Employee confidence in their boss supporting them if they suffer from a long-term health condition has fallen, according to new research.
Working To Wellbeing’s Window to the Workplace report found a 14% drop in confidence that line managers would support ill colleagues since the survey was last conducted four years ago.
Indeed, back in 2022, 70% of the 2,000 employees in the UK questioned had confidence in their line manager’s support in this area, which has since slipped to 56%.
The research by the vocational rehabilitation specialist also discovered that less than half (48%) of the UK’s workforce are confident that their line manager would support them in a return-to-work process, in comparison to 66% in 2022.
Perhaps this is because they do not know how to. Indeed, the research also reported a 12% drop in belief that line managers understand the return-to-work process for employees with a long-term health condition.
This has fallen to 53% from 65% in four years.
This mirrors a decline in confidence that line managers know how to make reasonable adjustments to support a colleague returning to work at 63% compared to 71% the last time the survey ran.
Behaviour change
Working To Wellbeing’s managing director Dr Julie Denning (pictured) said it is worrying that confidence in supporting those with long-term conditions to stay in work is dropping.
She added that vocational rehabilitation could provide the support needed as line managers need to get on with their jobs and not become pseudo health specialists.
“Currently, whether an individual benefits depends not on clinical need, but on whether they happen to work for the right employer, hold the right insurance policy, or find themselves on the right health pathway.
“We’re trying to change that and, crucially, in a way that retains everything that makes vocational rehabilitation effective: human to human and personalised, with behaviour change at the core.”