Administrative burden and workload are among the reasons that could push up to 16% of Quebec social workers to leave their jobs within two years, reveals a CROP survey carried out on behalf of the Order of Social Workers and marriage and family therapists from Quebec, the results of which were made public on Monday.
According to the Order, this means that up to 2,400 social workers consider it “likely” or “very likely” that they will leave their profession within two years.
Among those who took part in the survey, 39% claimed that tasks and administrative burden were a source of unhappiness for them at work, while 19% deplored a workload that was too high.
These results prove that there is “deep distress among these professionals which the Quebec government must address immediately,” argued the president of the Order of Social Workers and Marriage and Family Therapists of Quebec, Pierre-Paul Malenfant .
“This trend worries us greatly, because in the end, if TS break down and leave the profession, it is the population who will pay the price. Not only could the quality and availability of services be compromised, but the pressure on the shoulders of the remaining HCWs will be exacerbated,” he warned in a press release.
According to the Order, social workers work in a context where “a single form can take up up to three hours of work with a user”, which can harm their ability to “spend more time in the field in direct contact with people in need.
Survey respondents also cited a lack of resources (15%) and insufficient recognition (14%) when asked about their sources of unhappiness at work.
In the opinion of Mr. Malenfant, the arrival of Santé Québec, the new agency which will have the mandate to coordinate the operations of the health network, “represents an opportunity to review the conditions of practice and the methods of evaluation of performance to adapt them to the aims and reality of social services”.
The results of the survey were revealed Monday to mark Social Workers Week, which runs until Saturday.
The CROP survey was conducted from January 23 to February 19. Of the 16,155 members of the Order who were invited to respond to the questionnaire, which was aimed at TS working full-time or part-time, 5134 responded.
The maximum margin of error, calculated using a 95% confidence level, is 1.13%.