According to a recent Health and Safety Executive (HSE) Labour Force Survey, published in October 2018, 15.4 million working days were lost last year due to work-related stress, depression or anxiety. As April is National Stress Awareness Month, it is an appropriate time to examine the reasons why employees are stressed at work and what measures employers can take to alleviate this.
Stress at work can be a trigger for severe mental as well as physical illnesses and can lead to serious conditions if not managed properly or kept under control.
Common Causes
There are numerous causes of stress in the workplace, the most common being:
The HSE’s survey found that stress, depression and anxiety were more prevalent in public service industries, such as education; health and social care; and public administration and defence. Perhaps this is not surprising given recent pressures on these industries, owing to funding cuts and limited resources.
Read the Signs
ACAS (Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service) guidance on stress at work highlights five signs that managers should watch out for to help them spot stressed out staff:
The guidance also explains how employers should approach staff who seem stressed:
Legal Obligations
Under the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 (“the Regulations”), employers must assess the nature and scale of health risks at work, including stress, by way of risk assessment. Employers with five or more employees need to record the significant findings of the risk assessment. Under the Regulations, employers should implement any necessary measures, appoint competent people to implement the same and arrange for appropriate information and training.
The Court of Appeal case of Sutherland v Hatton (2002) remains good case law to support that, in civil negligence cases, employers owe a duty of care to their employees to take reasonably practicable steps to maintain a safe workplace.
Prevention
What can employers do to prevent work-related stress occurring in the first place?
Employers would do well to remember that, with mental health in particular, every employee’s case will be different and a one size fits all approach may not resolve the issue for that particular individual.