Stress and Wellbeing Lessons from The Boss

Resilience is key for wellbeing – it’s that ineffable quality than enables certain people to adapt to stressful situations and bounce back stronger than ever following a challenge, difficulties, stress or adversity.

Building employee wellbeing in the workplace means, among other things, that employees are happier, more productive, and more loyal – with greater levels of engagement.

As employers, we’re not automatically hardwired to help employees deal with stress and other things that affect resilience. But maybe we should be.

Statistics on stress point to a growing crisis: One in four adults will suffer with a mental illness this year. As a result, 70 million working days will be lost, at a cost to British industry of what is estimated to be £70 to £100 billion. With presenteeism also on the rise, meaning employees coming to work disengaged, tired, unmotivated and too stressed to work effectively, the risks to business for employees’ wellbeing and resilience are considerable.

So the question is, what can we do humanise our workplaces and combat stress head on?

Tips for Supporting and Managing Employee Stress

• Remind managers and leaders to remember how much employees may keep hidden and protected under their professional appearance. 
• Create an open dialogue for employees to be able to speak confidently about their challenges, and create ways for colleagues to connect in the workplace.
• Promote innovative solutions offered in the workplace to suit different employees needs, including flexible working schedules and environments. Encourage holidays, annual leave and time away from the office to encourage work-life balances.
• Continue to communicate helpful work-life benefits offered too.
• Let employees know just how much we care, and reach out in one-to-ones and team meetings.

From The Boss to the boss

When faced with stress, we all know there are times when getting by is all you can do. Resilience is often just that – getting by, moving past the challenge and soldiering on stronger than ever. Sometimes we can’t manage this alone and we need our family, friends and our community. Work plays a large part of that for many of us too, and even people with the strongest social circle could use some support at work too.

As The Boss said “everybody has a hungry heart” and we have the opportunity to feed the hearts of our employees and create a culture where everyone can bring their whole selves to work and where we can all engage with work, and with each other.