GOC workforce survey illustrates time and commercial pressures

A survey by the General Optical Council (GOC) has highlighted concerns around time and commercial pressures in practice, with the regulator planning to launch a thematic review on commercial practices and patient safety.

The GOC’s 2025 Workforce and Perceptions Surveygained more than 3700 responses, and included new questions on pressures in the workplace in order to understand some of the challenges of the working environment in more detail.

A significant proportion of respondents shared that they had sometimes or frequently experienced time and commercial pressures in their role within the last 12 months, the GOC learned – with 48% of optometrist respondents reporting that they found the standard time allocated to conduct a sight test insufficient to provide safe patient care.

Respondents reported pressure to see a high number of patients each day, affecting their ability to provide safe patient care (38%), with 33% reporting feeling under pressure to sell certain types of glasses or contact lenses.

The survey also found that 30% of respondents felt under pressure to meet commercial targets at the expense of patient care sometimes or frequently, while 22% felt under pressure to sell a product or service which they considered was not needed by the patient.

Steve Brooker, director of regulatory strategy at the GOC, commented: “This year’s research highlights the continuing challenges that registrants face in daily clinical practice due to features of their working environment and the troubling impact this has on their wellbeing and on their ability to provide safe patient care.”

He said: “It’s concerning how many registrants reported these pressures occurring sometimes or frequently. These registrants were more likely to report finding it difficult to provide patients with the sufficient level of care they need, suggesting a link between these pressures and patient safety.”

The GOC will launch a thematic review on commercial practices and patient safety, Brooker said: “to better understand how we can support registrants and protect the public.”

The GOC will run a series of conversations around the topic on LinkedIn, in order to hear directly from registrants about their views and experiences.

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The GOC’s survey found that overall job satisfaction had dipped, with 55% of respondents reporting feeling satisfied in their role over the past 12 months. This is compared to 58% in 2024, and 62% in 2023.

The survey found that 44% of respondents reported experiencing harassment, bullying, or abuse at their work or place of study, and 29% experienced discrimination at their work or place of study in the last 12 months.

Last year, the survey found that half of respondents reported experiencing harassment, bullying, or abuse in the past year, and 31% reported experiences of discrimination.

As a result of the 2024 findings, the GOC launched a research project to explore registrant experiences of challenging working environments. Read more about the outcomes of the research here.

New for 2025, the survey included questions on supervision – finding that 20% of working optometrist respondents had worked as a supervisor for pre-registration trainee optometrists in the past 12 months.

More than half of supervisors surveyed (62%) shared that their motivations were wanting to help others join the professions. However, respondents described experiencing pressure around time management and workload.

The GOC also heard that the most common reasons for joining the optical professions were an interest in eye health and eye care (67%), and wanting to help people (55%).