28% of employees would reduce salary for flexible working

A new study has found that more than a quarter of employees would be willing to slightly reduce their salary in order to have more flexible working conditions.

Enterprise cloud applications company Workday partnered with Yonder Consulting to conduct the research, The employee outlook: understanding employee sentiment and priorities across Europe, where more than 17,000 people below director level and employed by organisations with more than 250 staff members in nine European markets were surveyed.

The data revealed that 54% of respondents would not be willing to reduce their salary for more flexible working conditions, while 27% said they found it challenging to motivate themselves due to a lack of contact with colleagues and, for 23%, the Covid-19 pandemic made work seem less important.

Despite nearly half of employees (46%) rarely, if ever, working from home before 2020, more than half (53%) reporred being less stressed and 56% said they were more productive working from home last year.

Additionally, 30% of those polled believed they would receive a pay rise in the next year, but only 23% of Spanish workers and 18% of Italian employees think they will be in line for a salary increase. In Sweden, more than half of respondents (52%) believe their salary will increase.

Carolyn Horne, president of the EMEA region at Workday, commented that while it is reassuring to see that many business leaders have successfully managed through the unforeseen changes of the pandemic, the real impact will be seen in the way that organisations support employees in the transition to some form of normality as companies emerge from lockdown.

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She said: “Critically, this should include support for employee development through skills training and the creation of new opportunities, such as virtual learning and internal mobility, which will not only contribute to an organisation’s continued success, but support employee wellbeing.”

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