Johannesburg - Why are South African workers choosing resignation amid our job crisis?
South Africa is experiencing a ‘Great Resignation’, as workers are no longer satisfied by salary budgets and loyalty to their employers.
In a job-scarce country, workers are expected to hold onto their jobs, especially with inflation hiking the price of expenses.
This trend has been limited to occupations or niche fields of specialisation in the private sector. Recruitment companies have found that unstable economic conditions have led workers to explore other work opportunities, or simply resign.
Results from reward management platform Remchannel’s bi-annual 2022 Salary and Wage Survey found that 36.4% of the labour turnover in the corporate sector over the past 12 months resulted from resignations.
Andisa Liba, chief people officer at Floatpays, explained that any turnover over 16% gives a negative reflection on the company or the industry affected. A high turnover across departmental functions could indicate that there are organisational problems at the core of the decisions of employees to leave an organisation.
“During the pandemic, people experienced a level of flexibility and autonomy in their work lives that they had never experienced before. This way of working and balancing work and life undoubtedly left a lasting impression and is a key factor driving South Africa’s version of the ‘Great Resignation’,” Liba said.
The term ‘Great Resignation’ was coined in May 2021 by Anthony Klotz, associate professor of management at University College London. Klotz explained the term to describe the voluntary mass resignations that occurred globally amid the Covid-19 pandemic which was then at its peak since its outbreak in China in December 2019, after which it spread to the rest of the world, which compelled companies worldwide to adopt work-from-home policies.
Klotz believed that pandemic-related “epiphanies” about “family time, remote work, passion projects, life and death” changed employees’ attitudes toward work. He added that in conjunction with lay-offs, hiring freezes, unsatisfactory workplace relationships and lockdown restrictions, companies began experiencing the ‘Great Resignation’.
South Africa’s unemployment rate stands at 34,5% (as of June 2022) and jobs are scarce in an economy that cannot afford a large-scale labour exodus. This has left employers, who have already experienced tremendous pressure from lockdown and load shedding, to conduct business on a better profitable and sustainable basis.
A similar version of the ‘Great resignation’ has been happening in the UK where workers there have been resigning not only due to a mind shift change, but also due to financial demands.
A survey by accounting firm PwC found that 18% of workers said they "are very or extremely likely" to switch jobs in a year, while 27% of UK workers told the survey they would ask their employer for more money in the next 12 months.
Senior lecturer in Organisational Behaviour and Human Resource at Sheffield University, Cheryl Travers, explained that while the practice is a monumental shift for the working economy, the pandemic was a key trigger.
“Psychologically, it’s classic equity theory. If we put all that in, we want something back. Employers aren’t giving it back, so we’re going to take it,” Travers said.
“Over the pandemic, a lot of people got to experience spending more time with their family or even just spend a bit more time in their garden, and are now recalibrating what’s important to them,” Travers said.
Liba added that the employer-worker relationship is one of the significant ways in which businesses can improve staff loyalty and positive productivity output.
“An employee experience that includes support through emotional and financial wellness goes a long way in improving employer-employee relationships and driving staff retention.
“Employers can stem the tide of resignations by offering flexibility in all of these areas. Hybrid Fintech-HRtech platforms that offer benefits such as pay flexibility through on-demand earned wage access, for example, are increasingly easier to do,” Liba said.