Don’t stress out
February 12, 2008
The Health and Safety Executive’s (HSE) statistics on work-related stress are quite alarming: work-related stress accounts for over a third of all new incidences of ill health, and a total of 13.8 million working days were lost to work-related stress, depression and anxiety in 2006/07. It’s not surprising when British employees work longer hours than in any other country in Europe. On top of costly sickness absence, stress also causes loss of productivity, higher turnover and will inevitably have an indirect effect on customer satisfaction.
Employers have duties under health and safety legislation to assess the risk of work-related stress within the workplace, and also to take measures to control that risk, but how many employers actually carry out a formal stress-related risk assessment, or even know how to do it? The HSE has a wealth of excellent practical advice on managing stress in the workplace, including how to carry out a risk assessment. The Management Standards for work related stress are a set of standards to help employers minimise the negative effects of stress, and the information helps to identify the gap between current practice and ideal conditions. The standards highlight six key areas of work that can potentially lead to stress, including the amount of support provided, the amount of control an employee has over their own work, and the ways in which organisational change is managed. All the information relating to work related stress and the management standards is available at www.hse.gov.uk/stress.
Ways of trying to reduce stress include ensuring that jobs are designed effectively and the responsibilities are appropriate for the level of the role and the person carrying it out. Additionally, employees need to be able to speak to managers about their role, and receive feedback, support and encouragement. The opportunity to have a regular break away from the work environment will give employees much needed relaxation that will make them more productive when they return to their desk or workstation. This might mean providing a staff room, or even an outside space where employees can get fresh air and stretch their legs, (obviously this depends on the size and location of the workplace). Workplace relationships can have an effect on stress levels, and organisations must ensure that they take steps to identify and stop negative activities such as bullying.
Workplace stress is such a common issue in the UK, and has such a huge effect on many areas of managing people and businesses that it is something that no employer can afford to ignore.
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I think this issue is being recognised as a increasingly important issue to address.
I have quite a few large corporate clients in Cheshire who even go to the lengths of having a hypnotherapist, life coach or therapist to spend a few hours each week seeing staff members in their breaks / lunchtimes.