IS MENTAL HEALTH THE NEW BAD BACK
Recently, I had a meeting with the Head of European Health and Safety for a large global construction company. Like myself, this director is very keen to raise the profile of Mental Health Awareness in the construction sector. We both feel it is very important that employees look after themselves in this area because it is as important as looking after any other part of their well-being. One of the comments he made to me was that he approached someone on this topic and the shutters automatically went up and the response was “this will be the new bad back”. Personally I find this comment very short-sighted and also signifies the typical male response of burying your head in the sand. The problem is what people do not seem to grasp is this is already costing the U.K. economy 105 Billion pounds a year, this equates to £1000.00 an employee. According to the HSE, 39% of all work related illnesses that were reported were in the area of mental health. So whether we want to acknowledge it or not this issue is already costing your business money and not going away.
Ten years ago I became ill from suffering the impacts of psychosocial risks in the workplace. My illness and suffering could of been prevented by simply having an awareness program that was proactive rather than reactive. The fact I suffered a nervous breakdown does not make me a weak person or someone who belongs locked up in Broadmoor. To be totally honest what I suffered as a result of what I went through is actually quite common. I did not go to work and ask for this anymore than I would like a bad back or a fall from height. Throughout my career, I have had training on all different issues ranging form chemical and biological warfare to basic manual handling. All of this training I have tried to implement to the best of my ability. The only area I never received any training on was metal health awareness. If I had I would of implemented it in the way I did all the rest of my training. It is also ironic that the one area I did not receive any training was the one area that made me ill.
As an Industry we now have a growing problem on our hands, Depression, Stress, and Anxiety related illnesses are growing rapidly, The average time that employee takes off sick to recover from this type of illness is 25 days. In some acute cases they actually never return to work. This would be bad for businesses. The Oxford School of Economics has placed a figure of £30,614 to replace an employee. This is a far cry more than the £6000.00 that the CIPD have placed on the cost. This figure includes the hidden costs to business such as the time it takes an employee to get to optimum efficiency, loss of business and loss of goodwill by other employees carrying the extra workload. If I was an employer, I would seriously be considering strategies that would look at protecting this investment. Good Mental Health Awareness training programs are certainly a proactive way to protect your business and staff. According to a report I just read published by Johnson and Johnson for every dollar they spend on employee well being they are seeing a return of nearly four dollars. Reports like this just show us that proactive programs make good business sense.
So as an industry, we need to look at all the facts. This issue is getting worse and not going away. It is already costing businesses money. So are we going to wake up and tackle this issue or are we going to bury our heads in the sand? The choice is ours. The Irony of all this is, If we spent more time looking after and talking about mental health we would not need to bury our heads in the sand which would alleviate the chance of getting a bad back. WIN-WIN
A Tribute to my wife, MY HERO
I am one of the luckiest men on the face of this earth I have the honour and privilege of being married to the most remarkable woman in the world. The first time I met her I could see the strength and the vulnerability in her beautiful blue eyes, it was as if I could see into her soul. I knew immediately she was the girl for me. She is the epitome of strength, courage, and most importantly love. She is supportive, long-suffering and always knows just how to say the right thing at the right time. She always gives to others and is truly one of the kindest people I have ever met. What I find even more amazing about her is the way she continues to display all these qualities even though she now has a chronic illness called Fibromyalgia.
Eight years ago she started to show the signs and symptoms for this condition whilst she was working for a university doing cancer research. (Did I mention that she is extremely smart as well.) It started by her losing the ability to focus and impacted on her memory. She then started to feel as if someone had pulled the plug on her energy reserves and she was sleeping in excess of sixteen hours a day. Even simple tasks like walking to the shop have now become like the average person running a marathon. Her first diagnosis after much testing was that she had M.E. This was an extremely big blow to her as she now had to give up a career that she truly loved. Today eight years on I still see the sparkle in her eye when she discusses the procedures she used to perform in her laboratory. This was devastating to her but she never quit displaying the qualities that I love so much. After five years of no continued improvement in her health she was hit with another symptom of her illness, chronic pain. The emergence of the new symptom led to her being referred to a specialist doctor who now changed her diagnosis to Fibromyalgia instead of ME/CFS which shows very similar symptoms. It was at one of these appointments that it was explained to me that her pain receptors had become super charged and she was highly sensitive to even the lightest touch. It was at this point, it became clear to me why she would be wincing in her sleep every time she rolled over or I tried to cuddle her. She is in constant agony. During the day she tries to hide this pain, she does not want pity or to feel that she is a burden to anyone. She suffers silently just enduring an illness that has robbed her of so much of her previous joys in life, but despite this she never gives up.
