Wellbeing agenda at work is causing weird behaviour

[Waferbiscuit]

I work for a large charity which in the last 3-4 years has really embraced wellbeing and mental health (MH) at work. We’ve introduced new policies to support MH, have had MH awareness campaigns, MH first aid training, and staff wellbeing is always on management’s agenda. This is all good and I’m very supportive of it – on a personal level I had a suicide in my immediate family so am very much support this change.

However I am started to feel dubious about how this wellbeing agenda is playing out in the work environment and the changes I’ve seen in the large team I manage.

The first thing I’ve noticed is the number of staff coming to me and (over)sharing their problems in this more ‘open environment’. People are telling me about their relationship problems, health scares, detailed arguments with their friends, debt issues, boyfriend breakups, family conflicts etc etc. I’ve always had good relationships with my managers but never shared much, even in stressful times (divorce, pregnancy loss, illness etc) because I never feel it was necessary or professional. Now things have really changed and I have people telling me about their feelings and experiences on an almost daily basis. I am a good listener but not a trained therapist and I also don’t have the time or energy to handle all this.

Secondly, so many people have come forward with stress, depression or anxiety (more than 50% of my team) and are demanding adjustments – these range from more flexible working, WFH, different work set ups, buying lights to help with SAD and changes to their work programmes. This is fine but it’s hugely time consuming to sort. It’s also causing issues with allocation of work. Our work sometimes requires last minute activity and those who are more vocal about their wellbeing won’t do it so the work always then has to be given to the willing or ‘resilient’ staff.

Finally wellbeing upmanship seems to happening a lot more in the last year. This is where someone claims their problems are greater than someone else’s. I was required to furlough a portion of my team this year and some staff came to me saying they ‘had to be furloughed’ because they ‘couldn’t cope’ with the current environment and I felt pushed into furloughing them over others. I think people forget that while the stress they feel is real it doesn’t mean they are more stressed than someone else. As a manager I have to be objective and assume that the staff member who lost a relative to Covid might be more stressed than the person who didn’t. But apparently, nope, I’m wrong – someone else is always having a harder time!

In summary, I very much support the MH and wellbeing agenda but find how it’s playing out a bit odd. Has anyone else noticed this?

Before I am pilloried, and I’m sure I will be, my team have generally been happy, the environment is not too high pressured, and before someone says I’m a crap manager I’ve had positive 360 degree evaluations and positive feedback from staff.

[Icenii]

Yes, I have noticed this. I'm not going to provide comment on my feelings here however one point, I really believe any work that can be done flexibly should be. This is regardless of poor mental health. I really believe we will be better off as a society if certain jobs can fit around people's lives and people don't have to loose hours of personal time to a commute. We just need strong processes around performance management.

[Waferbiscuit]

@Icenii - I agree with you about flexible working. But I suppose my gripe, following from above, is that flexible working should be allocated fairly to all not just to those who shout the loudest.

[Yummymummy2020]

I don’t think it makes you a bad manager, I think like with everything some of these things intended to make things better for everyone can be taken advantage of too. Some people are more than genuine but you will always get chancers as well, unfortunately you can’t really do much about it though! I haven’t been in work in a while due to shielding but I did notice before I left similar to what you describe too! In saying that, our place was wearing people down so I wasn’t overly shocked people were stressed and fed up!

[31RooCambon]

The message from my work this last year has officially been Mind yourselves now, family first! mental health!

But those are just words.
We still have to get all of the work done, in more difficult circumstances, fewer people in the office, so the next time somebody high up at work tells us to mind ourselves, I'm going to ask what does that mean, in terms of our workloads!

[Toorapid]

Yes, I've found this as we push the wellbeing agenda too. Almost as if people now feel they need to have MH issues to fit in with the culture.

Maybe those people always have suffered and now feel able to talk about it, which is good, but the way they're sharing is definitely increasing the mental/emotional load of others.

[Gliblet]

Any kind of culture change in a workplace causes some imbalance until it starts to feel 'normal' again. Some of what you've described - like the difference between how people are behaving now and how you're used to manager/staff relationships working - is down to a mixture of personal preference and expectations. You never had that kind of experience with your managers, so it seems weird to you IYSWIM.

