Why are women shouldering the majority of career stress from Covid-19?

73% of women reported feeling career stress in November 2020, compared with 57% of men in LinkedIn’s Workforce Confidence Index.

The survey of 1,697 UK professionals points to how women have been experiencing a particular sense of career vulnerability as a consequence of the pandemic. During 2020 45 per cent of female professionals spent more time than in 2019 searching for their next job or project (compared with 33% of men). 37% of women spent more time working during non-work hours than last year (29% of men).

Women also took less time off. 55% said they had used less holiday, as opposed to 46% of men.

Unequal insecurity

LinkedIn figures also suggest an ongoing issue of lower hiring rates among women. Working mothers and  women over 30 have been the worst affected by pandemic-related redundancies and job shortages.

“Our latest data shows women are spending more time than men working out of hours or searching for new roles – often while juggling work with increased family responsibilities,” said Emily Spaven, UK Editor at LinkedIn. “If we’re going to create a fair recovery, we have to recognise the impact the pandemic is having on individuals and offering greater flexibility to women and working parents who are balancing ever-more demanding workloads.”

Work/life imbalance

EAPA UK chair Eugene Farrell said: “For all the social change of the past 30 years, the position of women in work continues to be riddled with age-old inequalities. The crisis has only served to expose those fault lines between the different attitudes to and experiences of men and women.

“In other words, women are still expected to take on expanded roles as mothers, carers and housekeepers in ways that men mostly aren’t – meaning all kinds of stresses on time and attention that have to be juggled with work commitments. So there are still perceptions among employers that women are less straightforward to employ, to promote, to be given additional responsibilities.

“While HR can’t reverse an entire culture overnight, they can make sure the particular challenges of female staff are widely understood and appreciated. On this basis, employers should be more flexible, make sure health and wellbeing is a priority, and ensure the right kinds of support are available to mitigate against the stress imbalance ”

Make sure families can get help from an EAP in 2021

The full extent of the benefits of EAPs to the UK population is limited by HM Revenue & Customs rules on family access.

While in Canada the services are well-known and promoted for use as ‘Employee and Family Assistance Program (EFAP)’, the usage among family members in the UK is low. EAP providers typically allow family members to use services at no extra cost to the employer. But UK tax rules see an EAP used by family as a taxable benefit.

Find a solution

There are practical ways to make sure family access doers’t come with a tax cost, says Tracey Ward, Head of Business Development and Marketing at Generali UK Employee Benefits.

“Work with your group income protection insurer / standalone EAP provider to assess whether any additional costs are actually incurred through extending access. If not, access may potentially be extended without any liabilities.

“If additional costs apply, consider whether the cost of the EAP could be put in the trivial benefit exemption.

“If the EAP falls foul of the trivial benefit exemption, work with your provider and/or tax adviser to calculate the potential tax liability, which could be met on a grossed-up basis – so that employees do not meet the tax cost – under what is known as a PAYE Settlement Agreement. This puts you in an informed position to decide whether or not it’s worth paying that liability in order to extend mental health support more widely.”

Family first

“Problems at home can be complex and involve relationships and issues across families,” said EAPA UK chair Eugene Farrell. So extending availability of EAP support to a family isn’t just a an additional perk, it’s important in terms of helping to find solutions for the employee. It doesn’t make sense to limit usage because of a tax liability when revenues for HMRC from this are very small – and it only undermines the overall impact of an EAP.

“The reality of this year will be many more people dealing with the fall-out from the pandemic crises, more people looking for help and reassurance around their mental health who will find the NHS isn’t in a position to help.

“Wider access to EAPs will mean fewer cases of people ignoring the warning signs, not talking or asking for help, and a way to avoid mental wellbeing deteriorating, leading to more serious cases for the NHS to take on.”

Head over to our LinkedIn to find out more about help from an EAP in 2021

Can robots provide better mental health support to employees than people?

Robots are the solution to dealing with the global pressures on mental health, says new research carried out by Oracle and HR research firm Workplace Intelligence.

