The People Lab at Harvard University has just introduced a powerful new tool called Public Servant Pulse to help measure five key workforce health indicators: workplace satisfaction, employee engagement, organizational pride, burnout, and intent to leave. The Public Servant Pulse breaks down each into the various criteria used to come up with top-line evaluations.

As People Lab explains, “Together, these indicators capture different dimensions of employee wellbeing that are linked to organizational performance, employee retention, and governments’ ability to deliver services.”

Unlike other exercises, this one relies on a large sampling of 4,792 participants, including 320 state, 1,621 county and 2,851 city or other local government employees. Employees represent 857 unique cities, 475 unique counties, and all 50 U.S. states, as well as Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. The results were weighted to reflect the national population of state and local public servants. 

Some of the most interesting findings derived from the five indicators include the following: 

Workforce Satisfaction

• “Average workplace satisfaction is 13 points higher among city and county government employees, compared to state government employees (71z% vs. 58%).”

• “Satisfaction tends to be higher among employees with higher incomes, as well as among employees with the fewest and most years of service, with a dip among those in the middle years of service.”

Employee Engagement.

• According to the data “Overall, 78% of employees are at least somewhat engaged, and 51% are highly engaged at work.”

• “Engagement is 8 points lower among state government employees than among city and county government employees (69% vs. 77%).”

• “Engagement tends to be higher among employees with higher incomes, more years of service and postgraduate education, with differences ranging from 3 to 9 points.”

Organizational Pride People Lab found that “Overall, 80% of employees at least somewhat agree that they are proud to tell others where they work, while 65% agree or strongly agree.”

• “City and county government employees are more likely to express organizational pride (82% and 80%, respectively) than state government employees (67%).”

• “Employees with college or postgraduate degrees and higher incomes are also more likely to express organizational pride; differences by tenure, gender and frontline status are small.”

• Hispanic employees (86%) and Asian employees (85%) are more likely to express organizational pride than White (79%), Black (78%) and other or multiracial employees (69%).” 

Burnout – About 40% of respondents indicated that they experienced at least one trait associated with burnout.

• “Depersonalization is nearly twice as high among state government employees as city government employees (30% vs. 17%). Emotional exhaustion is also higher among state employees (40% vs. 33%)

• “Emotional exhaustion is higher among employees who are in frontline roles, are female, have relatively less education, or have relatively fewer years of experience.”

• “Depersonalization varies less by frontline status and gender, but is higher among Black and Hispanic employees, as well as employees with relatively fewer years of experience.”

Intent to Leave – Of the employees surveyed, 27% indicated that they intend to leave their jobs in the next 12 months, 20% are unsure and 53% do not intend to leave.

• “Intent to leave – both overall and for reasons other than retirement – is substantially higher among state government employees than among city and county employees; 38% of state employees say they intend to leave for any reason vs. 26% of city and county employees.”

• “31% of employees with two or fewer years of service are considering leaving their role, compared to 25% of those with more than two years of service.”

Beyond these issues, People Lab also explored a variety of other pressing questions, including: How do workforce experiences relate to workforce health and how does workforce health relate to how employees view the people they serve?

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