,000 employees, managers, HR leaders and C-Suite executive across 11 countries, found that C-suite executives struggled to adapt more than their employees, younger generations experienced the most burnout, and that India, UAE, China and the U.S. had the most workers reporting the pandemic has negatively impacted their mental health.
C-level executives have struggled the most with adapting to remote work realities and report they are suffering from mental health issues more than their employees, but they are also the most open to finding help in AI.
Younger workers are feeling the most burnout due to the mental health effects of the pandemic and are more open to asking AI for relief.
Just like COVID-19, the mental health crisis has impacted people differently across the world. People in India and China are being hit the hardest and are the most open to AI support, while workers in Italy, Germany, and Japan are seeing less of an impact.
Despite seniority, generation and geographic differences, people all over the world agree: The pandemic has negatively impacted the mental health of the global workforce—and they want help.
“Diving deep into the differences between demographic and regional groups highlights the significant impact of the pandemic on the mental health for employees in various age groups, roles and regions,” said Dan Schawbel, Managing Partner, Workplace Intelligence. “Amidst the challenges of the pandemic, companies can use this moment as a catalyst for positive change in their organizations. While the pandemic raised the urgency for companies to start protecting the mental health of their employees, the efforts they put in now will continue to create happier, healthier and more engaged workforces in the decades to come.”
“The pandemic put employee mental health in the global spotlight, but these findings also showed that it created growing support for solutions from employers including technologies like AI,” said Emily He, senior vice president, Oracle Cloud HCM. “The way the pandemic changed our work routines makes burnout, stress and other mental health issues all too easy. Everyone has been affected in different ways and the solutions each company puts in place need to reflect the unique challenges of employees. But overall, these findings demonstrate that implementing technology to improve the mental health of employees needs to be a priority for every business.”
Learn more about this global study and download the new report here.
Research findings are based on a survey conducted by Savanta, Inc. between July 16 – August 4, 2020. For this survey, 12,347 global respondents (from the United States, United Kingdom, United Arab Emirates, France, Italy, Germany, India, Japan, China, Brazil, and Korea) were asked general questions to explore leadership and employee attitudes around mental health, artificial intelligence technology, digital assistants, chatbots and robots in the workplace. The study targeted people between the ages of 22-years-old and 74-years-old. Respondents were recruited through a number of different mechanisms, via different sources to join the panels and participate in market research surveys. All panellists passed a double opt-in process and completed on average 300 profiling data points prior to taking part in surveys. Respondents were invited to take part via email and were provided with a small monetary incentive for doing so. Results of any sample were subject to sampling variation. The magnitude of the variation is measurable and is affected by the number of interviews and the level of the percentages expressing the results. In this particular study, the chances are 95 in 100 that a survey result does not vary, plus or minus, by more than 0.9 percentage points from the result that would be obtained if interviews had been conducted with all persons in the universe represented by the sample.
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Workplace Intelligence, LLC is an HR research and advisory firm helping leaders adapt to trends, drive performance, and prepare for the future. Our mission is to create more intelligent workplaces using data-based insights. For more information go to our website and our LinkedIn profile.
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