SafetyCulture says we need to do more for deskless workers

There's no doubt that workers have been forced to do their jobs in a pressure cooker for the past few years. Continuing labour shortages, supply chain issues, and the soaring cost of living have only turned up the heat, fuelling a burnout epidemic as workers try their best to keep shouldering the burden – not just at work, but at home as well.

New research designed to provide insights specifically about frontline workers – those who must physically show up to a workplace each day to do their job – has revealed the full extent of the pressure workers are facing.

The survey conducted by SafetyCulture in partnership with YouGov found that 73 per cent of frontline workers say they’re under increased pressure at home, while 64 per cent say they’re under increased pressure at work.

Needless to say, those are very real complaints and problems that need to be addressed if employers want to keep frontline workers engaged, invested, and on the payroll. So, the question is, how do you get started? And how can tech help?

Here are a few strategies to help reduce the pressure and encourage your talent to stick with you.

Ask for feedback

The first step is a deceptively simple one: talk to your employees.

Do they have the right equipment? Are there processes that aren’t working? Do they feel they lack training in certain areas? What would make them feel more supported and valued? This will give you insight you can use to address their exact concerns. Failing to do so is not only dangerous, but it also makes your workers feel unimportant, unsupported, and even disposable.

Building a workplace culture where employees are confident to speak up is more critical than ever before. Employees need to feel listened to when they bring up concerns and ideas. Technology can help here. Mobile-first tools that are intuitive to use can allow employees to raise issues in real-time, as they occur. This empowers them to speak up if they see something that isn’t right, so they’re heard and hopefully see appropriate action taken.

Lean on smart solutions

Empowering teams with easy-to-use technology can also go a long way toward improving their effectiveness in their day-to-day roles. By equipping them with the tools and autonomy to drive initiatives forward, we can help make regulations easier to follow and maintain.

Technology can also play a key role in closing communication gaps at work – particularly across highly dispersed workforces. In particular, technology can ensure rapid communications on critical safety and policy updates can be received via employees’ personal devices.

Ensure adequate work-life balance

With mounting pressure both at work and at home, workers need time to recharge. Benefits like home working and flexible schedules are the often-touted strategies for helping employees even the scales, but they aren’t always doable on the frontline when you need workers to physically show up.

That’s why it’s time to get creative. Contrary to popular belief, flexibility for frontline workers can be achieved! Of course, not every type of flexibility will work for every role, but if you’re open to change, greater flexibility can be tapped into. Leaders can assess daily tasks, and roles, to question whether they could be done in a different location, time, or way.

Some other great questions to ask include:

• Could administrative tasks, mandatory training, or team meetings be done remotely or at a different location?
• Can employees have the ability to design their own rosters and swap shifts?
• Could some roles be combined and shared?
• Would flexible start and end times work?

These are good examples of finding flexibility for the frontline – another key to retention.

When you boil it down, frontline workers are simply asking for what anybody expects out of a job: adequate pay, safe working conditions, healthy work/life balance, and employers that value their contributions. It’s on them to get the job done, but it’s an employer’s job to equip them with the information and resources they need to do it.

Sam Byrnes is the general manager for Australia and New Zealand at SafetyCulture

About the research quoted above: All figures, unless otherwise stated, are from YouGov Plc. Total sample size was 1,976 adults (860 US, 558 Australia, 558 UK). Fieldwork was undertaken during August 2022. The survey was carried out online. The figures have been weighted and are representative of US, UK, and AU frontline workers (aged 18+).