Employee Wellbeing, Productivity, and Firm Performance

44 Pages Posted: 21 Mar 2019

See all articles by Christian Krekel

Christian Krekel

Paris School of Economics (PSE); Centre for Economic Performance (CEP), London School of Economics (LSE); World Bank

George Ward

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Sloan School of Management

Jan‐Emmanuel De Neve

University of Oxford

Date Written: March 3, 2019

Abstract

Does higher employee wellbeing lead to higher productivity, and, ultimately, to tangible benefits to the bottom line of businesses? We survey the evidence and study this question in a meta-analysis of 339 independent research studies, including the wellbeing of 1,882,131 employees and the performance of 82,248 business units, originating from 230 independent organisations across 49 industries in the Gallup client database. We find a significant, strong positive correlation between employees' satisfaction with their company and employee productivity and customer loyalty, and a strong negative correlation with staff turnover. Ultimately, higher wellbeing at work is positively correlated with more business-unit level profitability.

Suggested Citation

Krekel, Christian and Ward, George and De Neve, Jan-Emmanuel, Employee Wellbeing, Productivity, and Firm Performance (March 3, 2019). Saïd Business School WP 2019-04, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3356581 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3356581

Christian Krekel (Contact Author)

Paris School of Economics (PSE)

48 Boulevard Jourdan
Paris, 75014 75014
France

HOME PAGE: http://www.parisschoolofeconomics.eu/en/

Centre for Economic Performance (CEP), London School of Economics (LSE)

Houghton Street
London WC2A 2AE
United Kingdom

HOME PAGE: http://cep.lse.ac.uk/

World Bank

1818 H Street, NW
Washington, DC 20433
United States

HOME PAGE: http://www.worldbank.org/

George Ward

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Sloan School of Management ( email )

100 Main Street
Cambridge, MA 02142
United States

Jan-Emmanuel De Neve

University of Oxford ( email )

Mansfield Road
Oxford, Oxfordshire OX1 4AU
United Kingdom

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