Healthy employees are absent less often, have higher morale, are more productive, and have lower healthcare costs. The result: happier more engaged employees, a better bottom line for the business and a higher level of customer satisfaction.
Recent newspaper headlines paint an unhealthy picture for both employees and their employers. Take a look:
Health costs linked to overwork and stress. Stress and illness caused by work overload is adding an extra $6 billion a year to Canadian health-care costs. The biggest pressure is role overload—the overwhelming feeling that there’s never enough time to get things done. About 60 % of working Canadians say they can’t balance their jobs and family lives, and this conflict is increasing physician visits by 25 % a year, in-patient hospital stays by 17 %, and use of emergency rooms by 23%.
Employers fail to respond to work-related stress concerns. Employers identify work-related stress as the biggest threat to their employees’ well-being, with more than 78% reporting it as their “top health risk concerns.”
Job strain can contribute to heart attacks. On-the-job stress can increase your blood pressure, adding to your risk of having a heart attack or stroke.
Downsizing bad for health. Downsizing may boost company profits, but people who survive major job cuts are twice as likely to take sick leave, have a five-fold increase in backaches and muscle problems, and are five times more likely to die from cardiovascular disease within the next four years than those who lost none.
Workaholism evenly distributed across socio-economic spectrum. Almost one-third of Canadians call themselves workaholics. Workaholics are more likely to report fair or poor health, trouble sleeping, and less satisfaction in life in general.
35-50 per cent of disability insurance claims are stress-related. The link between overall health and workplace stress is clear. This trend has pushed more alternative work arrangements into business culture, such as remote work, contract workers and job sharing.
At any one time between 8 and 10 per cent of the workforce is off work on stress leave. Between 30-40 per cent of short-term disability leaves are related to stress and mental health.
Pessimism associated with heart health. People who constantly blame themselves for things that go wrong and believe that nothing good will come their way are more likely to develop heart disease than people with a positive attitude. Optimistic men are half as likely to develop heart disease as pessimistic men.
Electronic dependence divorces us from family and society. Family breakdown and deteriorating civility have been blamed on fragmented and stressed lifestyles. As we increase our dependence on technology, there is a crisis of “meaning and accountability” that threatens to paralyze society.
Employees struggling with work-life balance. We’re going faster and faster and there are no boundaries; even if your work is intoxicating in the best sense, it takes over as the meaning in one’s life, and that leads to… feelings of guilt that you’re not getting to your family or to other things.
- 47% reported they participated in “family time” (sharing a meal, doing things with your kids around the house, or going out) only once a week; 27 % said they “rarely” engaged in these activities.
- American parents spend an average of 5.5 minutes a day (38.5 min. per week) in “meaningful conversation” with their kids.
Do you see yourself in any of these messages? I suspect that you do. We are going faster and faster; in many cases, working harder; and our cup is getting emptier. It is very difficult, if not impossible, to feel fired up about our work when we are running on empty. Even those of us who love our work will feel depleted if we don’t take the time for replenishment.
Some of you might be asking, “What about the company’s or the organization’s responsibility? And you are absolutely right. Just like with the creation of spirit at work, employee health and wellbeing is a shared responsibility – shared between the employer and the employee. But what are you going to do if your company is not upholding their part of the deal? In the survey where more than 78% of employers identified work-related stress as their “top health risk concerns,” only 32.3 per cent of organizations surveyed offered stress management programs to employees. So yes, do what you can to make your employer accountable. At the same time, make self-care a priority. After all, you and your loved ones have the most to gain. So what can you do?
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Val Kinjerski, PhD, is a leading authority in the field of employee engagement and on the topic of “spirit at work.” A consultant, agent of change and professional speaker, she helps companies and organizations increase employee retention and boost productivity by reigniting employees’ love for their work. Check out her Spirit at Work Program and Inspired Leadership training at www.kaizensolutions.org. Val is the author of Rethinking Your Work and Rethinking Your Work Guidebook. Available now at www.rethinkingyourwork.com.
