Research unveiled by the Hidden Brain Drain task force last month has revealed the worsening state of 'extreme working' by organisations' top talent.
"Two years ago 45% of top management said they had 'extreme jobs', where they worked an average of 73 hours per week," said Hidden Brain Drain task-force director Sylvia Ann Hewlett.
"Today we can report this has dramatically worsened. The average number of hours worked by top talent is now nine hours more - 82 hours: 50% of extreme workers are now so exhausted they said they were 'speechless' by the time they got home, and had no energy in their relationships." She added: "Children of those with extreme jobs were found to be having issues at school."
According to Hewlett, the two-year-long research concludes "companies are taking top talent for granted". She said: "Anyone worth their salt will be looking for new pastures after having to endure what they have to."
Hewlett said companies have to play a greater role in promoting diversity, in particular protecting the lives of women who rise through management ranks.
Helen Wyatt, HR strategy leader at Unilever, who attended the launch of the research, said this was one issue the company was having to face: "Around 55% of our graduate intake is women, but by the first management level it falls to 41%, and by the next it is down to 30%." She used the research to announce how the company aims to have 50% of all management positions filled by women by 2012.
Attendee Caroline Waters, HR director, BT (pictured) added: "When we opened up more continuous dialogue with our talent pool, we found 34% of them wanted more flexibility and opportunities to move around and work when they want to. We allowed this and, as a result, our top talent attrition is now just 2%."
Hewlett said: "People still have a desire to feel proud of the company they work for, but they are being tested to breaking point. The changes we have seen in the past two years shows that any flexibility top performers once had in their working lives now seems to be lost."