As her husband, I have had to realize what signs her body is showing me about the state of her illness. I have also had to deal with the facts that we can never make any concrete plans to do anything as a couple. She might feel fine in the morning and by midday she could be ready to go to bed because she is just utterly exhausted. You can see the energy being drained out of her. We have learned that we do what we can, when we can. I know deep in her heart she feels guilty about this. I am constantly reassuring her that I would rather have her like this than not at all. I do not tell her this to make her feel better, I tell her this because I love her with all my heart. I tell her this because I know that those qualities that I fell in love with have not been polluted by her illness. They just manifest themselves in a different way. The fact that she has the drive to carry on day to day while being in constant agony is a testament to her strength. This makes me so proud of her. I know without a question of a doubt that she always gives her best under any circumstances. These circumstances to the unfamiliar eye may seem menial but when you realize what she has to endure to accomplish it, this is actually an achievement that requires considerable effort.
As a husband it would be quite easy to be bitter about what this illness has robbed from both of us. It would be easy to take the object of my affections off the pedestal I placed her on when I married her. It would be easy to chuck in the towel and say that I did not sign up for this. In reality that attitude would not only hurt me but it would devastate her. I would lose out on the wonderful ways she enriches my life daily, her loving feminine ways that make me feel like I am the only man on this earth. Her constant support and encouragement for me to reach my dreams. It is amazing, that she still has the positive traits to support me in my life when I know she feels hers has been taken away from her. She continues to give to me freely and wholeheartedly, without resentment or bitterness, despite her challenges. If that is not true love I honestly do not know what is? It is these qualities that make her the special woman she is despite the obstacles she faces daily. So in my eyes, she has a new accolade to her accomplishments, she is MY HERO.
Leadership-Advice from the shopfloor
I find myself in quite a unique position. As part of my career I have the opportunity to see leadership from many different angles. I have had the fortunate experience of being in the military, working in the public and private sectors and training. During these many roles I have had the opportunity to meet many different types of leaders and leadership styles. Some have been great, some have been good and some have been lacking. The intense pressures placed on businesses leaders today to perform is probably the highest it is ever been. Guiding businesses through global recessions, austerity and a highly competitive global economy, is without a question of a doubt making leadership roles extremely difficult. These pressures have made the drive for maximizing efficiency, streamlining processes and business buoyancy the top of organizational agendas. This need requires unity, organizational pride, clear tangibles goal and most importantly strong leadership.
Now I can give you a breakdown of all the different types of leadership styles and theories. This could include everything from the Heshey-Blanchard leadership theory to The Blake-Moulton Grid or it could include styles such as transformational and transactional. However, my goal in this article is not to inform you of different styles of leadership. My goal is to bring to light the concerns of the teams you lead. The guy that is in the office, the woman who is on the shop floor. The vast pool of experience you could be tapping in to to get the job done more efficiently, productively and at the same time motivating your workforce by giving them a sense of pride and belonging. So I am going to give you my basic overview of the shop floor concerns that are regularly expressed and could be a stumbling block to effective leadership.
1. They do not listen to us – This seems to be a common theme, so many times the people who you manage/lead do not feel that their opinions/suggestions are being heard. They have a wide array of knowledge and technical ability to do the jobs they do but do not feel that their contribution to the business is being recognized. They find it frustrating that they have a very simple solution that can improve performance but it is ignored. I have personally seen this happen even when the theory has been proven. I recall one operative saying “90% of the solutions they seek are on the shop floor they just need to listen to us”.
2. They have favorites- Once again this seems to be a theme that comes up regularly. Some people feel that managers/leaders have favorites. Having favorites to me seems like a pretty childish view to have. However, the resentment that this could produce to team members is toxic. Surely trying to instill collaboration over competition would be much more productive.
3. Why do not just leave us alone to do our jobs-. This is extremely prevalent with mangers that micro-manage. The employees that are faced with this type of management feel suffocated, undermined and undervalued. Micro-management decreases employee job satisfaction, and increases employee stress. This type of management inhibits employee engagement.
