How Feeling Unsafe at Work Affects Employee Behaviour and Business Performance

Most employees say they feel safe at work. Yet many of those same employees experience situations that leave them worried about their personal safety. A late shift, an unfamiliar location or a difficult interaction can change how safe someone feels, even if no incident takes place.

That difference matters to employers. Peoplesafe’s research report, The Hidden Safety Signal, examines how perceptions of safety affect people’s behaviour, confidence and willingness to work. Based on surveys, focus groups and interviews, the research shows that organisations can face consequences long before a concern appears in an incident log.

What does The Hidden Safety Signal research reveal?

• 92% said they felt very or somewhat safe at work, yet 51% had felt unsafe at least once in the past year.
• 40% said safety concerns had led them to change their behaviour or working situation.
• 23% said feeling unsafe had negatively affected their productivity, while 29% reported an effect on mental wellbeing.
• 16% turned down work because they felt unsafe, and 7% took time off because of safety concerns.
• 66% said a personal safety solution would make them feel safer.

Taken together, these findings show why safety conversations need to go beyond reported incidents. Employee experience is also an important source of information about where support may be missing.

Safety is contextual, not fixed

An employee might feel safe during a well-staffed daytime shift but less secure when working alone at night. Someone visiting a familiar workplace may feel confident one day and uneasy the next because the environment, people present or access to support has changed.

That helps explain why 92% of workers reported feeling generally safe, while 51% also remembered feeling unsafe at least once during the previous year. Feeling safe overall does not mean every task, location or interaction feels safe.

The report also found that 32% of workers who had never reported a workplace safety concern had nevertheless felt unsafe in the preceding year. Employers who rely only on complaints or incident records may therefore miss concerns that people are experiencing but have not formally raised.

How feeling unsafe changes the way people work

Two in five workers (40%) said safety concerns caused them to change their behaviour or working situation. Across the surveys and focus groups, employees described avoiding particular places or people, seeking support from colleagues, changing how they completed tasks, and becoming more alert to their surroundings.

These precautions may help employees feel more in control, but they can also divert time and attention from the work itself. Someone who is constantly checking exits or watching for potential threats has less capacity to concentrate on customers, patients, appointments or other responsibilities.

This is an important safety signal in its own right. Changes in behaviour can reveal concern before an accident, confrontation or formal report, and may indicate that existing support arrangements need reviewing.

The business impact of employees feeling unsafe

The consequences extend beyond personal discomfort. In the research, 23% said feeling unsafe had negatively affected their productivity, which is an increase from the 18% recorded in our research from 2025. A further 29% reported an impact on mental wellbeing and 7% said they had taken time off work because of safety concerns.

Safety concerns also affected participation in work. 16% of respondents had turned down work because they felt unsafe, and the research recorded people declining overtime, avoiding particular locations or considering leaving their employer. This is illustrated in a quote taken from a healthcare worker we interviewed:

Hearing that from the employer’s point of view, they didn’t lose this worker to an incident, they lost her to a feeling and they probably never knew why.

For organisations, these findings point to performance issues that show up in productivity, in absence, in recruitment and in turnover. They don’t establish a single financial cost for every business, but they show how unresolved safety concerns can affect performance well before a serious incident occurs.

What role can personal safety technology play?

Two-thirds of workers (66%) said a personal safety solution would make them feel safer. Employees described wanting reassurance that help was available, that someone knew how to respond and that support would arrive reliably when needed.

Depending on the role and level of risk, monitored lone worker devices and apps can provide a direct way to raise an alarm. Peoplesafe’s 24/7 Alarm Receiving Centre is staffed by trained Controllers who assess alerts and follow agreed escalation procedures. These services can offer additional reassurance when employees work alone, travel or encounter threatening behaviour.

Technology is one part of the answer, not a replacement for a positive safety culture. Employees also need suitable staffing, clear procedures, effective risk assessments and managers who listen and act.

Why incident data alone is not enough to measure workplace safety

Incident reports remain essential. They help employers investigate what happened, identify recurring hazards and improve procedures. The limitation is that they capture only what has been reported, not every moment someone feels vulnerable or changes their behaviour to avoid risk.

A more complete picture of workplace safety combines recorded incidents with employees’ perceptions and the actions they take when they feel unsafe. Employers can ask where and when people feel less secure, whether they are avoiding certain duties or locations, and what would give them greater confidence.

This feedback can inform lone working risk assessments, staffing arrangements, reporting processes and safety controls. Repeating the questions over time can also help organisations understand whether changes are improving employees’ experience of safety.

Practical ways employers can respond to hidden safety concerns

• Ask employees about specific situations, times and locations where they feel unsafe, not only whether incidents have occurred.
• Watch for changes in behaviour, including avoided tasks, requests for colleagues to accompany visits, and reluctance to work certain shifts.
• Make reporting straightforward, acknowledge concerns and tell people what action has been taken.
• Review risk assessments, staffing, lone-working procedures and access to dependable help.
• Measure employee perceptions alongside incident trends, absence and other relevant workforce indicators.

The aim is not to replace established health and safety measures. It is to recognise an earlier indication of risk and respond before concerns become more serious.

Employee safety starts with understanding how people feel

The findings from The Hidden Safety Signal challenge the assumption that low incident numbers necessarily mean workers feel secure. People can generally feel safe yet still experience moments of vulnerability, and those experiences can influence how they work.

Employers who listen to employees, watch for changes in behaviour, and provide reliable routes to support are better equipped to identify concerns that formal reporting might miss. Understanding perceptions of safety is therefore an important part of protecting people and supporting business performance.

Explore the full findings, methodology and recommendations in Peoplesafe’s The Hidden Safety Signal research report.