Top 8 Reasons Americans Are Stressed At Work

What do you think causes the most stress? The boss or the low pay? In my case it was the commute, though thankfully, having recently moved, I can now walk to the office. We should all be so lucky.

Nearly three in four Americans are stressed at work, according to a recent survey conducted by a market research firm Harris Interactive on behalf of Everest College. The survey, based on the responses of nearly 900 employed American adults, found that low pay was the top reason for job stress for the second consecutive year.

The high share of Americans reporting job stress is likely linked to the recession, as workers are still suffering the financial consequences, including fragile job security and poor financial health.

View the slideshow at Huffingtonpost.com

What’s the biggest source of stress at your place of work?

California has 3rd straight month of strong job gains, outpacing U.S.

California's job creation pace has accelerated in the last few months, with employers adding 25,200 jobs in July at nearly twice the U.S. rate.

Despite the job gains, the unemployment rate is stuck at 10.7%, according to data from the state's Employment Development Department.

July is the 12th straight month of job gains, and the year-over-year growth rate has been 2.6% -- nearly twice the U.S. rate of about 1.4% .

"California is gaining momentum," said Esmael Adibi, director of the A. Gary Anderson Center for Economic Research at Chapman University.

"This report as a very good report," he said. It is "indicative of a continuation of the growth."

Still, the report contained some mixed results. About 1.96 million Californians are unemployed and the labor force shrank by 52,500 in July. And most of the recovery has been concentrated in the coastal areas. Silicon Valley and the Bay Area have enjoyed much of the job growth, while the Inland Empire and Central Valley languish.

Read more at LAtimes.com

Canadian workers lacking resources and engagement needed to get the job done

Canada’s productivity gap continues to present questions for organizations trying to become more competitive. Towers Watson’s latest study of employee attitudes and concerns around the world, which included more than a thousand Canadians, reveals what could be a hidden contributing factor: a lack of sustainable engagement in the Canadian workforce.

Traditionally, engagement has been recognized as employees’ willingness to give discretionary effort to their jobs. While most employers intuitively understand the value of an engaged workforce (and many have programs in place to measure and support engagement), the research shows the steps organizations are taking to improve engagement are falling short.

What organizations fail to take into account is that engagement today concerns more than giving extra effort. To be highly engaged in today’s challenging workplace, employees must also be given the capability to excel (which we call enablement) and the capacity to maintain their efforts over time, (which we call energy). Employers are failing to create this combination of discretionary effort, enablement, and energy — the combination that forms sustainable engagement and yields a significant performance advantage over time.

Read the full story:
http://business.financialpost.com/2012/08/21/revisiting-workforce-engagement/?utm_source=Exacttarget&utm_medium=HRPADaily&utm_term=Membership&utm_content=Email&utm_campaign=082212Membership

If you need  to find out how your employees in Canada measure up, contact Insightlink Canada for more information on our 4Cs Employee Survey Services.

Companies Can Name Their Stars but Struggle to Retain Them

Just 76 percent of organizations surveyed say they are successful at retaining star talent yet stubbornly high unemployment has lulled companies into believing they no longer need to be aggressive in recruiting and retention, according to a Sibson study.

Read the full story: http://www.workforce.com/article/20120814/NEWS01/120819979/companies-can-name-their-stars-but-struggle-to-retain-them

Job Openings in U.S. Rose in June to Four-Year High

Job openings in the U.S. rose in June to the highest level in four years, indicating employment gains may accelerate in the second half of the year.

 

The number of positions waiting to be filled climbed by 105,000 to 3.76 million, the most since July 2008, from a revised 3.66 million the prior month, the Labor Department said today in Washington. Hiring and firings cooled.

A rising need for workers shows some employers are expanding as sales improve, laying the ground for a pickup in hiring that may help boost consumer spending, which accounts for about 70 percent of the economy. Payrolls rose more than forecast in July even as the unemployment rate climbed to a five-month high, the Labor Department reported last week.

Read the full story on Bloomberg.com

Hopefully this is a sign of coming strength in the labor market and a long-awaited reduction in the unemployment figures.