Glassdoor Employee Confidence Index: Shaky Start to 2024
Daniel Zhao
Chief Economist at Glassdoor | Jan 29, 2024
Employee confidence took another step down to kick off 2024, according to the latest data from the Glassdoor Employee Confidence Index. The share of employees reporting a positive 6-month business outlook fell to 45.6% in January 2024, down from 47.5% in December 2023 and now at the lowest level since our data began in 2016. Despite a modest upward trend to close 2023, employee confidence is starting off the year on shaky footing.
With more layoffs in the headlines, job security remains top of mind for employees. The share of reviews talking about layoffs continues to rise, increasing further in January and up 27% year-over-year. Even though measured layoffs remain at historically low levels, discussions of layoffs in Glassdoor reviews are higher now than they were in 2019, before the pandemic.
Another reason that employee confidence may be muted is that the hiring rate has dropped sharply over the last year. Hiring is one of the most visible indicators that employees have of a company’s business performance. Aggressive hiring plans signal leaderships’ confidence in the company’s growth potential and often tangibly provides more opportunities for existing employees to grow their careers. Conversely, hiring freezes signal that leaders are worried and can block opportunities for promotion or growth.
Hiring freezes are a less common topic than layoffs, but they were higher in 2023, up 81% year-over-year. And, in 2023, only 23% of reviews that mention hiring freezes report a positive business outlook, confirming that employees view slower hiring as a strong negative signal about their employers’ health.
Source: https://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Employee-Review-GEODIS-RVW83001700.htm
Employee Confidence by Industry
- Employee confidence in the Information sector was largely unchanged in January, dropping only 0.1pp to 48.2%. Despite layoffs in tech continuing to make headlines in 2024, tech job losses have been relatively muted and instead weaker sentiment may be the result of a sudden reversal from the aggressive hiring in 2021 and 2022.
- Leisure & hospitality (-1.5pp) and transportation & warehousing (-1.6pp) saw large drops in January, possibly due to the cold snap affecting much of the United States, limiting travel and recreation.
- Surprisingly, education and health services have seen a substantial decline in employee confidence in January 2024, falling -1.4pp month-over-month, or -6.4pp year-over-year. Despite strong hiring in education and health services over the course of 2023, employees are still feeling unsure about the health of the industry.
Glassdoor Employee Confidence Index by Industry
| Industry | Jan 2023 | Dec 2023 | Jan 2024 | MoM | YoY |
| Construction | 60.9% | 59.8% | 59.5% | -0.3% | -1.5% |
| Education and health services | 52.8% | 47.8% | 46.4% | -1.4% | -6.4% |
| Financial activities | 56.3% | 50.8% | 50.4% | -0.4% | -5.9% |
| Information | 56.8% | 48.2% | 48.2% | -0.1% | -8.7% |
| Leisure and hospitality | 45.4% | 41.6% | 40.1% | -1.5% | -5.4% |
| Manufacturing | 52.6% | 46.5% | 46.2% | -0.2% | -6.4% |
| Other services | 50.0% | 45.0% | 44.1% | -0.9% | -5.9% |
| Professional and business services | 61.6% | 54.6% | 53.5% | -1.1% | -8.1% |
| Public administration | 48.6% | 41.8% | 45.5% | 3.8% | -3.1% |
| Retail trade | 44.7% | 38.6% | 37.8% | -0.8% | -6.9% |
| Transportation and warehousing | 51.7% | 45.0% | 43.5% | -1.6% | -8.2% |
| Utilities | 60.8% | 54.2% | 51.3% | -2.9% | -9.5% |
| Wholesale trade | 55.9% | 50.7% | 48.6% | -2.1% | -7.3% |
Source: https://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Employee-Review-Dito-RVW83237114.htm
Employee Confidence by Seniority
Employee confidence fell the most for mid-level employees in January 2024, declining to 48.9%, just a hair above entry-level employees at 48.8%. Ongoing layoffs have targeted layers of middle management as companies attempt to reduce bureaucracy and increase efficiency, putting more strain on middle managers.
Source: https://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Employee-Review-Clean-Plate-Restaurants-RVW83358227.htm
Methodology
The Glassdoor Employee Confidence Index is a new report that provides a real-time pulse on the economy from the lens of employees. As one of the world’s leading sites for insights on jobs and companies, Glassdoor collects tens of thousands of employee ratings of their employers’ six-month business outlook (rated as “positive”, “neutral” or “negative”) each month.
The index is the share of U.S. full-time and part-time employees who report a positive six-month business outlook for their employer. The index is reweighted to account for changes in the platform and by industry to match a nationally representative mix of employee ratings by industry. Data presented at the industry and seniority level are three-month trailing averages.
Data on the use of terms and phrases in Glassdoor reviews is not reweighted. Term usage is normalized by the total number of reviews in the month.
Data for January 2024 is current as of January 21, 2024. In subsequent updates, we will revise partial or preliminary data from previous months.
To read more about the Glassdoor Employee Confidence Index, please read our launch paper.
Daniel Zhao
Daniel Zhao is Chief Economist at Glassdoor. On Glassdoor's Economic Research team, he has conducted research using Glassdoor's unique data on a variety of topics affecting job seekers and employers ranging from the health of the job market to pay transparency to employee engagement & retention. His work has been cited in publications like the New York Times, the Harvard Business Review and more. Prior to joining the Economic Research team, he also worked on improving the user experience for Glassdoor’s consumer jobs product and mobile app. He holds a bachelor's degree in applied mathematics and economics from Harvard College.
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