If you are finding that it's taking up too much of your time then you might need to either signpost other support a bit more clearly (like your mental health first aiders or EAP if you have one) or switch around the structure of things like one to one meetings so that you get work related stuff out of the way THEN have the conversation about how they're doing more generally.

The work allocation thing is definitely something to raise with senior management - if last minute task allocation is a necessity and it's fair to expect ALL your staff to share the burden then this needs to be made clear. You can safeguard wellbeing AND expect flexibility from your staff and you're right that it is completely unfair to consistently dump things on your more resilient staff. If you do that for long enough they'll either crack under the pressure or get so pissed off with you that they'll simply refuse to do it (and if other staff can refuse, what's to stop them?).

As for the wellbeing one-upmanship, definitely a 'thing'! Before Christmas I helped the manager of one of our larger teams draft some comms about team working, being considerate and flexible, and the responsibility of every team member to think about the impact of their actions and words on each other. It wasn't quite bad enough that anyone was about to get hauled in for a disciplinary but people definitely need a reminder now and then to look outwards at least as often as you look inwards.

Have your workplace done any work on resilience that looks at positive psychology and talks about making sure you have a broad perspective as part of this?

[Beaniecats]

This has happened at ours too 😆

[KeyboardplayerXXX]

I could have written your post OP. The over sharing is exhausting as well as time consuming and I always sign post now to EAP or the Mental Health First Aiders.

[Throwntothewolves]

I'm all for recognition and support of mental health, and prevention is better than cure imo. But, there has to be effective management of this in the work place. Just increasing awareness is not enough, the 'fall out' has to be dealt with. This is causing stress to the more 'resilient' or less vocal people so something needs to be done.
Management should ask for anonymous feedback on this initially and consider implementing things such as an employee assistance programme, and peer to peer support training which give employees outlets which they can use to share their problems confidentially. Any major concerns should be managed according to procedures, such as requests to be furloughed due to 'stress'. If someone has a real problem then they should be referred to occupational health.

An example of poor management of a very real mental health issue was when a colleague was struggling with ongoing mental health issues which had been exacerbating by a promotion causing additional stress. Management provided appropriate support, but where they went wrong was in dealing with the persons reasonable request to move to a less stressful position on return from sickness absence. They gave the person someone else's job. The person who had been doing the job was sidelined and was genuinely in fear they would be pushed out altogether. They even had to get the union involved to protect their position. So then management had two stressed people to deal with, though the second one was scared to speak out given they almost lost their job despite having been a model employee for years.

[CovoidOfAllHumanity]

I actually work in mental health services and I think some of this stuff is too much

Firstly sometimes, in the NHS at least, it is lip service. Talk is cheap but doing things that would actually help staff wellbeing often isn't. We got some gadgets for the break room but no guarantee of a break to use it. Lots of signposting to apps etc but again in your own time. It feels pretty fake.

I am old enough to have worked in the bad old days of crazy rotas, hours of daily unpaid overtime as standard and a culture of 'if you're not dead you come to work'. I am NOT saying I want to go back there but what we did have that's now been lost was huge care for one another, team loyalty and a sort of blitz spirit. You knew your colleagues had your back and you didn't let the team down. Now it seems it's every man for himself. I'm not convinced that is better. I try to say to them that if you take days off for minor reasons then your colleagues have to cover, then they get stressed and cross and take days off and then you have to cover which increases your stress. Whereas if we all do our allotted job as far as we possibly can and offer to help one another out voluntarily if someone is struggling then it makes it easier all round in the end.

I was very surprised when I first started managing people how many tears I had to dry and personal non work situations people would want to talk to me about. I have the skills for it but it still feels very uncomfortable and a conflict of interests to then have to work with a person whose marital issues you know all about. I try to sign post people to proper services but I don't want them to feel I don't care or dislike them. I would never in a month of Sundays have told my boss this stuff. I remember telling him my mum had been diagnosed with cancer because I wanted some compassionate leave. He sent me home a couple of hrs early that day and no more was ever said on the topic.

I sort of feel we are going about things the wrong way and we need to emphasise mutual support and co-operation rather than running to the manager and special individual pleading.

[jay55]

Sounds like the wellness culture has a huge negative impact on your wellness.

Listening to everyone's issues isn't your job, like you said you are not a therapist. Would you be seen as an ogre if you cut people off and gave them a list of resources for their issue?

