You are highly engaged and committed to organizational objectives. But you feel held back, like your company’s ecosystem is somehow working against you. You also wonder if your job fit and opportunities for growth are appropriately matched to your high level of personal and professional motivation.

According to a new study released by Hay Group’s Insight Research arm, this type of employee - “the frustrated employee” - represents 20% or more of the total workforce. They even captured the voice of this frustrated employee through a quote from a survey respondent:

“I need support, and my manager and his boss are not doing their best to provide it. I am inundated with work, and I end up staying here late each night. I root for the company and I think we are one of the good guys in the industry. I like my job despite this situation and I think things will change for the better eventually. But waiting for that time to come is very challenging. I’m almost ready to throw in the towel.” Hay Group Insight Employee Survey Respondent

Hay added that the finger often needs to be pointed right at the organization for their lack of support for these highly engaged but increasingly demotivated employees. They added that this is symptomatic of broader issues, including the fact that 40% of employees surveyed felt that “the amount of work expected of them is unreasonable and that stress levels in their jobs are a real problem”.

This issue may best be summed up with a quote from Thomas Britt’s 2003 Harvard Business Review Article, entitled “Black Hawk Down at Work”. In his piece, Britt explored frustration among one of the US Army’s most elite units, the Rangers.

“For these high performers, factors they can’t control—role ambiguity, inadequate resources, and overwork itself—can hinder their best work and drive them to seek jobs elsewhere. The ones who stay behind may well be the ones who just don’t care.”

Let’s keep the conversation going.

This past Saturday, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) released a report entitled, Depression Among Adults Employed Full-time by Occupancy Category. According to the study, 7% of full-time workers in the US had a “major depressive episode (MDE)” in the past year, with part-time workers at 9.3 % and unemployed at a whopping 12.7%.

SAMHSA examined 21 major occupational categories among workers ages 18 to 64. The rankings in the table below show a percentage of those experiencing a MDE in the past twelve months:

Women were found to be more than twice as likely as men to experience a MDE, and those aged 18 to 25 were at a higher percentage than their older counterparts.

SAMHSA concluded that these challenges can significantly impact a person’s ability to perform routine activities at work, costing an estimated $30 to $44 billion dollars per year in lost productivity, employee absenteeism and low morale.

Let’s keep the conversation going.

When RSM McGladrey embarked on their 2007 Survey of Women Business Owners, they elected to expand their scope in order to capture more compelling and holistic results. In partnership with the University of Chicago’s Graduate School of Business, as well as the Committee of 200 and the National Association of Women Business Owners, over 650 respondents were surveyed across 35 states.

The findings are fascinating. For example, more than two-thirds of those surveyed are married, and a similar percentage have children. Forty percent had a post-graduate education (compared to 9% of the entire female labor force) and nearly forty percent of those businesses in the top revenue category started their organizations between the ages of 20 and 29.

These women started young, are well educated and willing to take risks (often applying their personal home as collateral and using up the majority of their savings). They tend to favor logic over intuition and believe they are more optimistic and confident than others. Their biggest business challenge ahead? The economy, say forty eight percent of those surveyed.

So what made them take the leap of faith? Over two-thirds wanted to be their own boss and have more flexibility, and nearly half simply wanted to make an idea succeed. And their primary long-term goal? To generate enough income to provide for a comfortable life, which is really all that most of us are trying to achieve.

Let’s keep the conversation going.

There are certain undeniable truths for all who have pandered their wares to industry analysts:

1) Bring your corporate checkbook, because you are always on the clock;
2) Briefings start at 8am, following a long night of dinner, drinks, parties and schmoozing;
3) The intent of your words will filter through a childlike game of telephone before landing out of context in an industry report; and
4) You will never be rated as highly as you think you deserve.

Despite all of this, executives will hoist charts, graphs and questionable third-party sources into the air like Simba if by some chance an analyst crowns you king of your particular jungle. My disdain is not for the analysts themselves, but instead sits with the entire ecosystem, which pretends that pay-to-play doesn’t occur, and lets customers assume that unbiased information is being conveyed.

Imagine my chagrin when a friend turned me on to Greg the Architect, a tongue-in-cheek attempt by TIBCO Software to educate through sarcasm. And the coup de gras? An episode entitled “Off the Grid”, described as:

When a snag in a supply application irks the boss of Techrotech’s distribution center, Greg must journey beyond the mystic grid to seek the truth behind the industry analyst’s recommendation. Will Greg be left hanging?

I wonder how TIBCO’s analysts have enjoyed this video. Take a look for yourself and you will laugh at the not so subtle unearthing of the truth about analysts. Enjoy!

Let’s keep the conversation going.