Benefits January 2, 2007

FSU Survey Focuses on Strained Employer-Employee Relationship

January 2, 2007 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - A good working environment is often more valuable to workers than pay and low employee morale leads to lower productivity, according to a recent university survey.
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The survey of 700 employees conducted by researchers at Florida State University also found that whether or not an employee is willing to take on extra responsibilities or work longer hours is directly related to how satisfied they are at their jobs, according to a press release about the survey. Also, employees who have a bad relationship with their bosses experience a greater feeling of exhaustion, job tension, nervousness, depressed moods and mistrust.

“They say that employees don’t leave their job or company, they leave their boss,” said Wayne Hochwarter, an associate professor of management who worked with two doctoral students on the study, in the news release. “We wanted to see if this is, in fact, true.”

Thirty-nine percent of workers say their supervisors did not make good on promises and about the same amount (37%) said their bosses didn’t give them credit for a job well done.

Other findings of the study include:

  • 31% of workers said their supervisor gave them the “silent treatment” in the past year;
  • 27% of workers said their supervisor made negative comments about them to other employees or managers;
  • 24% of workers said their supervisor invaded their privacy; and
  • 23% of workers said their supervisor blamed others to cover up mistakes or to minimize embarrassment.

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