This year the Herald’s award-winning newsroom produced a range of first-class journalism, including investigating the state of our mental health in the Great Minds series, how NZ can rebuild stronger post-Covid with The New New Zealand and how to minimise the impact of living in an Inflation
Summer reads: Workplace revolution - the year everything changed for Kiwi employers
NZ Herald
7 mins to read
The Covid pandemic transformed the way we work.
AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.
With unemployment at a record low and immigration still stifled, the labour market has shifted the balance in favour of employees willing to question what they’re actually worth.
Depending on how you view the world, this is either a good or a bad thing. Supporters of the Government like to point out that record-low unemployment is fantastic for workers, while critics counter that the lack of available staff is stifling opportunities for business growth.
As the football writer Gabriele Marcotti often opines: It doesn’t have to be one or the other; two things can be right at the same time.
Barry Williamson, a recruitment specialist at agency Marsden Inch, says that in his experience, “$90K is the new $70k”.
“Money will always be the main motivator, particularly when there is so much media comment about the opportunity to increase salaries,” Williamson says.
AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.
The money aspect, however, tends to be influenced by the job applicant’s age and experience level.
“The younger the employee, the greater is the emphasis placed on money, whereas a more senior employee, already earning a larger salary, would be more likely to be influenced by retention opportunities that are lifestyle-based,” the recruiter says.
Williamson warns against chasing those bigger salaries at a time when employers are desperate to get certain jobs done.
“Anyone with a brain should realise that large salary increases come with an expectation of greater productivity and revenue generation,” he says.
The Great Resignation ‘tidal wave’ hits NZ - what it means for workers
Bargaining power is increasingly shifting towards employees as high staff turnover forces companies to get creative with remuneration.
New data shows between April 1, 2021, and March 31, 2022, staff turnover increased to 58.2 per cent nationally, up 10 per cent from 2020 to 2021.
Human resources platform MyHR released its Salary and Employment Report 2022 - a snapshot of more than 1250 companies and 27,000 employees in New Zealand - revealing numbers one expert called “crazy” but not surprising.
AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.
“Those numbers really do show the ‘Great Resignation’ as a tidal wave has crashed on the shores of Aotearoa,” said Jarrod Haar, Professor of Human Resource Management at AUT.
“That’s a decent snapshot. That’s half the workforce churning over.”
The hospitality sector was the hardest hit, with 94.2 per cent turnover (up 17.4 per cent), while healthcare was up almost 20 per cent to 50.5 per cent turnover, according to the report.
Other areas that saw significant increases in turnover were information, media and telecommunications (up 16.4 per cent), education (up 14.7 per cent) and the construction sector (up 13.2 per cent).
The Great Resignation: Survey reveals why quarter of Kiwis are looking to change jobs
A clear “warning bell” has been sounded amid the global Great Resignation, says a business advocacy leader - as a quarter of New Zealand workers intend to change jobs over the next 12 months, according to a new survey.
The survey revealed the top three factors for workers when considering changing jobs, with 78 per cent of respondents saying flexible hours or hybrid working was most important.
This was followed by career development leading to a rewards programme (74 per cent) and regular performance feedback (73 per cent).
More than 1200 workers were surveyed nationally as part of the 2022 Workplace Wellbeing Survey, commissioned by the Employers & Manufacturers Association (EMA) and nib New Zealand.
According to the survey, 91 per cent of employees had experienced negative physical effects - including fatigue and problems sleeping - in the past three months as a result of work. Furthermore, 87 per cent said they had experienced negative emotional impacts including anxiety and excessive worrying.
EMA chief executive Brett O’Riley said the survey is a clear warning bell - to businesses that aren’t already doing so - to pay more attention to employees’ well-being.
Workplace reset: What is ‘quiet quitting’ and who is it for?
“I recently learned about this term called ‘quiet quitting’ where you’re not outright quitting your job, but you’re quitting the idea of going above and beyond,” says Zaiad Khan, a TikTok user with over 10,000 followers, in a soothing voice, juxtaposed with a video of the New York City subway. “You are still performing your duties, but you are no longer subscribing to the hustle culture mentally that work has to be our life.”
Clayton Farris, a TikTok user with 48,000 followers, who posted about the trend days later, says in his own video: “I don’t stress and internally rip myself to shreds.”
The phrase went mainstream from there. “If Your Co-Workers Are ‘Quiet Quitting,’ Here’s What That Means,” read a headline in a Wall Street Journal article on August 12. The Guardian went with: “Quiet Quitting: Why Doing the Bare Minimum at Work Has Gone Global.” The term was defined and redefined. For some, it was mentally checking out from work. For others, it became about not accepting additional work without additional pay.
Many people feel perplexed: why do you need a term to describe something as ordinary as going to work and doing your job, even if it’s not well? Some people feel validated for never raising their hands at work, or judged because they actually like being overachievers.
Then there are those who are envious: they wish they could quietly quit, but believe they could never get away with it because of their race or gender. (There are also some professions that make it less easy. Who wants their doctor or child’s teacher to take the easy way out?)
The Great Resignation: An ‘Excellent’ way to stop your staff ‘quiet quitting’
A startup that says it has a fresh take on HR software has raised $2 million in a seed round that’s drawn some high-profile local backers - and attracted the attention of big names in the US including Netflix, Uber, Google and Airbnb.
The co-founders of Wellington-based Excellent, Samantha Gadd and Jenny Busing, say their software-as-a-service product is aimed at the emerging field of Employee Experience Design - or people managers collaborating with staff on better ways to do the likes of onboarding, pay reviews, arranging workspaces and wrangling professional development.
The seed round was led by Australasian venture capital firm Blackbird, with support from Icehouse Ventures, Sir Stephen Tindall’s K1W1.
Excellent has also drawn financial backing from a clutch of business leaders, investing in a personal capacity, with Spark chair Justine Smyth, Sharesies co-founders Brooke and Leighton Roberts, Trent Mankelow (Trade Me, Vend) and Mike Carden among its lineup of early shareholders (Carden, notably, has two successful HR ventures under his belt, Sonar6 - sold to US firm Cornerstone - and his current vehicle with his brother Philip, Joyous).
“At Blackbird, thriving workplaces are our religion. We’ve invested in many outstanding founders creating a fairer, happier, more engaged future of work: from Culture Amp, to Applied, and more recently Multitudes and The Mintable,” says Blackbird principal Phoebe Harrop. Multitudes, which measures workplace culture and performance is, like Excellent, a Kiwi startup.