4. Why do we never have what we need to do the job properly- This is actually one of my personal favorites. It is one that I actually feel the most strongly about. I know firsthand the frustration this causes. Not having the right materials to perform a given task and having to make do is very frustrating. It slows down processes and puts added work and stress on operatives to perform the job they are paid to do. In some companies this seems to be the norm rather than the exceptions.
Although this list is not by means all the frustrations on the shop floor it is the ones that seem to be universal across various sectors. Sometimes we seem to get so wrapped up in the fire fighting of our daily working lives we never step back and take a look at the basics that could help us take our performance to the next level. If we are ignorant of the concerns that the people we are leading, we may never be able to inspire them and raise their performance to meet the objectives of the organization.
I HAVE A DREAM
I have to be totally honest with you sharing my personal story about bullying and mental health has been one of the hardest things I have ever done. I felt compelled to do it after witnessing further bullying in the workplace and the impact it was having on other people. I could not sit back with a clear conscience and let this happen knowing the implications it has had on my life. I never would want anyone to have to endure the pain and great personal loss that was brought on by this unacceptable workplace practice. I knew that once I reared my head above the parapet that there was no turning back. I would have to publicly expose my life’s darkest moments. The fact that I would have to acknowledge that I suffered with mental health issues could potentially ruin the career that I was working so hard to rebuild. After weighing up the options I decided what really mattered to me personally was not a career, fame or wealth, but people. So I decided to go forward with the project and expose myself so I could help others. This journey has been an extremely tough battle. It has challenged me personally, financially and left the door wide open for the peanut gallery to have an opinion. It has actually shut just as many doors as it has opened.
To continue my journey and help others I needed to look back in history and see how other people triumphed over obstacles to accomplish social change that has made this world a better place. I had the advantage of growing up in The United States. My knowledge of American History, exposed me examples of great people overcoming adversity and driving social change. With the exception of Nelson Mandela and Ghandi, all of the persons that sustain me through the trials are people who were instrumental in the American civil rights movement. Dr Martin Luther King Jr, Peter Abernathy and Rosa Parks. These people had to endure attacks, imprisonment and in Dr Kings case death. Out of these three examples the one that struck the biggest chord with me though was Rosa Parks. Rosa Parks, was a lady that one day just thought I have had enough. Her actions not to give up her seat led to the Montgomery Bus boycott that lasted 381 days and an eventually led to the segregation laws of Alabama being deemed unconstitutional. She is quoted as saying, ” I am tired of just giving in”. She lost her job as a seamstress and was also arrested because of her actions. However 50 years on she is has been heralded “The first Lady of Civil Rights”, what an accolade.
Now I am nothing special, my life has been filled with anxieties that anybody else may have to face. I have had some incredibly difficult obstacles to overcome. Haven’t we all? However, what I do have is a dream. My dream is that one day we as a human race decide that enough is enough and we look at ourselves and decide what can we give back to this world instead of take from it. A day when there is no more wars, no more petty fighting. A day when we as humans say,”we all deserve to be treated with dignity and respect”, and start acting accordingly.
As my march goes on and I do my little bit to make the world a better place, I carry these great examples from history with me. Examples that inspire me, sustain me and most importantly teach me how to make the world a better place. Just like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, I have a dream.
Bullying a target’s perspective #bullying
I am writing this blog to give my personal perceptive of bullying. I am not a psychiatrist, psychologist or counsellor. I am a target that has had my life turned upside down by bullying. The impact it had on me was so serious that it drove me to the point that I wanted to take my own life. It eroded my self esteem and made me feel that I would be better off dead than continue to live under stress that it placed on me. What I am writing about is based on my first hand experiences of having to endure this systematic means of abuse.
Bullying in the workplace is extremely difficult to deal with. The psychological impact that it has on a target is paralyzing. It causes damage that takes years to recover from. Many victims end up being diagnosed with psychological disorders such as Depression, Anxiety, Post traumatic stress disorder and Post Traumatic Embitterment Disorder. The turmoil that it causes in a persons life has far reaching effects in other areas as well. It destroys personal relationships, breaks up families and in some more extreme cases leads to suicide. Personally, it has affected me so badly that ten years on I am still picking up the pieces. I have finally peeled back all the layers of the onion and have just been diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The fact that I am now hopefully on the final leg of my recovery gives me comfort. However, having this disorder has been a real slap in the face to me. Although I am glad to be able to sort out the real problem, the fact that it has taken ten years to diagnose means that I may be dealing with the effects of my experiences for years to come. This angers me immensely.
