Well@Work

Investing in your company’s future

"People spend a significant proportion of their lives at work, and often their jobs bring meaning and structure to their lives. In fact, work may dominate the lives of many individuals. Because work is a central aspect of many peoples’ lives, it generally is recognised that individuals should have a safe and healthy work environment” (Tetrick & Campbell Quick, 2003, p. 1). 

Work, in general brings a sense of achievement, promotes self-esteem and enhances one’s well-being. However, in today’s highly competitive and fast moving business world, professional workers can be unaware of the serious repercussions they can potentially experience if demands exceed their human limits. This can emanate from the nature of their work, their responsibilities and ever-increasing demands to cope with more and more critical job situations and very tight deadlines. Such experiences are likely to increase as new work practices are introduced that may restrict quality time and impinge on personal occupational health and well-being.

At Delegate Management Services, we have developed the Well@Work Programme to support you in providing better care to your best resources – your people, in order to address a significant debilitating ailment of contemporary corporate organisations - stress. The programme, developed on the general guidelines set by NIOSH in the US and HSE in the UK, has two principal aims:

• to create a sense of awareness amongst executives about the need to take care of their personal and psychological well-being at work.
• to highlight ways how to replace negative behaviours by positive ones in the performance of their duties.

All in all, it reflects your company’s commitment to raise the standards of health and safety at work and prevent psychosocial risks taking their toll on your workforce…and your bottom-line!

How does it work? 

Through Well@Work, our occupational and organizational psychologists offer a 4 step approach to companies who want to provide support to their professional staff who may be suffering from excessive pressures at work. We call it the ACTS (Analyse-Communicate-Train-Support) approach:

In step 1, we Analyse the current situation at your place of work through interviews, focus groups or basic questionnaires.

In step 2, we Communicate and share the findings with your management staff and/or health and safety committee to develop suitable plans of action that the company can afford and do not obstruct its general day to day duties.

In step 3, we provide  a basic 9 hour Training programme to key personnel (e.g. supervisors) to recognise symptoms of poor well-being at work and how to devise a simple referral system for their own employees.

In step 4, we provide constant Support through basic counselling to employees who request it and as part of the internal services provided by the company to its professional staff.  Employees may use telephone to contact us at agreed times to discuss their circumstances and receive professional support and advice on how to deal with the problems they have. 

Some statistics:  

• About 13.4 million working days are lost in Britain every year due to stress induced ailments;
• A typical sufferer may take up to 29 days off due to stress complaints;
• In 1 year alone the UK estimated a loss of more than 5 billion pounds due to stress-related sicknesses;
• In Holland, psychological dysfunctioning is a main cause of disability in the working population;
• In the EU, 30% of employees complain of backache, 20% of fatigue, 17% of muscular pains, and 13% of headaches;
• Around 70% of personal poor well-being are attributable to pure psychosomatic disturbances;
• In the USA, stress on the job costs businesses over $150 billion per year;
• Stress related disability cases have doubled in the last 10 years;
• The average cost of each claim is $73, 270;
• There is growing evidence of the link between poor well-being at work and coronary heart disease and some kinds of cancer;
• Some corporations have estimated that it would cost around 1 million Euros to replace a top executive and between 200,000 and 500,000 Euros to replace senior managers due to stress-related problems;
• An average of 14,000 workers in the USA die from job stress-related accidents every year and another 2.2 million suffer some kind of disabling injury. As a consequence businesses in the US lose over 30 billion dollars per year in lost productivity.