It must be impacting your productivity and mental well-being. You have to push back somehow.

My last workplace had a mental health drive but that consisted of putting the numbers of helplines on the toilet doors and monitoring hours.

[Waferbiscuit]

Sounds like the wellness culture has a huge negative impact on your wellness.
@Jay55 I'm good but I think the issue is that so many colleagues expect my role to be much more of a listening ear than in the past.

[LApprentiSorcier]

I think the problem is that wellbeing training and resources are generic, normally provided by so-called motivational experts (whizz-kid types).

The amateur dabblings of managers into psychiatry based on this rubbish often do more harm than good. Other than being generally supportive/sympathetic and signposting colleagues to the appropriate expert, managers should leave their colleagues' mental health well alone.

[Okokokbear]

When you talk about demanding adjustment for mental health conditions you just sound really cold, sorry. It's like you don't actually believe wellbeing and mental health are a thing and you just wnat some people to suck it up.

Also calling it a wellbeing agenda makes it sound like some kind of conspiracy theory. When it's just actually about trying to be decent humans to each other. In what is Ana awful time.

Perhaps ask yourself what is going on in the world and your organisation which means so many people have mental health problems? Perhaps also reflect on how well people can do their job when experiencing distress.

You don't sound massively well suited to actually managing people op. Perhaps you're really good at managing the projects or work. But this is different to managing people and it's not for everyone. It's like when they actually start showing they're human you can't cope.

I'd suggest reflecting this to your line managers. Perhaps it needs a split role? Something more pastoral and something more work or project management based? If your managers are asking for different things now from managers they should really reflect on whether the managers they currently have are still suited to the role.

[MadisonMontgomery]

I have noticed this too. Where I work we have a few staff with anxiety and/or depression. Work tries to be supportive, which is great, but to the detriment of other staff - we have had to change our hours so they can work hours that they feel are more helpful to their condition, and when extra tasks have come up they are left out of this in case it makes them stressed. It is actually making people resent them, and when we have recently recruited new staff, there have been comments that candidates with mental health conditions should not be offered jobs.

[Waferbiscuit]

When you talk about demanding adjustment for mental health conditions you just sound really cold, sorry....You don't sound massively well suited to actually managing people op.

I really don't think that is the case @Okokokbear but I knew some posters would say that I must be a bad manager because of what I've posted.

Look I'm not expecting people to be robots at work at all and have been very sympathetic and understanding to different challenges staff have. But there is a limit to how much the workplace can solve or work around people's individual problems - and I really the culture of sharing and claiming to be more stressed than others is on the rise and not especially helpful.

[borntobequiet]

In my experience the employers who implement extensive health and well-being campaigns are those who treat their employees the worst. It’s so they can blame the employees for not looking after themselves.
If I ever see another notice board with idiotic posters about work-life balance I’ll probably set fire to it.

[CovoidOfAllHumanity]

Well I guess okokokbear is right in a way although it comes across as a dig. It IS asking a whole new skill set of managers if they are expected to look after people in a pastoral way as well as organise the workforce, educate and train people and uphold standards. Why would it be assumed that all managers are automatically good at these things that were previously not in their job description? Sometimes these roles can be in conflict and what's best for an individual isn't best for the team as a whole or for the organisation so what should a manager do then?

Where people have a mental health condition amounting to a disability then I have a good track record of supporting them to get reasonable adjustments made. Where someone is going through a bad time in the short term for whatever reason then usually the team will pull around and support them because we are decent human beings and that's the team culture.

Where the problem arises is when everyone requests adjustments all the time then the minority of people doing the work get pissed off and good will dissipates. When it's all take and no give or people expect things as a right that aren't rights. If that happens it's bad for people with disabilities because they get blamed when they shouldn't.
Also performance issues and health issues getting conflated. People going 'off sick with stress' when the problem was they were not good at the job.

I have worked with teams where people do carry someone for a bit out of kindness and when my mum died this year I was that person. I try to pay it forward to others.
I have worked with other teams where someone was stridently demanding different conditions, complaining all the time and threatening to go off sick if not granted special treatment. That just made people not want to do anything to help and in the end everyone was off sick and then left because the atmosphere was so horrible.

[HeyDemonsItsYaGirl]

I really don't think that is the case @Okokokbear but I knew some posters would say that I must be a bad manager because of what I've posted.

