Behind the scenes of the European Working Conditions Survey

00:00:33 Mary McCaughey: Hello and welcome to this edition of Eurofound Talks. Today is an interesting Eurofound Talks because we're going to talk behind our European Working Conditions survey. The Working Conditions survey, which was started by Eurofound way back in 1990, has really been a unique source of information for policymakers on working conditions and working life for the last forty years now. But we're going to look a little bit behind the scenes. What is it about this survey that makes it so unique? What makes it, I suppose, the go-to source for policymakers and decision-makers who want to know what is the state of work across the European Union? We know, for example, that the 2024 survey shows that the European labour market is in a great deal of transition. We know that there have been improvements. They've been uneven in many places, but we have seen a decline in long working hours. We've seen an EU workforce that's resilient amid all of the geopolitical and technological change which has taken place over the last number of years, the workforce itself has been bolstered by an aging workforce, perhaps still staying at work, also by an increasing number of women in the workforce, and indeed migrants, which have occupied a larger number proportionately speaking of the workforce than previously. But we're still seeing lots of divides. We're seeing inequalities in the labour market, we're seeing gender, we're seeing sectoral divisions, and we're seeing some age divisions also. So how can we know whether these findings are actually accurate? And I suppose that's really at the core of this. We see many surveys. We see surveys across the board from small institutions, from companies, from multinationals, all talking about job quality. And they all seem to have a word to say, and they all want to appear expert. But of course, we know that the European Working Conditions Survey is most expert of all. And when we talk about these quiet quitting elements, AI, job destruction, when we talk about gender segmentation, etc., etc., these are things which capture the headlines. But really behind that, can we be assured that the data is correct? And the best person to tell us that today is Agnès Parent-Thirion, who is our senior research manager here at Eurofound and I think has been working on the survey since nearly the outset. Is that correct? Yes.

00:03:00 Agnès Parent-Thirion: I started in 2001 and the survey started in 1991.

00:03:05 Mary McCaughey: Okay, so ten years later. Okay. But nearly from the start. And Agnès has been our expert in this world of the working condition survey. So today, you're very welcome, Agnès.

00:03:16 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Thank you very much, Mary, and thank you for the invitation.

00:03:19 Mary McCaughey: Let's look at the survey. As I said, it was launched in 1990, so ten years before you joined. It was beginning and close to four decades ago. The EU was a very different place. There were just twelve member states. And of course, the world of work was very different. It's very difficult to imagine just how different the world of work was then. There was only about a third of people working with a computer, and there was so much that didn't exist then that exists now, that to try and compare, I suppose, is almost an impossibility. But at that stage, way back then, what was the fundamental motivation in creating a European working conditions survey?

00:04:00 Agnès Parent-Thirion: So I've been looking at our archives and talking to Pascal Paoli, who was the father, so to say, of the European Working Conditions Survey. And the circumstance was an opportunity. It was end of the year. There was budget left and it needed to be spent. So at that time, in the area of working conditions, there was this innovative tools which was working condition survey. So there was one in France, there was one in the Netherlands. And these tools were very innovative because they were about asking, going to ask workers and asking them how they work. And that seemed to be like a great tool when the European Commission wanted to implement its social action programme.

00:04:42 Mary McCaughey: As opposed to go back just to remember that Eurofound was established fifty years ago, more or less, and its remit was to ensure that it facilitated and supported the improvement of living and working conditions across the European Union. So that was the agency's core mandate. And so, of course, the working conditions element was fundamental to that.

00:05:00 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Yeah. And you didn't have any data on that at that time. You had some data on work accidents. But work accidents happen too late. So you want to know what are the circumstances which are good or not so good because you want to work on a preventative basis. So having a working condition survey allowed to objectivize. Allow to take this preventive eye. And it was very important. I read some board minutes and conversation. We are tripartite in Europe and it was very interesting to see how our tripartite stakeholders engaged into the survey, and they have really shaped it.

00:05:41 Mary McCaughey: I mean, in terms of what I talked about earlier, about the comparison, I mean, is it possible to look back at the survey as it was then and the survey as it is now in the most recent edition of 2024? And compare any elements, do we ask the same questions?

00:05:55 Agnès Parent-Thirion: We do ask a couple of similar questions on exposure to physical factors, for example, because the survey at the time was very macho. Males in industrial setting survey. So we asked things about night work, which we can compare about exposure to heat and cold and noise, a couple of things like this. Of course, the world of work has changed tremendously. The workforce have changed. So we need to ask more about the profile of the workforce. The type of work that people do has changed. We have more service industry, the technology completely different. And now part of even the management of the workforce has been devolved to algorithm. So the survey moved from maybe fifteen minutes to now forty-five minutes questionnaire. But what remains the same is we ask workers and we want to know how they work.

