Psychological pressure: Many employees suffer from psychological stress. (Source: Rawpixel/Getty Images)
Psychological stress is a major problem for many employees. However, trust in the company’s future viability leads to improvement.
Many employees in Germany complain about psychological stress in connection with their work. Around 78 percent cite exhaustion, 75 percent anger and annoyance and 66 percent listlessness as complaints, as shown by a survey by the AOK Scientific Institute presented on Wednesday in Berlin as part of the AOK Absenteeism Report 2023.
The values this year have fallen slightly compared to previous years, the peak phase of the corona pandemic. But they are higher than before the pandemic.
Pandemic and technological developments have an impact
47 percent of employees say they have noticed strong to very strong changes in their company – as a result of the pandemic, but also due to technological developments. 35 percent of those surveyed have a pronounced fear of the future regarding the situation in society as a whole, but only 8 percent have fears about their employer.
Belief in future viability is crucial
Companies that are considered to be sustainable by their employees have fewer absences from work: these employees say they were absent an average of 11.6 days due to illness in the last twelve months before the survey. For employees who rated their future viability worse, the average was 16.2 days.According to the report, overall days of absence due to mental illnesses increased by 48 percent from 2012 to 2022. There was an increase of 35 percent for all other disease groups – primarily due to the pandemic-related peak of respiratory diseases in 2022.