Stress:

managers training
www.ohtoolkit.co.uk
Contents

What is the issue?

What is the issue in our organisation?
Why should we deal with it?
What are our responsibilities?
How do we deal with stress in our workplace?
What can I do if a member of staff is stressed?
What next?
What is the issue?

Stress has been defined by the HSE as:

The adverse reaction people have to excessive

pressure or other types of demand placed on them.

Source: www.hse.gov.uk/stress/index.htm
What is the issue?

In Great Britain:
16.7 % workers say they find their work either
very or extremely stressful (2009 survey)
work-related stress accounts for approximately a
third of all new incidences of ill health

continued
What is the issue?

each case of stress-related ill health leads to an

average of 26.8 working days lost
an estimated 11.4 million working days were lost
to stress, depression and anxiety in 2008/9

Source: www.hse.gov.uk/stress/why.htm
What is the issue in
our organisation?

Insert your own data

Why should we
deal with it?
Legal our responsibility under health and safety
law
Moral our obligation as a good employer
Financial dealing with stress at work not only
reduces sickness absence levels but can improve
things such as

Source: www.hse.gov.uk/stress/why.htm
Why should we
deal with it?
Employee commitment to work
Staff performance and productivity
Staff turnover or intention to leave
Staff recruitment and retention
Customer satisfaction
Organisational image and reputation

Source: www.hse.gov.uk/stress/why.htm
What are our
responsibilities?
The Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 requires
employers to secure the health (including mental
health), safety and welfare of employees at work
This includes providing a safe place of work, safe
systems of work, and information and training
What are an employers
responsibilities?
The Management Regulations 1999 require
suitable and sufficient assessments of health and
safety risks at work to be carried out this
includes assessing the risk of stress-related ill
health
How could we deal with
stress in our workplace?
The HSE has developed Management Standards
These act as a yardstick against which you can
measure your performance and provide indicators
of good practice
The Management Standards approach helps
employers work with their employees and
representatives to carry out risk assessments for
stress

Source: www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/indg406.pdf
How could we deal with
stress in our workplace?
The target is for all organisations to match the
performance of the top 20% of employers that are
successfully minimising work-related stress. This
means we will need to
How could we deal with
stress in our workplace?
Assess the risk and potential causes of stress, eg
by looking at sickness absence records or attitude
surveys, or conducting specific stress-related
surveys or getting feedback from focus groups

continued
How could we deal with
stress in our workplace?
Use these to assess how the organisation is
performing in relation to the six risk factors. This
includes managers talking to their teams to
identify stress hot spots

Consult with staff to decide on improvement

targets and action plans

Source: http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/indg424.pdf
How could we deal with
stress in our workplace?
To help employers understand how to do a risk
assessment for work-related stress, the HSE has
identified six key areas (or risk factors) that can
be causes of work-related stress
How could we deal with
stress in our workplace?
The six Management Standards cover the primary
sources of stress at work. These are:

demands such as workload, work patterns and

the work environment

control such as how much say the person has in

the way they do their work

continued
How could we deal with
stress in our workplace?
support such as the encouragement,
sponsorship and resources provided by the
organisation, line management and colleagues

relationships such as promoting positive

working to avoid conflict and dealing with
unacceptable behaviour

continued
How could we deal with
stress in our workplace?
role such as whether people understand their
role in the organisation and whether the
organisation makes sure that they dont have
conflicting roles

change such as how organisational change

(large or small) is managed and communicated in
the organisation
How could we deal with
stress in our workplace?
The HSE has produced a survey tool and an
analysis tool in order to gather relevant
information about these six areas

They also recommend looking at existing data

and carrying out discussions with employees
How could we deal with
stress in our workplace?
If we find we have a problem, there is good
advice about dealing with the issues on the HSEs
best practice pages, including the need for staff
consultation

Source: www.hse.gov.uk/stress/experience.htm
How could we deal with
stress in our workplace?
We also need to manage anyone who is already
absent because of stress-related ill health

The HSE also has detailed guidance about

sickness absence management

See: www.hse.gov.uk/sicknessabsence/guidancehome.htm
What can I do if a member
of staff is stressed?
If youre concerned about any of your staff:
check there are adequate organisational
arrangements in place and that a risk assessment
has been done
arrange to speak with them to find out how you
can help them both immediately and in the longer
term
What can I do if a member
of staff is stressed?
If your member of staff has visited their GP about
stress, it would also be helpful to contact them in
writing (get your member of staffs consent first)

See: www.hse.gov.uk/stress/individuals.htm
What next?

Generate a plan for your organisation, eg:

produce a policy
See: www.hse.gov.uk/stress/standards/pdfs/examplepolicy.pdf
get feedback from focus groups and analyse the
data
use the HSEs survey and analysis tools

More information is available from the HSE and

IOSH
See: www.hse.gov.uk/stress/standards/before.htm
and www.ohtoolkit.co.uk