'It doesn't actually solve the underlying issue of employee burnout'
Ontario’s right to disconnect law has a lot of flaws, and it’s up to employers to address the issue that gave rise to the notion of limiting workers’ access to work beyond their working hours in the first place, says an expert.
The provincial government’s rule took effect June 2, 2022, requiring that employers with over 25 workers on their books need to have a policy delineating how and when employees can and cannot be contacted – with leaders being urged not to reach out to staff after their working day is done.
The policy is “really well-intentioned”, but it “missed the mark,” says Courtney Lee, VP, People at Humi, in talking with HRD Canada.
“We do have an issue when it comes to burnout… But there's a couple of underlying flaws with the policy itself.”
The first flaw is that the policy does not actually address the issue of employee burnout, she says.
“It’s trying to address one aspect of work-life balance, which is disconnecting outside of work hours,” she says. “But what it’s not tackling are some of the deeper issues that are causing that type of requirement or pressure, which is things like unrealistic workloads, lack of support, inadequate resources, and things like that. So I think the policy is addressing one part of it, but it's not actually addressing everything.”
Nearly half of employees across the world are suffering from burnout, according to a previous report.
The second flaw is that the law requires employers to have a physical policy, but there are no repercussions for employers that don’t have one, says Lee.
“It feels very cosmetic in nature. It feels like something that's optically driven versus something that's actually solving an underlying issue.”
Instead, the law has an “inadvertent negative consequence of creating rigidity in a world where we're trying to drive flexibility,” she says, as its forcing workers to finish their workload within their set work hours.
“It's intending to free employees up from after-work hours, but flexible schedules, from my perspective, are going to be the collateral damage,” says Lee.
Ontario’s right to disconnect law applies to anyone who identifies as an employee.
The entry of artificial intelligence into the world of work provides employers with the opportunity to up their productivity but also ensure not to overwork their workers, says Lee. This could help employers address the issue of burnout.
“What you can do is you can reduce workloads if you do it properly. You can leverage technology, AI infrastructure to streamline and drive efficiencies and how you operate,” she says, adding there's always going to be a need for human oversight in most of these areas.
However, employers would need “a lot of capacity analysis” when looking at the workforce and how AI and technology in general is implemented, and “how it reduces the manual work that an actual person would do,” says Lee.
Pushing for flexibility is also a great way to ensure workers’ mental health is at an optimal level, she says.
“What you essentially do is you trust your employees to do their job, and you hold them accountable if they don't.
“You give them flexibility in how they do that from a programming perspective, looking at alternative ways to work, defining how people can work.”
Overall, 68% of hiring managers report an increase in employee productivity compared to one year ago. However, employees say they have been logging longer hours, according to a previous report from Robert Half.
