UPFRONT When work doesn’t

New Zealand workers are under performing. At least, that is how they feel according to recent survey by employment agency Drake New Zealand.
The survey of 500 contract and temp workers found that 64 percent of them were not achieving their potential in their present employment.
The finding seems to parallel research done consistently over the past 10 years by the New Zealand Institute of Management, which suggests that Kiwi managers also perform below their potential – more than 30 percent below their capability in fact.
If both workers and managers have such under-utilised potential, that is huge untapped resource going begging in the workplace.
The Drake study also found that while 32 percent of people found their work “so enjoyable it didn’t feel like work”, 43 percent said their work didn’t energise or motivate them at all.
Gay Barton, Drake’s general manager, thinks employers need to work harder at making work more stimulating, ensuring that employees have full and enjoyable involvement with their careers.
Alignment of personal and workplace values and expression of personal feelings through work both rated highly with employees. solid 80 percent of workers believed it was important that their job equated with their personal values. Another 76 percent considered it important that their work made difference to other people’s lives. Eighty percent also believed it important that their work allowed them to “express their own feelings”.
More concrete workplace attributes such as job security (70 percent considered this important) and high pay (71 percent) rated highly, but interestingly, nearly 40 percent of respondents would take 20 percent pay cut to work shorter, four-day week.