Carewashing alarm. Companies’ investments to make employees feel better are growing (+37% by 2028), but workers don’t realize it. For 4 out of 5 employees, according to a Gallup survey, the company does not really care about the well-being of those who work there. This gap between the initiatives announced by employers and the real daily experience of employees is precisely the so-called carewashing. And it is an essential indicator. Because the search for well-being is increasingly one of the driving forces in the world of work.
The global corporate wellness market is rapidly expanding, going from a current value of almost 70 billion dollars to an estimated 95.8 billion by 2028 (+37%), according to a report by The Business Research Company. However, this positive dynamic does not seem to translate into a real improvement for workers. Only 21% of employees globally (Gallup poll) believe their company cares about their well-being, while the remaining 79% perceive a strong disconnect between statements and facts.
In the face of projects ranging from health screening to psychological support and smart working, growing dissatisfaction remains. The percentage of workers globally who perceive a sincere company commitment to their well-being has fallen dramatically, from 49% in 2020 to 21% in 2024, a reduction of 57%. Behind the phenomenon of carewashing lie structural problems. While many companies focus on cosmetic initiatives, employees continue to report an increase in negative emotions at work: stress (41%), worry (38%), sadness (22%) and even anger (21%). The cost of this disengagement is reflected in the global economy, with an impact estimated at 8.9 trillion dollars (equal to 9% of global GDP).
“The lack of consistency between what companies say and what they actually implement is at the root of this mistrust. For example, promoting mental health workshops in which guidance is provided on how to establish appropriate boundaries between work and private life and, at the same time , not monitoring workloads, inducing people to sacrifice their personal time to respond to tight deadlines, shows how a potentially virtuous initiative can, on the contrary, turn out to be a boomerang for the company that promoted it”, explains Marika Delli Ficorelli, Head of HR of Zeta Service, a company specialized in HR and payroll services which suggests, to overcome carewashing, concrete actions such as ensuring consistency between values and initiatives, personalizing solutions for employees and monitoring the impact of the policies adopted.
Unhappiness was the driving force behind the 42% of Italians who have recently changed jobs or plan to do so soon. The main reason is the search for “physical and mental well-being” (36%), even before the search for career opportunities (survey by the HR Innovation Practice Observatory of the School of Management of the Polytechnic of Milan in collaboration with BVA Doxa). The search for well-being matters more and more to workers and for this reason overcoming carewashing is essential for the new job market.
