Recent study has suggested that Malaysian employees have the highest level of job satisfaction, when compared to its regional counterparts. According to the Qualtrics Asia Pacific Employee Pulse, more than half Malaysians (67 percent) are satisfied with their current jobs. This figure is higher when compared to employees in the neighbouring countries such as Singapore (64 percent) and Hong Kong (50 percent).

However, despite majority employees are being happy at work, the same survey also revealed that less than half of workers are actually looking forward to going to work. Only 45 percent Malaysians answered in positive note, compared with 43 percent of Singaporeans and 34 percent of Hong Kong employees, Free Malaysia Today reports.

Surveyed over than 5,000 fulltime employees from around the world, the study showed that employees that work in the travel and leisure, retail, and utilities, seem to be among the most motivated to show up at work. They are recorded to be enthusiastic about going to work for ‘most of the time’, if not always, with 60 percent employees in travel and leisure agreed with the question, 64 percent in retail, and the highest record by utilities with 100 percent, all far higher than the national average.

See: Lower Unemployment Rate and Fewer Retrenchments for Singaporeans in Q3

Besides job satisfaction, the quarterly survey also focuses on attrition owing to long working hours. Most Malaysians did not see long working hours as a main reason to leave their jobs. Contrary to popular perception, long working hours did not necessarily contribute to high employee turnover rates in Malaysia, the survey said.

Breaking down the figures by sector, the survey revealed that those employed in the finance sector were the least likely to leave their jobs despite the long hours, with only 11 percent expressing such a desire. Meanwhile, 25 percent of those working in media and advertising would want to move from having such long hours. Additionally, half of the respondents in this sector said they worked more than 45 hours a week.

Qualtrics Southeast Asia Head, Foo Mao Gen stated in the report that many employers tend to misinterpret about how their workers feel towards their jobs. “It is not uncommon to assume that longer working hours and high stress levels would naturally lead to a disgruntled and dissatisfied workforce, however, it has been pleasantly surprising to have this fact refuted,” he said.

Read also: India, China, and Vietnam to Lead Salary Increases in Asia Pacific in 2018: Survey