Hello and welcome to Work Week, the podcast where we tackle one big question about the rapidly evolving workplace, explore what the research says about the issue, and explain what it all means for you.

I’m Dr. Gabby Burlacu, Senior Manager at The Upwork Research Institute. What you’re hearing today is a digital proxy of my voice — created by our team with the help of AI.

Today, we’re digging into a topic that has implications for organizations, leaders, and workers. 

The big question for this week is: Why do fewer than half of U.S. workers hold quality jobs?

For many, today’s labor market feels uncertain. While unemployment is relatively stable, many organizations are implementing hiring freezes or organizational restructures. Workers across industries are navigating economic pressures, technological disruption, and shifting expectations. Amid these challenges, questions about what makes a job truly sustainable and fulfilling are coming into sharper focus.

Are the jobs people hold today supporting their long-term well-being, growth, and stability? Or are they leaving workers feeling stuck, burned out, or undervalued?

Let’s look at what the data shows.

Gallup’s American Job Quality Study twenty twenty-five found that only forty percent of U.S. workers hold what Gallup defines as “quality jobs.” The report is based on a survey of eighteen thousand U.S. workers across industries, demographics, and employment types. 

According to Gallup, quality jobs are characterized by five essential components: fair pay and benefits, a safe and respectful workplace, opportunities for growth, a meaningful voice in decision-making, and sustainable schedules. If you're tuning in around the time of this episode’s release — during the week of Thanksgiving in the U.S. — having a job that meets all five criteria is certainly something to be thankful for.

However, as the research shows, the majority of workers — sixty percent — are in jobs that fall short in one or more of these critical areas. And these gaps matter. The quality of a job directly influences a person’s overall well-being, as well their job satisfaction and long-term engagement with work. In fact, the research also shows that fifty-eight percent of individuals in quality jobs are highly satisfied at work, compared to twenty-three percent not in quality jobs. When job quality is low, quality of life suffers, burnout and turnover increase, and businesses face serious risks to productivity and morale.

How did the workforce end up here — and perhaps more importantly, what can leaders and individuals do to change the trajectory?

To answer this, we need to look beyond the surface of job titles and compensation packages. Because at the root of job quality is something more foundational — how work is designed, and how workers are treated.

A key insight from Gallup’s research is the role of leadership in shaping job quality. Leadership influences everything — from how roles are structured to how much autonomy workers have over their time. In fact, Gallup found that sixty-two percent of U.S. workers say they lack control over their work schedules. This isn’t a small issue — schedule control has become one of the most important factors in job satisfaction and retention.

When workers can’t make decisions about when and how they work — when they’re forced to trade away personal priorities, health needs, or family time for rigid scheduling demands — the result goes beyond frustration. A lack of flexibility can lead to declines in well-being, engagement, and loyalty. Workers may begin to feel like cogs in a machine rather than human contributors to a shared mission.

But schedule control is only one part of the picture. A quality job also includes the ability to grow. And yet, the Gallup research shows that one in four workers say they have no opportunities for advancement or promotion. A quarter of the workforce is stuck in place, without a clear path forward.  

Moreover, data from The Upwork Research Institute shows that many organizations are also falling short in worker development. Our Future Workforce Index twenty twenty-five found that twenty-nine percent of business leaders don’t feel comfortable with employees pursuing self-development — even on critical topics like AI — outside the organization’s four walls. And yet traditional corporate learning systems often fall behind the pace of evolving tools and skills. 

If workers can’t develop themselves within the organization’s structure, and they’re discouraged from doing so on their own, they are left in jobs that feel static. Jobs that offer a paycheck, but not progress. 

And whether their job helps a person grow and thrive is a key factor that separates a run-of-the-mill job from a quality job. When workers don’t see a visible career trajectory or a way to build skills or step into more challenging roles, motivation fades.

These are not issues that can be solved by tweaking perks or adding another performance review. They require structural changes — changes that only leaders can make.

Leaders are accountable for job quality through their day-to-day decisions. Whether consciously or not, leaders shape the employee experience by how they set schedules, assign work, create feedback loops, and provide development opportunities. These decisions determine whether employees feel like passive recipients of work or active contributors with agency and purpose.

This goes beyond formal HR policies. Job quality is shaped by whether leaders foster environments where people feel seen, heard, and valued. That means creating space for employees to contribute ideas, supporting their growth, and recognizing their impact. Do workers have a say in how their work is done? Are they given the tools to succeed, and the space to develop new skills? Are their contributions recognized — not just with a paycheck, but with purpose?