More than 12,000 employees, HR leaders, managers and senior executives across 11 countries were surveyed for the study on the impact of Covid-19 on levels of stress and anxiety, with the conclusion that “they prefer robots instead of other people to help”.

UK differences

In the UK, employees were found to be more resilient, with 62% saying they were feeling more stressed and anxious at work (compared with 70% internationally). 77% in the UK wanted more access to technology to support their mental health, with 69% being receptive to the idea of a robot therapist. Overall, however, UK staff were more sceptical about using AI to support mental health (60% were in favour, versus 75% globally).

Robots at work

The research suggests that staff are looking for more action by their employers on mental health – with technology being the easiest answer. 76% said they thought their company should be doing more to protect their mental health. 83% would like their company to provide technology to support their mental health: self-service access to health resources (36%), on-demand counselling services (35%), proactive health monitoring tools (35%), access to wellness or meditation apps (35%), and chatbots to answer health-related questions (28%).

Only 18% of people would prefer humans over robots to support their mental health, the study claims. This is because robots provide a judgement-free zone (said 34%), an unbiased outlet to share problems (30%), and quick answers to health-related questions (29%). 68% of people would prefer to talk to a robot over their manager about stress and anxiety at work; 80% of people are open to having a robot as a therapist or counsellor. 75% said the use of AI had already helped their mental health at work: providing the information needed to do their job more effectively, automating tasks and decreasing workload to prevent burnout.

People need people

EAPA chair Eugene Farrell said: “The increased demand for advice and support during the pandemic has led to more organisations introducing online support resources, Q&As, videos and podcasts around mental health . That’s been valuable in making sure everyone can have immediate access to a fundamental level of help and ideas, signposting them to the EAP if they want to speak with a human being or arrange personal, one-to-one counselling to explore issues in a more thoughtful, psychologically reassuring way.

“We’re in a world where automation is the norm. It’s a tool for completing tasks, whether that’s at work, for shopping or buying insurance. But it’s important that counselling and the principle of mental health support, is based on a core of human relationships and care. Who wants to open up about a psychological issue, struggling to find reassurance and sense of meaning, while knowing that they’re really only opening up to a blank space, an automated void?

“EAPs will always be about people helping people.”

Cut hours not people and prevent a mental health crisis, says the University of Cambridge

Some level of employment – even just one day a week – plays a fundamental role in securing mental wellbeing and prevent a mental health crisis, according to new research. 

The Cambridge sociologists found that UK employees who were either furloughed or shifted to a part-time position during April and May 2020 were at the same risk of poor mental health as full-time colleagues. But those who’d lost all their working hours were twice as likely to suffer from poor mental wellbeing. The work was carried out as part of the Employment Dosage project among more than 7,000 UK people.

Sharing hours

In the wake of their findings, researchers have called for the UK government to encourage more employers to share out available working hours rather than cut jobs. This would be in line with the ‘short-time working’ approach being used across Europe – seen as a less expensive option than furlough schemes and less likely to cause a long-term legacy of damage to mental health from redundancies.

“As well as the individual misery caused, the costs of poor mental health to the UK’s productivity and health service are vast, and cannot be afforded at this critical time,” said Professor Brendan Burchell.

Stay together

EAPA chair Eugene Farrell said: “We’ve always known that while workplaces can be a serious source of stress, any negatives are far outweighed by the benefits. Being part of a team, sharing a mission, overcoming challenges, the recognition and status; as well as all the day-to-day pleasures that come from just being among people, being part of something together, even if it’s only digitally for the moment.
“That’s what EAPs have been doing all these years: helping people stay at work, able to keep the benefits from being in work and contributing, while also managing to deal with all kinds of personal issues. EAPs help save people from long term absence. Getting the equilibrium right, between work and home lives, is going to be essential to everyone as we work our way though the pandemic age.”

Wellbeing programmes still need the proof of good data

A lack of good quality data continues to undermine the status of employee wellbeing initiatives, claims REBA, the Reward and Benefits Association.