00:06:52 Mary McCaughey: So from fifteen minutes interview to forty-five minutes interview, does that imply that there's a huge increase in the volume of questions asked also?

00:06:59 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Oh, yeah. Yeah. Because at the beginning, we asked nothing about the household and all the issues of unpaid work. But with women increasingly being a member of the labor force, it's important to understand how men and women combine that with homework. Yeah, exactly. The work was more or less in service industry. So we've had to add a question about customer work, violence at work, which happens more in this context, emotional demands, which at this stage people thought, oh, it's only going to be for women. But actually no, men also report emotional demands. And then we've moved away from a nine-to-five, five days a week in the office environment for life in the office. So we need to ask about the place of work. We need to ask about the working hours, the control that you have, the flexibility.

00:07:55 Mary McCaughey: The hybrid working arrangements, how that plays out at work and how the worker experiences that.

00:08:01 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Yeah, exactly.

00:08:02 Mary McCaughey: And also, I suppose, AI and the impact of digitalization, but also climate transition, green effects.

00:08:10 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Yeah. So we have different tricks to look at this. What we don't do is to say, does this lead to that? Do you think digitalization lead to that? Because that's not, it measure more a subjective experience, a perspective, a point of view than what's really happening. So very often we ask the elements, do you use the AI at work? Is part of your work supervised by an algorithm? And then we assess it with the other elements of the survey. So we are able to integrate a lot of the elements of work which are important. And then a keyword for the survey, I think would be, we need to mention is collaboration. Not only do we collaborate with our tripartite stakeholders, but we collaborate with the research community and we collaborate with other survey producers. So we bring in all their knowledge and for example, to look at climate change. We know that we can measure some of these working conditions which are linked to climate change and increasing that. We also look at how jobs make green jobs, and then we can combine this.

00:09:23 Mary McCaughey: And so when you talk about this kind of collaboration, does this mean to say that really drawing on all of these aspects and these inputs, would this be considered the most comprehensive working conditions survey across Europe?

00:09:38 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Yes, I think so. Yes. We spend a lot of our time when we prepare the survey or when we get the data, when we want to validate our data against other sources to look at different sources. So yes, as a comparative basis, as a comparative survey. Exactly.

00:09:53 Mary McCaughey: Because national member states, they have their own surveys, which they play out also. But of course, our survey is not only uniquely for the EU member states. It also goes beyond, doesn't it? Yes.

00:10:05 Agnès Parent-Thirion: So we cover, for example, in the last edition, the Western Balkans, Norway and Switzerland paid to join the survey. The survey has been used in the US, been used in South Korea. It's been used in Latin America. The most recent edition is in Canada when they're doing it now. The work that we've developed, and always in collaboration, has been recognized internationally by national statistical institutes. And when you look at statistical guidelines for monitoring the quality of working environment by the OECD or the quality of employment by the ILO, Unesco and Eurostat, you see some of the European Working Conditions survey.

00:10:50 Mary McCaughey: So in that, yeah. But we're not seeing, we did have the UK obviously as part of the twenty-eight member states no longer. And there's no talk about them joining the survey in any form into the future.

00:11:04 Agnès Parent-Thirion: No, but we are in contact with the research community in UK. And for example, there's a survey called the British Skills and Employment Survey, and we do have similar questions, but there's no official collaboration. Okay. So to come back to why that would be that we would consider this survey the most comprehensive, but also this unique survey. What are the key elements? Yes.

00:11:29 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Well, first of all, it's comparative and I think it's at the heart of the survey. We started the survey with an idea that it was a tool for many member states that we were developing. So we've been looking at how to measure working conditions in question, which wouldn't address like national legislation or which wouldn't be too specific to an occupation or a country. So basically the way to do this was to think what's universal and what's universal is health. And we've used a lot of the work that has been taken on, on work and health to develop our questions so that we had a somehow a thermometer that would be more or less comparable. And then we invest a lot in the quality of the survey in Eurofound. And that's what makes it very different. As you know, the survey is very expensive, but it's also because we make sure that, for example, the questionnaires are translated and comparable. We've introduced a number of procedures like Translatability assessment, what we call free MC reviews, and all kind of things to really embed in every stage of the production of the survey, this comparability. It's not a researcher survey, of course, we are researchers, it is researcher survey done with tripartite windows. And that's really important because it's also a certain vision of the world of work. And we know the key role that social partners play in negotiating, discussing about the world of work.