These are the questions that shape quality jobs in today’s workforce.

The Future Workforce Index provides a powerful counterpoint to traditional full-time employment models — by looking at the experience of skilled freelancers. The research shows that, in many cases, freelancers report a healthier relationship with their work than their full-time, in-house counterparts — one marked by greater autonomy, optimism, and alignment with personal well-being.

Eighty-three percent of skilled freelancers surveyed for The Future Workforce Index said their work contributes positively to their physical, mental, and emotional well-being. This is a stark contrast to the rising burnout reported by many full-time employees. But to be clear, the benefits that freelancers realize to their health and well-being aren’t due to their status as a freelancer, but to the controls that freelancing gives them over their own careers. When people have greater control over their schedule and client base, when they can determine how and when they upskill, and when they can negotiate their rates against a fair market, they’re more likely to thrive.

In fact, eighty-two percent of skilled freelancers believe they have more work opportunities available to them now than they did one year ago — compared to sixty-three percent of full-time employees. Freelancers are optimistic about the future. And they’re not waiting for an employer to grant them permission to grow — they are proactively upskilling, developing new capabilities, and building dynamic careers that suit their lives.

What we’re seeing here is a clear pattern: autonomy, flexibility, and agency are key components of a quality work experience. And for many, freelancing is enabling these qualities in ways traditional employment struggles to match.

Take the success story of freelancer Catherine Marsden as an example. After feeling stuck in her long-time career in nonprofits and research — and with no clear path forward — she decided to try freelancing on Upwork. What began as a short-term experiment quickly turned into a career transformation. Today, Catherine is a full-time freelance virtual assistant, researcher, and data analyst who travels the world while doing work she enjoys and feeling a sense of purpose in her career. 

What makes freelancing work for Catherine is the level of control she now has. She chooses which clients to work with, sets her own schedule, and defines success on her own terms. This wasn’t possible in her previous full-time, in-house roles.

The data about freelancers’ well-being and Catherine’s success story don’t suggest freelancing is perfect or that every worker should leave their job to become independent. But this information does challenge leaders to rethink what defines a good job. Because in today’s workforce, job quality is less about a fixed structure and more about a dynamic, human-centered design.

Even in traditional employment settings, leaders can create quality jobs by reimagining roles with more autonomy, providing schedule flexibility, and building systems that support career development. 

So what does this look like in practice?

First, ensure fair pay and benefits. Conduct regular pay equity reviews and benchmark compensation against the market — both during hiring and throughout the employee experience.

Second, create safe and respectful workplaces. Prioritize psychological safety, invest in inclusive management training, and hold everyone — including yourself — accountable for the environment you shape.

Third, support opportunities for growth. Build pathways for internal mobility, encourage skill development, and make room for employees to stretch into new roles, even when the path isn’t linear.

Fourth, elevate employee voices. Create structures for shared decision-making — whether through regular feedback loops, cross-functional working groups, or rotating project leadership.

And fifth, make sustainable and predictable schedules and give individuals more control over when and how they work — with flexible start times, clear workload planning, and room for asynchronous collaboration when possible.

If you’re a leader, you have a choice. You can continue to define jobs by their inputs such as hours, tasks, and rules. Or you can design them to include worker-centric outcomes like fulfillment, development, and well-being. When job quality rises, so does productivity. So does innovation. So does retention.

Let’s wrap, as we always do, with an action step you can implement immediately and a question to reflect on throughout the week.

First, your action step: Take stock of the roles on your team. Choose one and ask yourself — does this role provide fair pay, opportunity for growth, schedule flexibility, and a meaningful voice in how work gets done? If not, what would it take to make that a reality? Then ask the person in that role the same questions. Their answers may surprise you. From there, you can replicate this process for roles across your organization. 

And your reflection for the week: What would it mean for your leadership legacy if every job on your team became higher quality? What if your influence could be measured not in revenue alone, but in the number of people whose roles were made more sustainable and fulfilling — simply because you chose to lead differently?

This is the heart of job quality. And this is the future of work all leaders have the power to build.

Thank you for listening to this episode of Work Week. I’m Gabby Burlacu and if this week’s topic sparked ideas for you — or challenged how you think about jobs in your own organization — share it with a colleague or leave a review. And make sure to subscribe for the latest updates about the future of work.