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Southeast Asian markets such as Vietnam (65.1%), Thailand (65%), and the Philippines (64.4%), have noted the highest organisational health scores across the region.
When surveyed, Singapore's workforce was identified within APAC as a top performer in 'organisational health' — a category which measures work engagement, employee wellbeing, and organisational support. Specifically, local employees surveyed across the healthcare & pharmaceutical, government & non-profit, and education industries claimed the highest scores out of the 10 industries surveyed.
According to the Workplace Wellbeing in 10 APAC Industries: Intellect Dimensions Benchmarking Report 2024, Singapore employees ranked fifth among all 12 countries — the local organisational health score of 64% was higher than the regional average (62.9%).
At the same time, smaller Southeast Asian markets such as Vietnam (65.1%), Thailand (65%), and the Philippines (64.4%), have the highest organisational health scores across the region.
Meanwhile, Taiwan (58.7%) and Korea (58.1%) reported the lowest organisational health scores, reflecting the potential for more mental health support to be implemented across workplaces in each market.
Traditionally scrutinised sectors lead in organisational health
Despite the healthcare & pharmaceutical, government and non-profit, and education industries typically being associated with high levels of stress and burnout, a positive shift was recorded — due in part to employers taking more preventive and reactive measures to care for their workforce.
Sitting at top three, these industries scored as follows:
- healthcare & pharmaceutical (67.5%)
- government and non-profit (66.8%)
- education (65.8%)
However, locally in Singapore, employees in the healthcare & pharmaceutical and education industries recorded slightly lower organisational health scores at 66.0% and 65.5%, compared to the industry average.
Taking a deeper look at these industries, healthcare & pharmaceutical employees reported the highest levels of optimism (70.3%) across industries. Paired with a relatively strong sense of purpose (73.8%), this suggests employees are intrinsically motivated — evidenced in their high levels of employee wellbeing (69.7%) and work engagement (67.7%).
Similarly, government & non-profit employees reported high levels of employee wellbeing (68%) and work engagement (67.4%) as well. In comparison, the education sector scored better in the areas of work-life balance (63.9%) and relationship building (75.3%).
Employee presenteeism a key area of improvement
Presenteeism — which is the lost productivity that occurs when employees are not fully functioning in the workplace — has been found to cost companies billions of dollars a year.
Measured by the cost of physical and mental health associated with presenteeism and absenteeism borne by organisations, the report found that industries which scored below the industry benchmarks for organisational health scores — including E-commerce & online services (60.6%) — reported high levels of presenteeism.
Breaking down the data by market, in the Philippines, E-commerce and online services reported the highest levels of employee productivity (74.7%), followed by Malaysia (74.4%) and Singapore (73.7%). Despite seemingly positive scores, these markets still fell slightly below average when compared to the overall benchmark across industries (76%).
Theodoric Chew, Co-founder & CEO of Intellect commented on the findings: "The prevalence of presenteeism across the region underscores the urgent need for employers to implement targeted interventions and proactive measures. This first-of-its-kind report, which uniquely draws primary insights from 50,000 of our users, is our first step in gaining a deeper understanding into the impact of employee wellbeing programmes across industries."
Lead image / Workplace Wellbeing in 10 APAC Industries: Intellect Dimensions Benchmarking Report 2024
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