Stress Awareness Month is coming to a close, but is a month really all the time we should be dedicating to this important topic?
The Internet is awash with articles concerning mental health decline in the workforce and the figures are truly shocking. Stress and burnout is now resulting in 23.3 million lost working days per year, costing the UK economy a staggering £28 billion.
The documented impact of stress on productivity and health
This should come as no surprise; the effects of stress are well known and based in science. It can kill workplace productivity, as employees lose the ability to concentrate on their work. It robs them of their creativity and problem-solving skills, which are so vital in any line of work. Stress lowers people’s confidence, leaving them feeling poorly equipped to deal with their daily tasks. And, as previously noted, when the stress builds up too much and becomes chronic, people are forced to take time off work, sometimes for months with no guarantee that their mental health will recover when they return.
Fighting stress at work starts with looking for clues
To begin combatting stress in the workplace, you have to first know what you’re up against. As a team or business leader, are you certain that your colleagues are being forthcoming about their mental health? A recent survey revealed that only 12% of employees have confided in their bosses about feeling stressed even though two thirds of bosses said they were confident their employees would talk to them about it. You can see the disparity here.
This lack of confidence is now being compounded by a new phenomenon: “wellbeing washing.” This is when employers say they’re looking after their employees’ mental health and wellbeing without actually providing any real support, further eroding trust.
There are some telltale signs that your employees might be stressed without letting you know: working through breaks, making repeated mistakes, taking sick days, and being visibly tired are some obvious ones. Yet employers don’t have time to inspect each and every worker for signs of poor mental health. Looking after your employees’ mental health is so important, but tracking often invisible signs of stress isn’t easy.
A solution to stress management at work starts with YU
That's where You Understood comes in. We can help monitor your employees’ wellbeing with our powerful app. The dashboard helps you analyse anonymised data of your entire workforce to see the overall mood of your team, identify patterns amongst departments, and observe the impact of potentially stress-inducing events. You can then use this information to proactively intervene to boost morale.
Our app makes it easy to get to the root causes of stress and negative emotions by highlighting the connections between emotions and potentially unnoticed other factors. Everything in life is connected, and our app can improve your employees’ self-awareness to help them manage and regulate their emotions, leading to a more conscious and fulfilled life. Contact us on our website or LinkedIn to find out more, and make sure emotions don’t go unnoticed.
Photo by Luis Villasmil on Unsplash