Employees’ work psychology has a significant impact on work quality. More importantly, it affects not only individuals but also the shared working environment of the team and the business.
With the many workforce changes during the recent pandemic, employee psychology has inevitably been affected. Changes in employees’ psychology and thinking may be positive or negative, and all of them will affect work. Let’s explore how employees’ work-psychology trends changed during the pandemic.
I. Those Who Left
1. For many reasons, some employees had to leave their current jobs.
- Businesses reduced their workforce to lower labor costs.
- Employees chose to move to other jobs for better benefits. Some industries were severely affected. Businesses had to reduce salaries or cut benefits and compensation as business conditions declined.
- Businesses provided poor support and protection for the rights of employees affected by the pandemic, causing many employees to no longer want to stay.
- Employees became unemployed because business operations were suspended. They returned to their hometowns or had to seek work in industries that were still operating in order to earn an income.
- Some employees left because they did not want to trade their own or their family’s health for their jobs. The severe pandemic situation led them to limit going outside to reduce the risk of infection.
- Employees sought work that satisfied their interests and suited them because financial compensation was not enough to keep them in their jobs. The pandemic created a period of pause. Many people had already realized that their current work was not truly right for them. Because their earlier career direction had been misguided, they had entered fields they did not enjoy. This period gave them an opportunity to reassess, learn, and develop in a more suitable field.
2. After these changes, how did the work psychology of these people tend to change?
Some people carried a positive mindset. They took time to rest, while some saw this as an opportunity to return to work they loved and that suited them. These people might proactively resign to leave their positions to those who remained.
However, most people carried a negative mindset. They had been terminated or laid off, while financial, family, and life pressures pushed them into difficult circumstances. At the same time, demand for workers during the pandemic seemed virtually nonexistent. Business operations had stopped, or there was no work to do. Social assistance was insufficient and too slow to help them manage their lives. To this day, many people have left their jobs and returned to their hometowns.
As the pandemic situation improved, these workers began finding new jobs. Although they might still carry negative feelings from their former companies, they may appreciate these new opportunities and take their work more seriously.
II. Those Who Stayed
Those who continued working also experienced two mindsets: positive and negative.
1. What are employees who maintain a positive mindset during difficult periods like?
They will remain positive if:
- Employees view this as an opportunity to maintain their income during the pandemic.
- They clearly recognize that labor shortages will affect work significantly. As a result, they accept the situation and strive to maintain and complete their work to the highest level possible.
- When there is excess working time because there is not much work, employees use that time to learn more on the job and diversify their skills and knowledge.
- Employees fully demonstrate their capabilities and performance. The fewer employees there are, the more clearly the capabilities and skills of those who remain will emerge, giving leaders an opportunity to observe talented employees. This provides a basis for future salary increases, bonuses, promotions, or transfers.
Work Trends in the Coming Period:
- People value time more.
The recent pandemic period made them realize that there were many things they wanted to do but could not, and many things they wanted to know but could not learn. They realized that time could be used more effectively instead of being wasted. In addition to their current work, they will use their time to learn more, both supporting their current jobs and developing themselves.
- Many people do two jobs at the same time. This is based on two different mindsets.
First, they want additional income and greater choice in a forced situation, instead of having to start over after losing the only job they had.
The second mindset is that some people continue doing their current job to secure their income, while their second job may be in a field they are passionate about or feel is a good fit for them.
2. The Mindset of People with a Negative Outlook
They will become negative if:
- Many people cannot separate themselves from other people’s situations. They become weighed down by the company’s workforce reductions, even when they are not on the layoff list.
- Some people do not truly want to do this work, but they cannot leave because they do not know what else they could do. This leaves them unwilling to leave but also unwilling to work.
- Some people may not be suited to the financial and cultural changes within the business during the pandemic. They stay only to earn an income and will resign and move to another job once the pandemic ends.
- They demand benefits based on the belief that they contributed to the business during the pandemic.
- Focusing solely on salary and benefits while disregarding other issues.
- Lacking responsibility at work and showing little enthusiasm for supporting the work of vacant positions.
==> These negative mindsets have a significant impact on work and the workplace environment. These individuals carry their dissatisfaction with them. They may even gather a group of people who constantly talk about negativity. This reduces the morale of others within the team and the organization, rather than accepting that this is a difficult period and working to improve the situation.
Moreover, inconsistent work quality creates many additional burdens.
Their future work habits and tendencies:
- Carrying psychological inertia and stagnation in their work from the pandemic period into the present.
- Carrying low work-quality standards from the difficult pandemic period into normal times, thereby reducing quality and productivity.
- Indecisively looking for better opportunities elsewhere without daring to make a move.
- Continuing to complain about the difficulties they faced while working during the pandemic.
- These individuals are unlikely to remain strongly committed to the organization in the future.
It would be disastrous for an organization to make the wrong choices about who to let go and who to retain. When we look at individuals with negative mindsets, their serious impact on morale and work quality is truly concerning.
Organizations always need to assess employees’ professional psychology and personality, as well as their capabilities, in order to make the most appropriate decisions about who should stay and who should leave. Identify the motivations that drive employees to contribute and remain committed to the organization. Based on this, make changes to recruitment and training in the future. This also provides a basis for assigning suitable responsibilities and positions to each individual, ensuring that they have the capabilities and qualities needed to fulfill their role within the team and the organization.
3. When Should You Measure Employees’ Capabilities, Work Performance, and Professional Personality?
Moving toward the use of tools that support businesses in comprehensively measuring and developing employee capabilities is essential. This begins with recruitment and continues through workforce development and growth. The products provided by VienQuest Institute help businesses understand and manage their workforce quickly, conveniently, and effectively based on scientific analysis.
Some tests that support the measurement of employees’ capabilities, work performance, professional personality, and workplace motivation include:
Test for Measuring Professional Personality and Human-Resource Capabilities Trait-Map: https://vienquest.com/trait-map/
Capability and Job Performance Test Uchida-Kraepelin: https://vienquest.com/uchida-kraepelin/
MQ Test: https://vienquest.com/dong-luc-lam-viec-dieu-ma-it-nguoi-xac-dinh-duoc/
EQ Test, IQ Test,…
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