Employees look to leaders as study finds gap between workplace promises and employee experience
A survey of UK employees has revealed that more than half experience a mismatch between what their employer says and what they do in practice, with many looking to leadership behaviour when judging an organisation's true values.
By Helen Breese | Published on 13 October 2026
Categories: Press office; Research; Nottingham Business School;
The research by Nottingham Business School (NBS), part of Nottingham Trent University, surveyed more than 1,170 people working in medium and large organisations across a range of sectors, including healthcare, education, finance and public services.
Workers were asked whether their employer lived up to its stated values, if day-to-day behaviours match diversity, equality and inclusion and wellbeing policies, and whether leaders’ actions and hiring and promotion decisions reflect the values the organisation claims to have.
The largest reported gap concerned wellbeing. 53% said there was either a strong contrast or some inconsistency between their workplace's wellbeing policies and what they experienced in everyday behaviour.
Participants also felt that DEI policies didn't always match reality, with around 44% of employees reporting inconsistencies between diversity, equity and inclusion policies and everyday behaviour at work.
In addition, nearly one in five employees (19%) felt their organisation's culture did not align with the values it promotes internally or externally.
However, employees were most likely to trust organisational commitments to wellbeing and inclusion when they saw leaders’ behaviour, recruitment decisions and promotion practices reflecting those commitments in everyday working life.
The findings raise concerns of ‘HR whitewashing’ in UK companies, where organisations make public commitments, but employees don’t see meaningful behavioural or structural change.
Professor Zara Whysall, Professor of Business Psychology at NBS, said: “These findings don’t mean that organisations are deliberately misleading people. Instead, employees often perceive a disconnect between policies and reality – such as receiving wellbeing messages while struggling with an excessive workload or their employer publicly celebrating diversity and inclusion while promotion opportunities are perceived as unequal.
“This is because a policy is much easier to change than organisational culture which requires consistent action from managers and leaders over time.”
Professor Nadia K. Kougiannou, Professor of Work and Employment Relations, added: “A wellbeing or DEI policy has limited credibility if employees encounter workplace practices that contradict it. Managers and senior leaders should be assessed on how they put these commitments into practice, including how they manage workloads, address exclusionary behaviour and make recruitment and promotion decisions.”
Read the full paper HR whitewashing: employee perceptions of policy-practice alignment in UK organisations, published in Employee Relations: The International Journal.