00:13:09 Mary McCaughey: I mean, one of the big things with surveys, and one of the big costs, of course, is to ensure that it is as representative as possible. And there is always that question, how can you ensure the representativity. I mean, today's world is even more diverse and sort of multi-dimensional than previously. We mentioned that earlier in our conversation. How is it that we can ensure that people understand that this survey is fully representative?

00:13:43 Agnès Parent-Thirion: We do a lot of efforts, and the results as assessed by a statistician would be there will be some comparability errors. We have a process for looking at sampling to make sure that we give an equal chance for people to be integrated into the survey. We spend a lot of time and energy to get access to registers of individuals and households so that we can pick up people who would have something to say. We invest in the interviewers when it's face to face, to make sure that we come back to the people, so that the people who may not want initially or may not be able to take part in the interview, they will come there. We work on the comparability, and we work in making the survey questionnaire available in a number of languages.

00:14:31 Mary McCaughey: And not only the official languages, but other languages within those languages. Yeah.

00:14:36 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Yeah. So it's easier in some contexts than in others. So when for example, in face to face, you are limited by the fact that it's an interviewer with a certain language who comes to a respondent with that language. So we've worked with the agencies to try if the person speak another language, even if in the country, they would be bilingual to facilitate interviews in other languages. But when we did it by telephone, it was much easier to allocate an interviewer in one language, of course.

00:15:10 Mary McCaughey: Yeah, but how many would we be talking about in terms of respondents per country, if we're looking at the twenty-seven member states? What are we looking at?

00:15:20 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Yeah, about 1,000 per countries.

00:15:22 Mary McCaughey: About one thousand and under one thousand. We would clearly.

00:15:26 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Where we have that in the smaller countries. So we calculated and it should be fine. Yeah.

00:15:32 Mary McCaughey: And compared to other global surveys how would that compare.

00:15:36 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Oh it depends. If you're looking at a labour force survey it's just a weird little peanut. So yeah. I don't know how a drop in the ocean. Oh well thank you. No, but there's this idea that if you are representative, you don't need that many sizes. So that's.

00:15:52 Mary McCaughey: So the point is that it is not quantitative elements that we're looking at. In this particular case, it is the quality of the data and that it is representative. And you can you can vouch for that. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. When we have this data and we understand that it provides this unique source of knowledge, that it provides a comprehensive overview, that it is representative. What do we see being done with this data? Who is using it and what are they using it for?

00:16:22 Agnès Parent-Thirion: So we do a lot of work for checking the data, looking at its validity. It's all this data cleaning which are tasks which take a bit of time, but to make sure that the occupation is got it right. And we have the earnings which are comparable and all kind of thing. Then we have the data, we are happy. And yeah, you'll be super happy. And in Eurofound we start producing tables looking at Domino's and refusal. So getting a feel about the quality of the answers, and then we produce our report. We also do a lot of work on the harmonization of the time series, so that we can see how things are changing, and it's our policy, and it's something which benefit us profoundly that the data is being made available to the outside research community within the year after the publication of the overview report. Actually, this time it was made available to the research community before we launched the report. And this is very useful because researchers use it for all kinds of questions, some that we had no idea the data could be used for. And we try to monitor and see what type of articles come out. And when we produce the next edition of the survey, we always carry a user survey to the people who've used the data so that we can learn their feedback. What worked well, what didn't work, what we should develop because this is what they use the data for. Yeah. And this is very important because we invest a lot of money into the survey, a lot of our time and energy. So the relevance of our survey is extremely important. And to ensure the relevance of our survey, we need to learn from previous editions that we also need to have mechanism to capture what is in the air of today, what in research, in policymaking, what are people thinking of? What do they not know? Would they like to know what is emerging? And then we try to find instruments like new questions or existing questions to capture and include into the survey.

00:18:35 Mary McCaughey: And as you say, Agnès, I mean, one of the main elements that once we have the data is ensuring that it is disseminated and that people know that it is there. And as you see, as you say, researchers access that themselves once it is available to them and they manipulate and produce and analyze on their own basis. But you're also very much involved in disseminating that data so that you have been invited to present that data at national level in many countries. Give us an example of the kind of invitations that you've received, for example, from Parliament committees, perhaps in France or at European level, where you have had to present the data and what it means for policymakers.