The roller coaster ride of emotions I felt whilst going through bullying was a mixed bag of feelings. At first I thought it was just joking and that it did not matter. I tried to hold my own and make remarks back. Some may consider this biting but to me it was just giving as good as I was getting. It was at this point that I could see the frequency starting to increase. It actually came to the point that comments and derogatory drawings were posted in the canteen and on the toilet walls. It seemed to be a green light for weaker characters on the team to also become involved and this increased the intensity. I am quite certain that this happened so that they would not be deemed to be weak and be targeted themselves. One characteristic I have noticed about bullies is that they are either insecure or bordering on psychopathic. The ruthlessness that the latter is prepared to use to accomplish their aim is nothing short of sadistic. I have felt first hand the wrath of this type of personality and they lengths they will go to, to systematically destroy you, is frightening. They also are very Machiavellian in the way they use others to accomplish their means. This is extremely frustrating because you know who is loading the gun but can’t prove that they are getting someone else to fire it. This puts you in a state of fight or flight mode constantly. The physical sensations I felt in this state led to me becoming constantly anxious to the point that it prevented me from doing my job properly. I was constantly worried about where the next attack was coming from instead of being able to focus on what I needed to be doing. I started second guessing my capabilities and was afraid to make a mistake in case it gave people more ammunition to chastise me or validate the accusations and attacks that were made. Many of these accusations were purely to either hide, or provide a diversion from, the bullies own short comings and hidden agendas. The impact this had on my system was overwhelming. I felt like going to work everyday was the same as running the obstacle courses that I used to run through whilst I was in the army. The only difference was instead of blanks being fired it was live ammunition.
This constant pressure then spilled over and affected my personal life. I became so irritable. I took out my frustrations on the people I loved the most, my children This would cause me to feel great guilt because I knew it was not any fault of theirs. I still carry that guilt to this very day. The fact that this stress was now coming home with me was causing me problems personally and I felt that I had no respite from it. My whole life seemed to be spiraling in to a state of despair and because my mental state was now compromised I seemed powerless to regain control. This eventually wore me down to the point I felt no way out but to die.
Being the target of bullying has robbed me of ten years of my life. I have had to endure great personal loss. I have had to try to rebuild my life and also live with the added complications of living with a mental disorder because of it. All of this I can live with but the part of this whole scenario that pisses me off the most, besides the effects it had on my children, is the fact that management intervention was nothing short of piss poor. At first the intervention was just to ignore it. Secondly they make a token gesture at trying to resolve it and then the final insult is when they discredit you and tell you that you are too sensitive. They have no comprehension of the toll that this type of behaviour has on a person’s mental health. They take no accountability for the lack of competence they have shown in resolving the matter. When bullying is the preferred style of management you have no chance of intervention at all. It is absolutely appalling to have to be subjected to something that is nothing less than abuse, and be made to feel it is all your fault.
I hope by sharing my experience of bullying that we can raise awareness and hopefully start taking the steps to treat people at work with the dignity and respect that we all deserve.
How would Confucous view you on Health and Safety
Ten years ago I became very sick because of bullying in the workplace. This event has changed the course of my life greatly
I now suffer with a mental illness that was either not previous diagnosed or was initiated by this psychosocial hazard. I have had to spend a lot of time rebuilding my life because it absolutely destroyed it. Today, ten years on I am still picking up the pieces. However not everything that has come out of it has been bad. It has enabled me to meet a lot of great people, reevaluate my values in life and most importantly became passionate about Health and Safety.
Throughout the course of my recovery I have spent many hours soul-searching. I was trying different recovery methods just looking for answers to elevate the great pain that I know found myself in. The thought of dealing with this highly stigmatized diagnosis was soul-destroying . The method that has worked for me with the best results has been mindfulness. The peace that I get from practicing this form of meditation really helps me to come to terms with the newly developed anxieties of my life. It was during the exploration of this meditation that I started studying buddhist and far eastern philosophy to get a better understanding of how this practice worked. This path led me to the Chinese philosopher Confucous.
