Self-employed people in Flanders have jobs with interesting variation, but also jobs with high intensity causing considerable fatigue. The motivating jobs offer good learning opportunities. However, combining work and family life is not always easy and many self-employed persons complain about psychological exhaustion. These findings come from the first ‘Workability’ monitor of self-employed entrepreneurs, organised by the Flemish Social and Economic Council.
About the survey
In the spring of 2007, a questionnaire on ‘well-being and stress among self-employed entrepreneurs’ was sent to 6,000 self-employed persons living in the Flemish Region in northern Belgium. The results of this survey are being used to map the quality of work or ‘workability’ profile of self-employed people in Flanders. As such, the study (in Dutch, 471Kb PDF) is an extension of the already existing Flemish workability monitor for employees, which is organised by the Flemish Social and Economic Council (Sociaal-Economische Raad van Vlaanderen, SERV) (BE060601SD).
The workability monitor considers four aspects of quality of work: psychological fatigue (‘stress at work’), well-being at work (‘motivation’), learning opportunities (‘opportunities for development of skills’) and work-life balance (‘combination of work, family and social life’). Validated measurement scales were selected and limiting values established for these four workability aspects, using indicators that are both scientifically correct and practically applicable in a policy context.
Of the 6,000 self-employed entrepreneurs who received the workability questionnaire, 2,367 respondents completed and returned usable survey questionnaires. This represents a response rate of 39.5%.
Main findings
The workability indicators show that all four quality of work aspects posed little or no problem for the majority of self-employed entrepreneurs in 2007. For over nine out of 10 self-employed entrepreneurs, the working situation is not problematic in terms of well-being (91.8%) and learning opportunities at work (94.4%). More than six out of 10 self-employed persons stated that the working situation is not problematic in terms of psychological fatigue (63.3%) and work–life balance (65.5%).
Problems arising
Looking at the situation from the perspective of those who reported experiencing difficulties with regard to the four workability indicators, the following results emerge at regional level:
- 125,000 self-employed entrepreneurs (36.7% of the total) are confronted with stress at work (‘psychological fatigue’), 44,000 of whom (13% of the total) complain of acute stress at work (‘psychological fatigue acutely problematic’);
- 28,000 self-employed entrepreneurs (8.2%) struggle with motivational problems (‘well-being at work problematic’), 9,000 of whom (2.7%) are seriously demotivated (‘well-being at work acutely problematic’);
- 19,000 self-employed entrepreneurs (5.6%) face insufficient learning opportunities in their work (‘learning opportunities problematic’) and 4,000 (1.1%) of these persons report a total absence of learning opportunities (‘learning opportunities acutely problematic’);
- 118,000 self-employed entrepreneurs (34.5%) systematically experience difficulties in combining work, family and social life (‘work–life balance problematic’), with 37,000 (10.9%) self-employed entrepreneurs speaking of an acute conflict in this regard (‘work–life balance acutely problematic’).
From a combination of the four conditions, it can be concluded that 47.7% (163,000) of Flemish self-employed persons enjoy an acceptable quality of work. These entrepreneurs are not psychologically fatigued by their work, are motivated, have sufficient learning possibilities and a good work–life balance. On the other hand, this means that 52.3% of self-employed entrepreneurs are confronted with one or more workability problems: 27.1% of self-employed people are confronted with one pressure point, 19.9% with two, 4.6% with three and 0.7% with all four pressure points.
Risk factors
In addition to mapping quality of work pressure points, the workability monitor also surveys four major determinant job risk factors in this regard: work pressure, emotional stress, task variety and working conditions. The results show that the working situation of 46.6% of self-employed entrepreneurs is problematic in terms of work pressure. The equivalent proportion for emotional stress is 28.8%, while it amounts to 7.9% for task variety and 17.2% for working conditions.
Gender, age, sector and occupational characteristics
The size of the survey sample makes it possible to calculate workability data for various categories, such as according to sex, age, company size and sector of economic activity. Some of the key results are outlined below.
- Relatively more female than male self-employed entrepreneurs cite dull and routine work (‘task variety a problem’) – 10% and 6.9%, respectively. However, relatively fewer self-employed women than men are confronted with high work pressure or difficult working conditions.
- The 30–39 year age group experiences the greatest problems in combining work and private life (39.1%). In the same age category, the study also finds the largest number of entrepreneurs (52.1%) who are confronted with high work pressure.
- With regard to economic sector, hotels and restaurants reveals the largest proportion of self-employed entrepreneurs whose situation is problematic in terms of not only psychological fatigue (41.7%) but also well-being at work (16.2%), learning opportunities (19.1%) and work–life balance (47.2%). This makes hotels and restaurants the sector with the lowest workability rate (32.5%, compared with an average of 47.7%).
- The liberal professions record the highest proportion (95.1%) of motivated entrepreneurs (well-being at work ‘not problematic’) and sufficient learning opportunities (98.3%). However, self-employed persons in this group are most likely to report emotionally stressful work (47.1%, compared with an average of 28.8%).
Commentary
The survey is a large-scale and important attempt to map the quality of work of self-employed persons in the Flemish Region. Regarding the results, the study confirms the prevailing view that self-employed workers face more challenges in relation to well-being at work. Some 47% of the entrepreneurs surveyed report being satisfied with their quality of work, compared with 54% of employees surveyed in the 2007 workability monitor (BE0710019I).
Guy Van Gyes, Higher Institute for Labour Studies (HIVA), Catholic University of Leuven (KUL)