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the Mexico-US border whose job is to process The study’s co-author Jochen Menges,
discount coupons from US retailers, a highly who teaches at the University of Zürich and
repetitive task with no additional incentives for Cambridge Judge Business School, said:
performing well. “Monotonous jobs are held by millions of
people around the world and more research
The researchers measured the employees’ needs to be done about those jobs. “Our
mindfulness using a six-point mindfulness research now seeks to redress the balance
attention awareness scale, before assessing in favour of blue-collar workers. We find
their boredom levels and attitudes four weeks that more mindful employees perceive their
later. Then, after four months, they collected monotonous job as less boring and have
data about the number of coupons employees higher job satisfaction, and are thus less likely
had processed and number of errors they to leave.”
had made. The researchers found that
higher levels of employee mindfulness meant The study suggests that if quality work is more
they were less bored by their monotonous important than quantity, organisations should
work and performed work tasks to a higher recognise and support employee mindfulness,
standard. and that incorporating mindfulness training
into the workplace could both increase
However, mindfulness was also linked to work quality and increase staff retention in
employees completing a reduced quantity of monotonous jobs.
work. Mindfulness was also found to have
a significant impact on workers’ attitudes However, the researchers stress that
towards their job; those who were more mindfulness or mindfulness training is no
mindful had greater job satisfaction – in silver bullet for the many problems associated
part because they felt less bored by their with monotonous work tasks and that much
monotonous work. Employees who were needs to change about these jobs – from
mindful were also found to be less likely to quit how they are designed to how they are paid.
their jobs – though there was no evidence this Andreas Wihler, an Associate Professor
was a result of their lower boredom levels. of Management at the University of Exeter
Business School, said: “Mindfulness helps
The study notes that workplace mindfulness employees in monotonous jobs to be
has been examined and implemented largely more satisfied. But organisations would
in the context of white-collar jobs that feature be ill-advised to rely on mindfulness for
relatively high levels of variety and human making boring work conditions bearable.
interaction. In contrast, more monotonous Organisations are still responsible for
working environments that are common in resolving structural and organizational deficits
sectors such as manufacturing, services and through work redesign.”
agriculture, have received little attention from
academic research and mindfulness literature,
despite their prevalence across many
industries and regions. workplaceinsight.net
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