COVID-19 Resilience Report

Executive Summary

We analyse resilience assessment data through the Covid-19 pandemic on 10,687 people. This enables us to evaluate the impact of interventions, track resilience factors and understand how well OECD countries have fared through the pandemic.

While global human factor scores mostly increase through the pandemic some regions, such as New Zealand, have reduced.

Comparing regional responses to the pandemic shows markedly different human responses to the challenge with Europe leading and NZ, with the US and Canada, trailing behind.

1. Resilience interventions improve human factors in adversity

While many organisations stop investments in people through a business downturn, some continue to invest. How have they benefited from their investment?

Those who invested got positive results in every population group. While the gains from pre to post assessment are moderate, all risks reduce and all strengths – apart from Compassion in female participants – increase.

In New Zealand we see a significantly more positive jump in most of the factors measured. In particular, Anxiety and Worry, reduce markedly and more than in other regions. On the strength side, we see improvement in fulfilment. Again, better than global data.

If employee mental health, wellbeing, and engagement are important, it is abundantly clear that New Zealand organisations are getting a good response from their investment.

Both the female and under 30 populations, who start with lower scores, show the most positive improvements. In particular, the gain in resilience ratio and percentage reduction in number at risk (a score of less than 1.1) is significant. This is an important investment for younger people and women in the workplace. Reductions in Worry and Fatigue are notable in all groups as are the gains in Bounce and Sleep quality. See tables 1 and 2 below.

2. How global resilience has changed through the Covid-19 pandemic

This is one of the most important questions of our time. Humanity as a whole has confronted a pandemic with multiple interacting impacts on our jobs, lives and health. If we believe the media, the impact – particularly on our mental health – is catastrophic.

Our data does not support this hypothesis globally. In fact, most people have responded well to this adversity. They are actively bouncing forward and rebuilding their resilience as measured by 60 human factors. Globally, we are more adaptive and stronger.

Our New Zealand data shows the opposite. Resilience ratios and human factor scores have dropped consistently across the three periods as shown in table 1 below.

The disruption to New Zealand life and work was significantly less than the northern hemisphere lockdowns, morbidity and mortality. Yet our human factors show us becoming less adaptive and more fragile. Our resilience is failing, while our colleagues bounce and get stronger. The media appears correct in the New Zealand case.

We have analysed the data by region to assess how each region has changed over the same period. In table 5, we rank the different regions in which we conducted the assessments by the lowest ratios in the last period. Europe shows a strong response while New Zealand shows a marked decline. WhileUSA/Canada region has the lowest starting point, there is growth.

3. New Zealand employee resilience has declined while the world bounces

We selected a small sample of key factors from the questionnaire, to understand what has changed. Remember these all come from pre assessments, before any training has started. Globally, risks have reduced, and strengths have increased.

In New Zealand, these same factors have changed in a negative direction. This is true for female, male and under 30 populations. In almost every case, our risks scores are increasing, and our strength scores are decreasing. This is opposite to the trends we see globally. For participants under 30, the difference is marked.

Anxiety and Worry are factors correlated with anxiety disorders. Loss of Joy and Fatigue are correlated with depression. Hostility and Rumination are correlated with Anger. This are all risks that can undermine human wellbeing and resilience.

Bounce, Sleep Quality, Positivity, Focus, Fulfilment and Compassion are all strength factors that correlate with wellbeing and resilience.

In all of these factors, New Zealand data trends lower through the period of Covid even though, some scores are initially higher. Why have human factors trended in negative directions despite a relatively mild Covid-19 disruption? Other regions show a positive response to a much more severe outbreak as measured by mortality, morbidity and economic disruption. We encourage readers to reflect on what this means. See table 6 below.

The Good

New Zealand employers who have invested in Resilience Assessment and Training – almost all of which has been digital – are seeing clear and measurable improvements in almost all factors of resilience. The resilience ratios are increasing. The number of people at risk is decreasing. Anxiety and Worry have dropped markedly post-training. Fulfilment has increased markedly post training. The response of New Zealand employees is generally better than our global sample. People can learn to bounce, grow, connect and discover flow.

The Bad

When we measure resilience and human factor scores over time – September 2019 to February 2021, New Zealand resilience has declined over this period. In contrast, globally scores on the same assessment have actually increased. Ironically, New Zealand started at a slightly higher position pre-covid and ended lower when compared with global data.

One wonders how people who do not have support from their organisation are coping, let alone those who have lost their jobs.

The Ugly

New Zealand is celebrated as the country with the best COVID-19 response. Our people have been relatively unscathed when compared with the covid impact in our major markets such as UK, Europe and the US. Yet, we have not responded as positively.

