This blog post is by guest blog author Silviu Costea

A few weeks ago we sent out invitations for a survey looking at people’s experiences with the Coronavirus pandemic. Speaking of which, many thanks to all those who took the time to fill it in! We were curious to hear from as many people as possible about how the pandemic changed their work life, how it challenged them, and how it made them grow. In this short post we would like to share some of the interesting things which we learned about the pandemic from this survey.

But before we begin, there is one caveat to be mentioned. Our survey contains a limited amount of responses, and most of our respondents were based in Sweden. With these being said, although the insights we gained cannot be generalized to the whole Swedish or European population, they are nonetheless valuable. Now let’s take a look at exactly what these insights are.

In the first section of the survey we were curious about the challenges that people faced in their work life due to the COVID-19 crisis. When reading the answers, we saw multiple themes emerging. Most of our respondents, who managed a business or had one of their own, indicated that it has become increasingly challenging to keep clients interested. The second theme that we identified was that of experiencing more pressure than before. We heard that many of people experience more stress, anxiety, and fatigue. And that they see the same in their employees. The third theme was related to working from home. A significant proportion of our respondents found it challenging to structure their work while being stuck at home, as well as compensating for the lack of social interaction.

The second question we were interested in was about the opportunities which emerged in the last year. Here, most of our respondents appreciated the incentive that the pandemic offered them to digitalize their business or work. Similarly, a lot of them were pleased with the decreased travel time, as many meetings moved online. This, paired with working from home, also offered a few of them more free time, which they likewise appreciated. One particularly insightful finding was that a considerable proportion of people felt like they got more new ideas and perspectives, both in their personal and professional life. The pandemic seemed to have taught a lot of us how to think in new ways.

On a similar note, we were also curious about the ways in which people experienced personal growth during this time. Most of those taking the survey answered that they became more digitally skilled. Some of them also took more time to reflect, spent more time with their families, and became more flexible.

Another question that we asked in the survey was about which skills people would like to develop. Here, the main themes were: getting better at managing online meeting platforms, honing one’s digital skills in general, and becoming even more flexible.

Lastly, we wanted to hear about people’s predictions about the future of the work environment in the next 5 years. Here too, multiple similar answers emerged. For example, many of our respondents agreed that remote work is here to stay, at least to a certain degree. Some of them thought that remote meetings will become more common, and the others thought that we will see a mix of online-offline work. Different people hold slightly different views on this topic. This highlights that now is the moment for companies to work out a strategy for where their staff will be working a year from now.

We hope that these results bring everyone closer. It has been quite a journey over the last year. We find it inspiring that so many of us share similar experiences. This allows more room for a community to be built, where we can support each other and help each other make the most out of the challenges that we are faced with. Keep an eye out on our social media, as we are preparing new workshops and programs built around this idea. We want to bring people together (safely, online) and help each other grow.

Silviu Costea

Silviu is a social psychologist in formation, completing his master’s degree from Utrecht University in The Netherlands. Using the insights he gained and the skills he developed through his education and extracurricular projects, he is dedicated to helping individuals, teams, and companies succeed.