What if the biggest impact on job satisfaction wasn’t automation itself, but how it is perceived?
For the past few years, a sense of instability and unease has permeated the job market. See-sawing between “work from home” and “back to the office” mandates, the overwhelming speed at which AI has developed, and a Cost-of-Living Crisis in the UK all set the stage for high stress levels throughout the workforce. It’s no wonder employees are struggling to keep up, and team morale is taking a hit.
Terms like “quiet quitting” and “revenge quitting” have dominated workplace conversations, highlighting a significant shift in how people perceive their work. But what part does technology, particularly automation and integration, play in shaping how people feel at work?
Research from the Institute for the Future of Work warns that AI-driven automation could widen inequality if not properly considered. This highlights the growing anxiety around the impact that automation is already having on jobs, spurred on by media headlines, and what this could mean for future job security.
The reality is that automation isn’t just about boosting efficiency and cutting costs; it’s an opportunity to reimagine what job satisfaction looks like and reignite a sense of purpose in the workplace.
Enter… Automation
We blame automation for taking jobs, but what if it’s the secret to loving them again?
Automation isn’t and never has been about replacing people – it’s about empowering them. Job satisfaction rises the more people feel that their skills are valued and that they are being used to their full potential. If organisations want to avoid their employees mentally checking out, they need to boost job satisfaction, and one way to do this is by implementing automation. After all, who wants to spend most of their time stuck in manual, repetitive tasks?
According to the Automate to Elevate Report, the vast majority of employees (97%) point to the automation of administrative tasks as the main influence over their overall job satisfaction. This is often represented in the tedious or mundane tasks that can be a big, manual burden, freeing up time for meaningful, deep-thought work or collaboration. Too much time spent on draining, repetitive tasks takes a toll on employees’ happiness at work, and leads to reduced engagement, satisfaction, and wellbeing. Employees feel much more fulfilled when their work is valued, and they feel they can contribute in a meaningful way.
Creating time to think, create, and collaborate
Over the past several years, automation has gained recognition by the modern workforce as beneficial. The impacts of such technology go far beyond what is immediately visible, like productivity gains, overall job satisfaction, improved efficiency and work quality, and the bottom line: business impact.
Automation enables workers to operate at their highest potential by contributing to work outside of their daily tasks and the scope of work. It can empower workers to focus on business-critical work where they can be more strategic with their time, talent, and focus.
As the pressure for growth increases, it’s the existing, often already overburdened teams that feel the impact. Using automation to give employees the gift of time in their working day can have a huge impact not just on their wellbeing and happiness, but on the quality of their work. While we often think of big, needle-moving projects and initiatives as being the drivers for job satisfaction, research shows that taking smaller, tedious tasks off people’s plates has an outsized impact. In fact, 97% of respondents said that automating admin tasks and/or “busy work” is a main factor in their overall job satisfaction.
Don’t forget about the humans
Workplace relationships enrich our experience and boost job satisfaction, and technology creates more time for staff to engage in meaningful work and connect with their peers. 64% of people with very strong relationships at work felt very satisfied with their jobs while only 11% of workers without strong relationships felt the same. The correlation is clear, and yet many within the workforce don’t have time to spend building relationships; when wading through strenuous workloads, the water-cooler chat and coffee runs are the first things to go.
The extra time that automation frees up allows workers to build collaboration, connection and creativity. Research supports this, with 81% of respondents agreeing that building positive relationships and connections with coworkers at any level is important in their overall job satisfaction. Suddenly, there is much more time for a quick chat over a hot drink, or unplanned moments of collaboration in the hallway. Those spontaneous interactions that appear when employees are not glued to a desk feeling overwhelmed by their workload and keeping up with time-sensitive admin is what helps to build trust, camaraderie and strong team bonds.
While media headlines tend to focus on the fear surrounding AI replacing jobs, the reality is far more uplifting. AI isn’t, and never will, replace humans, but instead empowers them to focus on the uniquely human tasks and skills that deliver the most value to businesses. When employees are no longer bogged down in manual administrative work, they have time and headspace to do their best work.