While global data shows strong bounce and growth under adversity, New Zealand has failed to bounce and appears to be more fragile.

Where is our bounce? How is it that employees in supportive organisations are seeing their resilience decline over time? Both Stanford Medical and Noah Yuval Harari have recently cautioned against extreme lockdowns.

How resilient would we be if COVID-19 resurges?

Key Messages

Patterns of resilience in sustained adversity (Coronavirus Pandemic)

Tracking resilience scores over the past eighteen months in three defined periods – Pre-Covid (1), Early Covid (2) and Late Covid (3), demonstrates regional differences. Pre-Covid Europe and New Zealand had the highest ratios. While Europe sustained its resilience through the following periods, New Zealand actually dropped markedly. South-East Asia, Australia, UK and the US all increased their resilience through these periods. Interestingly the USA/Canada region started and finished at the lowest level.

Questions: It appears that strictly enforced lockdowns (New Zealand, UK (period 3) and Europe (period 3) correlate with reductions in employee resilience. Despite significant disruption due to morbidity and mortality in US, Canada, UK and Europe, we see resilience being sustained and increasing. As demonstrated in a paper from Stanford in December 2020, mandatory stay-at-home and business closures are not justified (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/eci.13484).

Global growth in resilience

The tables below show the growth of strength factors measured pre and post training and the reduction in risk factors. The Growth ratio is calculated as difference between mean pre and post scores divided by standard deviation. N = 1,385.

Growth in strength factors post training (n = 1,385)

Reduction in risk factors post training (n = 1,385)

Essential services outperform those working from home

Interestingly, Food production, an industry that has been deemed an essential service, shows the most significant growth in resilience after training. This suggests that business closure has a marked effect on resilience growth.

The positive impact of New Zealand interventions to support bounce and growth

Examining as sample of Pre-training assessments in the first six months of Covid with Post-training assessments in the second six months, demonstrates the gains in resilience scores achieved with digital interventions. These include the individual reports and recommendations, training videos, practice tips and webinars. In this case, we see that New Zealand employees enjoy a very positive return on the investment by their employers.

It is notable that the most marked gains were achieved in under thirty and female populations. Both these groups started lower than average and showed significantly more gains that the average and male populations.

The reductions in Anxiety and Worry which are both associated with anxiety disorders, is marked. Fulfilment, of our leading predictors of high resilience, increaseas in all groups. Young people secure large gains in Positivity and Focus as well.

Critical strength factors to build through adversity

Over the past four years we have tracked the resilience factors that correlate with the highest levels of resilience. The selected factors have strong psychometrics, established correlations with high resilience ratios, and are scored high by those in the top 10% of resilience scores.

We rank them in terms of the difference between the top 10% and bottom 10% of scores.

For example, in the case of presence in 2020, 96% of people in the top 10% of resilience ratios score this factor as ‘very often’ or ‘nearly always’. In comparison, only 6% of those in the bottom 10% of resilience ratios, score this factor as ‘very often’ or ‘nearly always’.

While there are small variations over time, there is a clear signal that helping people to bounce, grow, connect and find flow can be accelerated if we focus on the right skills to build. Right now, there is a call to action for Presence, Fulfilment, Focus, Bounce, Optimism and Vitality.

In the same way, we can identify which risks the top 10% manage well as compared to the lowest 10%. This should encourage organisation and wellbeing solutions to focus on understanding and mastering Worry, Fatigue, Self Critical, Ruminatin, Anxiety and Apathy.

The message to younger populations

It is clear from our data across all regions that resilience ratio increases with age. It is no surprise that the resilience ratio for people under thirty is lower than all other groups. This is particularly marked in New Zealand.

The five key stengths that young people lag behind on, includes Assertiveness, Purpose, Focus, Decisiveness and Tactical Calm. The five risks where young people stuggle include Uncertainty, Boredom, Worry, Rumination and Sleep Delay.

The message to female participants

Female participants lag behind the average on the following strengths: Decisiveness, Tactical Calm, Impulse Control, Fitness and Assertiveness. Post training, we see a marked growth (30% or more) in Relaxation, Assertiveness, Contemplation, Decisiveness, Sleep Quality, Fitness, Purpose and Impulse Control. This demonstrates training is meeting the needs of this group in strength building.

The risks where female participants struggle include: Chronic Distress Symptoms, Fatigue, Self Doubt, Sloth and Apathy. Post training, we see a marked reduction (~30%)  in risks such as Self Critical, Fatigue, Self Doubt, Sloth and Chronic Symptoms. Once again, training is meeting the needs of this growth.