The language you use is quite telling. "Demanding adjustments" and "someone else is always having a harder time!" You talk about them like petulant children and you clearly think they aren't really suffering and are just using MH as an excuse to get their own way.

I don't think your workplace's wellbeing agenda is causing problems. I think your prejudice is.

[lottiegarbanzo]

If the company wants people to unburden themselves of their personal troubles, it needs to provide a professional counselling service.

I don't really get the one-upmanship aspect. Surely everyone's issues and unburdenings are confidential? So how would anyone be in a position to compare, except the manager?

Surely when someone says 'you have to furlough me because x', or 'I can't do work at short notice because y', you would say 'I will take that into account as far as is possible, while also ensuring the team's work gets done'. Then you make the best possible decisions based on the information available to you (and only you). So I don't get the 'feeling pressured' to agree a particular measure for a particular person part.

Presumably, if it reaches a point where there's so much vulnerability in the team that the work cannot be done, then you'd either say there's no opt-out on this one, or you have to go down a proper medical route of people providing professional diagnoses and only those being accommodated.

Your present system sounds a lot like 'he who shouts loudest gets what he wants'. (While some more vulnerable but more private people might be losing out in every way).

[lottiegarbanzo]

Incidentally, I'm reading your use of the term 'come forward with...' x, y, z issue as meaning self-diagnosis, not formal medical diagnosis. Is that right?

[HappyFourTeeth]

What is the point of all pushing a well-being agenda exactly if ultimately you don’t want to spend time listening to peoples problems/take peoples issues into account/make adjustments/encourage flexible working?

My workplace constantly pushes this message and we are forced to go on courses encouraging us to practice ‘self care’ and ‘look after our mental health’, yet when push comes to shove, there is no real change in culture or impact on our working life. They want us to shut up and work.

So again, I’ll ask, why have these initiatives if they are meaningless and have no outcomes?

[TDMN]

@HappyFourTeeth

What is the point of all pushing a well-being agenda exactly if ultimately you don’t want to spend time listening to peoples problems/take peoples issues into account/make adjustments/encourage flexible working?

My workplace constantly pushes this message and we are forced to go on courses encouraging us to practice ‘self care’ and ‘look after our mental health’, yet when push comes to shove, there is no real change in culture or impact on our working life. They want us to shut up and work.

So again, I’ll ask, why have these initiatives if they are meaningless and have no outcomes?

Just on the first point you listed - 'listening to peoples problems' (as the rest are all valid)
Thats not what a manager is for! A managers way of supporting is to signpost to professional help and maybe know a little information if there's ongoing problems, a manager isnt a therapist and a lot of people are misunderstanding the message from companies because its not clear.
It happens at our place - 'Please talk to someone' comms, with links and numbers to professional help and a brilliant referral service, but people constantly want to spend hours discussing their personal issuss with their line manager and get huffy if we gently suggest the professional services, like we're fobbing them off!
And im not talking someone saying 'im going through a divorce and my mental health is on the floor' and the manager is going 'WOAH stop there you need to speak to a professional font talk to me' because thats not what we do, we absolutely listen and let them get it off their chest intially, but people want to spend hours every week discussing their issues and we're not trained counsellors, we arent trained in how to cope with all the information, we are human too.

[TDMN]

Forgot to add and cant edit! our place is very good at adjustments etc but not every business is, so completely understand that you might have some frustration on this issue @HappyFourTeeth as have friends in other companies who are doing a lot of lip service stuff who feel the same way

[Waferbiscuit]

@lottiegarbanzo - I don't really get the one-upmanship aspect. Surely everyone's issues and unburdenings are confidential? So how would anyone be in a position to compare, except the manager? Surely when someone says 'you have to furlough me because x', or 'I can't do work at short notice because y', you would say 'I will take that into account as far as is possible, while also ensuring the team's work gets done'. Then you make the best possible decisions based on the information available to you (and only you). So I don't get the 'feeling pressured' to agree a particular measure for a particular person part.

Colleagues are aware of other's issues so there becomes a bit of a hierarchy around whose issues are more important. To your second question we have had to furlough or part-time furlough many staff who say they will not cope and have threatened to raise with unions. We are trying to be sensitive to wellbeing concerns so it does end up being the people who shout the loudest are the ones who get the most support and attention.