00:19:20 Agnès Parent-Thirion: I receive invitations on all kinds of topics. I like for example, I'm French, but France has a very nice working condition survey, which they have the working condition survey. Then they move up to the company level, then they go back to the worker to look at psychosocial risk and they link it with an administrative register data. And I've been to a few presentations where we've looked at what is the position of France in comparison to the rest of European countries. And then look at what's happening in France with this very sophisticated system.

00:19:58 Mary McCaughey: So mapping the European Survey onto the data that is available at national level. Yeah.

00:20:05 Agnès Parent-Thirion: So I find this very interesting because we we can learn an awful lot. And as a researcher working for Eurofound, I'm always afraid to be in an ivory tower. So I think it's very important that we multiply and ensure that we have a feedback from real people, a various group of stakeholders. So that's some invitation.

00:20:31 Mary McCaughey: And again, Agnès. Would that, would your impression be that the majority of those requests are looking for that comparative dimension as being the unique element of what Eurofound has to offer when it comes to the survey results?

00:20:46 Agnès Parent-Thirion: This is a key part of the added value. But we also get some requests on topic, which are not measured anywhere else. For example, we have a quite a good set of data and analysis around women's and work or work organization. And in many countries they don't have this sources of information. And we carry what we call in Eurofound speak secondary analysis, which are in-depth analysis, looking at certain topics.

00:21:17 Mary McCaughey: And when you look at those certain topics and you've now been involved, as you said, since since 2000 on the survey, what kind of trends speak to you as you look at the working conditions results over those years? What are the main elements that you would put on the table?

00:21:35 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Well, for me, the thing I see first is the fragmentation. We are living in a very different world and people have very different work situations. So this is something I'm interested to see how we see some groups which are not talked about very much, which to my perspective, looking at the data would deserve given more attention. Like I think this issue of places, a place of work, work location is extremely important. So we know from a white-collar perspective that we are working hybrid and three out of ten working.

00:22:12 Mary McCaughey: But it's only a third of all workers that do that or can do that. Yeah, yeah.

00:22:16 Agnès Parent-Thirion: But there's also many workers who are working in different workplaces. I think this is very important. We've had in France this issue about Legion. And recently in Ireland, we've had some reversed. And I think this, the people who have to commute to go to work, the people whose work activity depends on commuting or driving, they are in circumstances which at the moment are really worth discussing. But the first question I'm looking at when we get the data set is always the proportion of women managers. It is increasing, but very slowly and.

00:22:55 Mary McCaughey: And Agnès, if I am correct, it's still increasing that the number in that increase are still managing women for the most part.

00:23:03 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Exactly. And smaller teams and teams of part-timers.

00:23:06 Mary McCaughey: And teams that are more difficult to manage.

00:23:09 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Well there. Yes. There you go. Not because they are women.

00:23:14 Agnès Parent-Thirion: No we're not we're.

00:23:15 Mary McCaughey: We're addressing that particular issue on this occasion. I am fascinated by what you've said about what we can see in terms of trends, but these are trends in a way which are at a top level. This data allows us to go right down to a very detailed level of understanding of the worker and the workforce. What can you tell us about that? Yes.

00:23:40 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Well, first of all, the top level findings are important. One of the key results of the current edition of the working condition survey is that in terms of job quality, which is a special part, in this job quality has been improving in four dimensions. It's been decreasing in two. And for one, we don't have trend. But I think this is important to know the direction in which we are. Because we always in policy talking about the future that we want and trying to find a way to reach this. So having data to tell you, yes, you're going in that direction. That's very important. Looking at the granular, my favorite are looking at occupations. And I enjoy it, for example, very much the work we did on green jobs or on essential workers, because we could really feel with the data how people are working. And what is really interesting is to see, for example, in health, where you have a lot of labor shortages and workers in health think their work is meaningful. It's useful. And most of them say they can do work well done, which is reassuring for us. At the same time, they have a lot of work intensity. Their work is physically demanding. Working hours are all over the clock, earnings are not good for everybody. And I think it's very important to look at the different sectors. And that's what our data say. Actors from the local level have a view. With the survey, they can compare how the sector ranked in order to others. And I think it helps to then put topics on the table and find ways to address whatever issues or congratulate about any progress that you've been working on.

