Working at home has not led to more burnouts, TNO survey shows

A mother working from home on her laptop with her young child sitting on the table beside her.
Photo: Depositphotos
A mother working from home on her laptop with her young child sitting on the table beside her.
Working from home is here to stay. Photo: Depositphotos.com

More people are working at home because of coronavirus, and some people are working longer hours but there has not been an increase in burnouts, a survey among 10,000 people by Dutch research institute TNO has shown.

While 40% of people are spending at least part of their working day based at home, fewer workers are actually doing overtime, the survey found.

Six in 10 respondents said they had worked more than their official hours during the coronavirus crisis, but this is well below the 75% of people who report doing overtime before the pandemic hit.

Nevertheless, those who did work overtime, were working longer – an average of 11 extra hours, rather than four, before the start of the pandemic.

This extra work has not had a negative effect on health, the survey showed. Eight out of 10 people said their health is good to very good, which is slightly up on before the coronavirus crisis.

Incidences of burn-out still remained very high at 17%, TNO said, but had not increased because of the changed working circumstances during lockdown. This outcome seems to show that people’s resilience had not been affected, TNO concluded.

Despite working more in their home environments, nine out of 10 respondents said their work-life balance had not changed.

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