Good Work Index | Survey reports

Since 2018, the CIPD Good Work Index has been measuring and reporting valuable evidence on jobs and people’s experience of work in the UK. We urge policy makers and employers to use these insights to inform policy and practice, to help make work better for everyone.

Each year, we survey more than 5,000 workers across different sectors and occupations about key aspects of their work and employment. This year’s report tracks how these aspects of job quality have fared through COVID-19. Our data shows that inequalities in job quality persist in the UK and, as we steer the way through what will be a complex post-pandemic recovery, the findings serve as a reminder that we must protect not just the quantity, but also the quality of jobs.

Download the 2021 report and appendices below:

Research report - CIPD Good Work Index

(2 MB)

Survey report - CIPD Good Work Index

(5 MB)

Appendix 1: Tables, CIPD Good Work Index

(2 MB)

Appendix 2: Methodology, CIPD Good Work Index

(2 MB)

7 dimensions of job quality

Pay and benefits

Pay, employer pension contributions and other employee benefits

Objective pay looks to have held up, but important occupational class and gender differences in pay continue.
There has been a negative impact on median earnings across managerial and professional workers who had been furloughed.
While rates of low pay overall have remained stable over the last year, the proportion of women in low pay has increased since 2020.  In semi-routine and routine occupations nearly three in ten women are low paid, which represents a significant increase from 2020.

Employment contracts

Contract type, under-employment and job security

Around half of those employed on non-standard contracts in 2020 are in permanent contracts in 2021 and this group report the highest churn in contract types.
Job insecurity is influenced by workers’ experience of furlough: workers not furloughed are the most secure about their jobs.
External job prospects are strongly influenced by age: older workers are the most pessimistic about their prospects of finding a comparable or better job in the labour market.

Work–life balance

Long hours, commuting and options to work flexibly

Workers in transport and storage, waste management, utilities, education and health and social work experienced less positive work–life balance.
Those working in lower occupational classes report having less flexible work arrangements than those workers in higher-skilled occupations, similar to the findings in 2020.
Workers in lower and higher managerial and professional occupations are most likely to report that they find it hard to relax in their personal time after work.

Job design and nature of work

Skills, workload, empowerment and meaning

Workers in higher occupational classes continue to report higher levels of autonomy, job complexity, purpose, skill match and development opportunities than others.
Key workers report more negative perceptions of some aspects of job design, for example regarding ‘resources’.
Those who have never worked from home generally have more negative views on job design indicators than those who work from home some or most of the time.

Relationships at work

Social cohesion, psychological safety and management support

Workers rate their relationships with immediate colleagues and ‘staff you manage’ most highly, with almost 90% of responses rating these as ‘very good’ or ‘good’. While relationships with line managers are positively rated overall, poor relationships are most frequently reported with line managers and other managers.
Assessment of workplace relationships has improved across all but the smallest employers.
Working from home had a positive influence on work relationships, particularly on perceptions of psychological safety and line-management relations.
Those furloughed full-time were, however, less positive about their workplace relationships, especially in relation to psychological safety and, to some extent, line management relationships.

Employee voice

Opportunities to have a voice at work

Individual rather than collective voice channels predominate in the UK, though there is significant variation by organisational size and ownership sector.
Worryingly, the number of people reporting no voice channels in their workplaces has increased in recent years. There is an absence of voice channels in 22.9% of private-sector firms in 2021.
Only 33% of those in routine occupations say managers are good at seeking the views of employees or employee representatives, compared to 55% of those in higher managerial occupations.

Health and wellbeing

Physical and mental health

Key workers report less positive mental health and physical health compared to non-key workers.
Less positive responses are reported on overall health and wellbeing by those spending all of their time working from home or never working from home.
Workers with higher health and wellbeing scores report higher task performance.

Beyond the numbers, what does 'good work' look like?

Read our expert commentary and join the discussion on how current trends and ideas are shaping work in your organisations.

CIPD view on good work

Work can and should be a force for good, benefitting people and societies as much as it benefits business and the economy. Measures of GDP and employment rates are important, but we also need to understand whether the jobs we have are good or poor and how they can be improved.

But what does a quality job look like? At the CIPD, we believe that good work:

is fairly rewarded and gives people the means to securely make a living
allows for work–life balance 
gives opportunities to develop and ideally a sense of fulfilment 
provides a supportive environment with constructive relationships 
gives employees the voice and choice they need to shape their working lives
is physically and mentally healthy for people.

All jobs have the potential to be better and we should aspire to making good work a reality for all, regardless of personal characteristics or occupation. It may not be realistic to make all jobs great in all ways, but there are several dimensions to job quality, and by being more creative with job design and HR practices, employers can and should make work better for everyone.

Job quality is affected by a range of factors, including employment legislation, labour market conditions, HR practices, the quality of people management and by workers themselves. Policy-makers, employers and people professionals all have a role to play in ensuring that work is both productive for the organisation and good for employees. The CIPD Good Work Index gives insights that help individuals, employers and policy makers improve and protect job quality at every level.