In an earlier post, we here at Safety Matters addressed some of the trend of mental health issues and how they might affect a workplace. We are hopeful that this post provided you with some information about how something that is believed to be so personal and individual and private can have such a profound effect on the public, families, friends, and especially co-workers in terms of distractions, lowered productivity and lower morale.
Mental health issues have been prominent for years in the public, but they have been under the radar, so to speak, in workplaces. In my book, Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Safety, the author touched on drug and alcohol abuse being deemed a disability, and provided some steps on how to best address this sensitive issue in your workplace. Well, in some ways, mental or emotional disorders like burnout, stress, depression and other similar maladies could also be seen as a debilitating problem, where if unchecked, could become sever enough as to dramatically affect job performance, morale, productivity and even attitude of the individual and the team.
[IMAGE CREDIT; St. Patrick’s Hospital via Flickr]For the sake of an occupational health and safety program, workers’ mental and emotional health is just as important as keeping them physically healthy to remain active and productive in the workplace.
And similar to alcohol or drug addiction, depression, anxiety, burnout and similar issues can be observed through signs (which were discussed in the previous post) and there are some things you can do as a senior manager, supervisor or team leader to determine a possible mental or emotional problem and how you might encourage better efforts in the workplace while also being sensitive to the situation the individual is going through. After all, these things are a diseased condition, not usually something that was always a part of the worker, so it is something that can be remedied with the right level of compassion and discipline.
There are some resources to check out in this area, including the Canadian Center for Occupational Health and Safety, and OSHA in the U.S. can direct you to some immediate resources. However, if you are looking for also dedicating mental and emotional issues into your overall health and safety plan in your workplace and not just seeking a quick-fix band-aid solution, we can give you a glimpse into how we would address these issues in our classes, seminars and a future second edition of our book.
Certainly, mental or emotional problems have a definite stigma attached to them, most notably they lend a perception that the individual who is suffering is fragile or weak or irrational. Almost like one of those people who is on the street that we find talking to him or herself. One of the things that would need to be addressed in the workplace – preferably before someone is noted or known to have a problem – is to address the stigma of mental or emotional illness, how to spot it and introduce some coping strategies to help provide support and compassion, rather than runnign away from the person like he or she was a leper.
All management, from senior executives down to team leaders, would be trained in how to spot mental or emotional isues, determine potential triggers in the workplace – such as high-stress tasks – that might contribute to a problem, and to have hem trained on the best way to approach a worker who may have an issue. They people may also be trained on how to find these potential problems even in themselves before tit affects their ability to lead and supervise others.
Workers, like with virtually all health and safety policies that are implemented, should also get on board with this. Workers can and should be trained on what to look for in each other, and be prepared to have a frank talk with a co-worker who might be exhibiting signs of trouble. Workers will get on board if they are trained to understand the value of every worker at full productivity, what a lack of productivity means for the rest of the work force and the effects that emotional or mental problems by one person can affect everyone around like a ripple in a pond.
There are “stress test” forms that can be downloaded so determine employees who may be susceptible to too much stress, and then there are steps that can be taken to ensure that the work environment is as free of stress as is practical. A good health and safety program may already have some employee assistance resources, and management and workers can all be effectively trained (or reminded) of the existence of these resources and how to best talk about them with someone who might need that help but does not realize it or is in denial.
Mental issues by consider someone “crazy,” but you would be crazy if you did not consider the mental and emotional health and well-being of your workers and colleagues to be every bit as important as their physical well-being. As there are warning signs of possible physical danger in the workplace, there are also steps that can be taken and training to be undergone to help everyone understand the emotional and mental dangers in the workplace as well. Remember that a good health and safety program looks to protect the safety and health of the whole worker, not just the physical body – because happiness and joy in the workplace doesn’t come from physical health; it comes from somewhere much deeper, and it is our job as safety practitioners (which we all are, even if it doesn’t say so in our title) to protect and defend that core of the person and everyone in the workplace. A happy worker is a healthy worker. If you would like more information, e-mail Purcell Enterprises and we will be happy to direct you or provide you with some guidance on handling these issues in your workplace.