00:25:32 Mary McCaughey: And Agnès, all of that then is available. You can drill down by sector, by contract and employment type status. You can drill down by gender, gender as in male female. But you do ask the question at the beginning as to how somebody identifies. Yeah, exactly. Okay. And then by age.

00:25:51 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Yes.

00:25:51 Mary McCaughey: And income?

00:25:53 Agnès Parent-Thirion: And if you want income, you can do whatever you want, basically, because we give the microdata people who don't want to use microdata, they can go on our website and we have something called the Data Explorer, and they can produce a lot of tables and maps and charts and pie, and they can also access the results directly. So this is more limited what we give them, because we are making sure that sample size and issues and we can't really foresee every breakdown that people would want. But this is very important in terms of producing high quality data and making sure different type of users with different interests can access it.

00:26:38 Mary McCaughey: And I think that's a very important point to make, is that the Data Explorer does allow the user to, as you say, filter by all of those different dimensions, but also to compare with one country, with several countries, with the EU average, with countries within the EU, outside the EU, as we have talked about before. And ultimately, we will also be able to show how that data compares with every edition over the last forty years. So a lot of information available online with European Data Explorer. And I would suggest that any of you who have not done so should spend many happy hours finding your way through the data. I would like to come back, though. We could talk, as you know, for hours on this because there's so much detail and I know you have so much more that you could say. But if you were talking to the policymakers who are now discussing the Job Quality Act, which we're looking at the roadmap moving into the act during 2026, and you had the opportunity to speak to them in the corridor. And by the end of the corridor, you had to get your point across. So talk to me in three.

00:27:46 Agnès Parent-Thirion: Easy peasy. First of all, I think the findings which we have found with this addition, but with previous edition, which is super important, is that job quality is good for workers, businesses and supports the European social model. It's not ideology, it's empirical findings. So I think this is extremely important to say, yes, this is a good thing. And sometimes people oppose competitiveness with social policies. Actually, empirically they go together in Europe. So I think this is something which we should be proud of and something which we should continue to nurture. Second is if you want to improve job quality, there are many instruments, many tools, but one voice, which is very important is that of employees. And with the survey, we have an idea of what people are doing and what are the issues, and to support the voice of employees through HR policies on worker participation, on systems where they are involved, employee representation. I think this is a wonderful source of resource for companies and others, because the workers can tell you where this is not working. But if we were to change this, this could work better. So really, there is a value in supporting employee participation and employee voice. And finally, work is placed such an important role in our society. It plays a role for individuals. We can see that in terms of there are some studies that look at how much does the quality of job contribute to quality of life? And it contributes to the same level of health. That's a lot. So it's something very important for the individuals, for the happiness. It's important for companies. And we get so much from work. We get an earning and some security. We get to meet people and to work with people that sometimes we don't like, which I think is extremely important for us. We like and sometimes we like. Yeah, which is important for democracy and for all kind of things that are part of the European model. It's also gives an opportunity for people to grow and it gives them a focus and the opportunity to grow, to do something meaningful to learn.

00:30:15 Mary McCaughey: Our work plays a significant role in our lives and in society at large.

00:30:20 Agnès Parent-Thirion: So we would need more studies on working conditions, more research needed. Yes.

00:30:26 Mary McCaughey: So we've got to the end of the corridor. And I suppose what you've made very clear is that there is an evidence base for the importance of monitoring and measuring working conditions and quality of work that there's no doubt that quality of work feeds into greater productivity. It will enhance competitiveness. And it is a win-win for all social partners when we look at investing in job quality. I think the importance of the role of work in our lives is something that we shouldn't underestimate. And I thank you, Agnès, for the work that you have done over the last number of years, since the early 2000, to ensure that working conditions and its progress across the European Union remains first and foremost in the work of Eurofound. And yes, it is a huge investment, both in terms of cost and human resources. But as you have explained very eloquently, it is well worth it in terms of the contribution it is making. So thank you for joining us today. And you can hear this episode and all of the previous ones on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you access your podcasts. This is just one element of the large campaign to highlight the work from the Working Conditions Survey. The full overview report that we mentioned earlier is available on our website, as is the digital story, as is the Data Explorer. With all the data that we have referenced today, and of course, also the data assets that you can use and reuse for your own use within the workplace. You can also listen back to many of the Eurofound talks, which have raised several of the issues referenced here today, gender equality, quality of work, sustainable work, older workers, and many more. There's also a podcast with Barbara Gerstenberger that highlights the first findings of the survey. And you can listen back to that and many more. Also access our webinars online. So until next time when Eurofound talks to you.