Improving employee stress – is there a benefit for your organisation?
As a manager, you may feel that employee stress is largely out of your control and that there isn’t an organisational benefit for you to improve it.
However, this couldn’t be further from the truth.
The impact of stress in the workplace
Stress is a BIG problem for organisations.
- It’s the second cause of absence in the UK, following general sickness like colds, etc.
- It affects everything from employee engagement, productivity and culture
- It directly impacts your turnover and profits
- It can result in a costly legal claim
CIPD research shows that workplaces absences in the UK are at the highest rate in over a decade!
The research highlights that UK employees were absent an average of 7.8 days over the past year, and that stress is a significant cause, with three quarters (76%) of HR Managers reporting stress-related absence in their organisation in the past year.
Why is it important to effectively manage stress?
Actively working on managing employee stress will help you:
- Reduce Absence (one of your largest hidden HR costs): Tackling stress upfront reduces absenteeism, ensuring a consistent workforce and smooth operations.
- Save costs: Addressing stress not only improves well-being but also makes financial sense, reducing healthcare costs, turnover expenses, risk of legal claims and operating with an efficient workforce.
- Improve creativity and innovation: Stress relief nurtures a positive atmosphere, fuelling creativity and innovation.
- Enhance customer relations: Happy, stress-free employees deliver exceptional customer service, boosting satisfaction and retention.
How do you know if your workforce are experiencing stress?
The first step is to recognise when an individual may be experiencing stress. The NHS defines workplace stress in three areas:
- ‘emotions’; where our feelings change, such as becoming withdrawn, losing confidence or reacting intensely in situations;
- ‘thoughts’; where problems may feel bigger than they are, feeling responsible for any negative outcome or automatically jumping to the worst-case scenario, and/or;
- ‘behaviours’ - for example, working longer hours or avoiding certain tasks.
At an organisational level, signs of stress may include employees being disillusioned, high levels of absence, frequent lateness, disciplinary or performance problems, high employee turnover, and a reduction in overall organisational output.
How do you manage employee stress in your organisation?
Effective management is the key to avoiding stress problems in your organisation. Line managers must show they take stress seriously and that the organisation has an understanding approach.
Popular methods to identify and reduce workplace stress could include:
- Stress risk assessments such as the one available from the HSE
- Annual staff surveys or more regular ‘pulse’ surveys
- Regular employee check-ins/reviews by line managers
- Staff education and training (for example, stress management courses)
- Training line managers to identify and manage stress.
- Providing a helpline/counselling through an Employee Assistance Programme (EAP)
- Encouraging employees to seek medical help or other support
- Ensuring policies and procedures reflect and reiterate these points where relevant
- Flexible working options and improved work–life balance
How can we help?
We can help you support an individual employee suffering from stress by looking at what adjustments could be made to the workplace, connecting you with specialist support where needed (it isn’t always as expensive as you may think!) and arranging training as needed.
We can also help by assessing what your organisation could do to manage stress looking at all aspects of the organisation.
If you would like to talk to us about how we can help please arrange a call here. Or if you would like quick access to our team of HR experts you can purchase pay as you go time directly through our shop if you are not already a client. CHARITY10 gets you 10% off our prices for our charity clients.