Now Confucous was an interesting character, he was a teacher, politician and philosopher. He was very interested in traditional values of how people treated and respected each other. He is credited for highlighting the principles in the golden rule over 500 years before the birth of Christ. At this time in Chinese history, there was a practice called LI. LI was a tradition set up to get people to build a stronger value system. It governed the way people addressed each other and rituals for where objects were placed on alters etc. Now after this system being in place for around fifty years confucous observed that people were just going through the motions and had forgotten the true meaning behind these rituals. This observation really made me think about things we have in our society that were set up to make it a better place for us and we had lost the value of.
One area where I observed this most was peoples view of Health and Safety at work, particularly on the shop floor. It has been 41 years since the Health and safety at work act has become legislation. Have we forgotten as a society what it is actually for? Health and Safety to most people has become a ritual of ticking boxes and compliance and they have forgotten why we should be doing it. Health and Safety is not solely about complying it is about making sure that people go to work and leave safely. This has caused a great shift in my view on Health and Safety and has invigorated me to share my personal story to let people see what happens when we do not think about health and safety personally. Yes, I was one of the people that had lost the importance of Health and Safety and it has cost me dearly.
So my challenge to everyone is quite simple. Ask yourself one simple question? How would confucous view my practices of Health and Safety?
How do you view Health and Safety?
How neglecting one important area of Health, Safety and Wellbeing has affected my life on a daily basis.
This blog entry is deeply personal and really highlights the struggle I have had in the last nine years because I failed to recognize the importance of a Health, Safety and Well Being topics that are still afraid to be discussed by individuals and employers to this present day. These topics that affected me so dearly are Workplace Bullying, Stress and Mental Health.
I currently am in full-time employment as a carpenter. Prior to that I was a medic in the army. Both of these jobs have given me extensive access to all sorts of Health and Safety training. This included everything from biological and nuclear warfare to safe manual handling. I have always been very conscious to implement all the training I have received because I would never want to hurt myself or anyone else. I take Health and Safety very seriously. In spite of all the training I received I have never once attended or been offered any training that could of prevented me getting as sick as I did because of something I had to endure at work. By sharing my personal story “Work Under Pressure”, I hope to raise awareness and hopefully get individuals and employers to really take seriously the affects this area of Health and Safety can have on a person’s life. My story can be watched on this free to stream you tube video with the following link: http://youtu.be/XiXUf58I0EU. Please watch my story as it highlights what I went through and why my recovery is still on going to this present day.
After being severely bullied at work I tried to commit suicide because I could no longer cope with the stress that this type of behaviour had caused. In just over a period of eight months had my self confidence eroded, placed in extreme amounts of anguish and no longer had the ability to cope with life. Even though I endured all of that my recovery has been a much harder road . A road I never would have had to travel if more emphasis and training would have been placed on bullying and stress.
The first step of my recovery was to be treated in a psychiatric hospital in Oxford. I spent approximately eight weeks under supervision by a consultant psychiatrist and mental health nursing team. This was an awfully traumatic time. I was locked on a ward like an inmate. I was given numerous medications that affected my brain chemistry to try and stabilize me. Running in any medications of this type is extremely challenging. Emotionally you are torn from pillar to post. The inability to think coherently was the hardest part of it all for me. After eight weeks I was released from the ward to face another six weeks as a outpatient at a day centre. This was another challenging time. I attended sessions on CBT, living with depression,coping with stress and numerous other types of therapies. Finally some of the tools to cope with my predicament. If only some of these topics were covered by a tool box talk or in house training sessions, I might of been equipped to deal with the pressures I faced at work.
After going through theses initial therapies I had to work extremely hard to get myself to a place where I was fit to return to work. I attended therapeutic gardening projects, residential colleges for disabled peoples that specialize in not only training but also work closely to help them cope with the challenges of now being classified as disabled. All of these experiences was because I was ignorant of how stress and bullying affected a person’s well being.
My story would not be complete if I did not also share with you the impact this had on my family. It destroyed my family life. It put emotional and financial pressure on the whole family. They had to endure all my struggles with me. My daughter to this day is still angry and we have a very poor relationship. I only hope she can forgive me for all the mistakes I have made. The biggest being not aware enough of how important well being in the workplace really is.
I hope as people read this they realize how detrimental bullying and stress can be. I also hope Employers take this topic seriously and gain the courage to discuss this very important health and safety issue more seriously.
WORK UNDERPRESSURE NM
workunderpressurenm 