By Mandy Hale

The current pandemic is profoundly affecting the way we live and work. Even as New Zealand returns to Level 1, and an “almost normal” day-to-day life, many people continue to experience on-going or higher states of stress and anxiety.

As you might expect, when someone is experiencing increased levels of stress and anxiety, often their work is negatively affected. As a people manager, you might notice that some team members are unwilling to return to the workplace, have difficulty concentrating, while others need motivation, have outbursts of frustration or display signs of extreme stress. In the most severe instances, this can become a serious health and safety risk for the person affected and their colleagues.

A high state of mental or physical exhaustion that compromises a person’s safety, well-being and performance at work is known as workplace fatigue. The most common causes of fatigue in a workplace environment include:

  • Irregular working hours;
  • Sleep disruptions;
  • Environmental conditions making it hard to concentrate or work safely;
  • Physically or mentally demanding tasks;
  • Personal and emotional well-being; and
  • On-going pressure or criticism.

And, COVID-19 has added a new dimension to this list.

As a manager of people, you have a role to play in helping your employees manage stress and anxiety at work and reduce the risk to their safety and well-being. Unfortunately, fatigue management isn’t merely a prescriptive situation where you can tick all the boxes in a checklist to fix the issue. Fatigue management is complex, takes time, and may require unique solutions for different individuals. But it is manageable!

I sat down with Esther Williams, Head of HR at our parent company, FCB Group, and Vaughan Granier, Workplace Relations Manager at HR Assured New Zealand to talk about the strategies they use to approach this workplace health challenge. Together we came up with this downloadable tip-sheet “Managing Fatigue at Work”; it’s jam-packed with our top tips for assessing and supporting your people to make them feel good and safe at work.

 

In this tip-sheet, you’ll learn some important ways to identify when stress management intervention is required, such as:

  • Quick health-checks;
  • Being creative with well-being surveys; and
  • Training managers to truly connect with their team with one-on-one catchups.

You’ll also find some of our most effective and creative recommendations for boosting morale and alleviating stress for your team. Some of my favourite tips include:

  • Blocking out time for non-work activity;
  • Sharing personal experiences;
  • Humanising your approach to workplace fatigue;

If you have any questions or concerns about managing fatigue in the workplace or your health and safety obligations contact the team at HR Assured.

If you’re an HR Assured client, you can call our Telephone Advisory Service anytime for support.

If you’re not an HR assured client, we’d like to invite you to try our Telephone Advisory Service for free. Contact us today to arrange a confidential, no-obligation chat.