From its survey of 309 wellbeing, HR and employee benefits specialists REBA found a striking increase in the number of organisations making use of management information to assess the effectiveness of wellbeing programmes, up to 92% from 74% in 2019.

But the actual value of the information was questioned: participants believed the biggest problems were the limited availability of data (49%), and its poor quality (43%). 36% said their organisation lacked the right data collection method; 31% didn’t have the required data analytics; and, 25% the expertise to analyse the data effectively.

REBA has highlighted how employers continue to measure the impact of employee wellbeing through ‘proxy’ measures such as changes in reported employee engagement. Other findings from the research pointed to how mental health continues to be the primary employee wellbeing concern for senior management – with 78% reporting plans to introduce mental health/resilience workshops this year.

EAPA funded the development of an EAP Return on Investment calculator with the Institute for Employment Studies in 2019. The calculator has led to the collection of more than 2,000 examples of employer calculations to date.

“The REBA research confirms the long-standing frustration of everyone who works in employee wellbeing,” said EAPA chair Eugene Farrell. “We know how important it is to organisations, their performance and stability, now more than ever before. But trying to quantify such a mass of variable factors will always be a trial.

“The ROI calculator is based on IES expertise and banks of previous research in order to provide a sensible, realistic guide to financial returns from the use of an EAP.  It’s also a useful way to check on different models, what the difference would be to ROI from changing the level of investment, an awareness campaign to increase usage etc. The more employers who use the calculator tool, the richer the dataset and the more useful it becomes for benchmarking – and for making conversations with the FD about wellbeing that bit more straightforward.” 

How to ACE lockdown

Eugene Farrell, chair of the UK’s Employee Assistance Professionals Association (EAPA) and Mental Health Lead, AXA PPP healthcare

The ongoing period of WFH and social distancing means much of the bracing novelty of the crisis – that feeling of challenge and worry while also having more time to rest, exercise or try new hobbies – is wearing off. It’s becoming easier at this stage to become demotivated and revert back to old habits, dominated by work priorities and the need for presenteeism.

We might find ourselves dominated by our moods rather than looking at all the different ways we’re getting something out of each day. And so when we get very little back from what we’re doing we don’t feel like we achieved much and we don’t feel good. This creates a cycle that can be hard to break.

Getting the right balance of activities, other than just working, means a healthier basis for every aspect of our lives, work, relationships and home.

Some more thinking and planning can help to change things up, make things more beneficial for us and our family. This is where an ACE approach can help us to increase the quality of our lockdown life, and bring us more satisfaction and motivation that will help to get through all the challenges still to come.

ACE stands for:

Achievement – how much was achieved in the activity? (0 = nothing achieved; 10 = Loads achieved).

Closeness – how was the experience of being close to others? (0 = I did it alone, felt alone; 10 = with partner or family and felt close to them).

Enjoyment – how much you enjoyed doing the thing (0 = didn’t enjoy it at all; 10 = really enjoyed it).

So if we score all activities using an ACE measure we can see how things are balancing out – or not.

For example, if we sit at our desk crunching spreadsheet numbers we might feel we got a lot done. The achievement score is high, but it may not make us feel that good. Working alone means closeness is zero, and enjoyment may vary depending on the work.

If we get fed up and sit alone watching TV all day, it’s a distraction or avoidance behaviour. This will have low achievement, low closeness and low enjoyment. If we plan a family movie night with popcorn and snacks the closeness score shoots up, enjoyment moves up and achievement can feel pretty good too.

Going for a walk with your partner or family would score high on closeness, hopefully high on enjoyment, and although low on achievement it brings us pleasure and enjoyment that is good for us. Setting an aim to achieve 5k in the walk, say, adds in that sense of achievement. 

Thinking more about the things we can do, a positive and varied use of the increased flexibility of time available, we can plan a set of activities that isn’t just about ticking off the achievement task box, and bring more enjoyment to our life as well as quality.

Supporting employees dealing with death and bereavement

Andrew Kinder, Vice Chair, EAPA UK and Professional Head of Mental Health Services, Optima Health, www.optimahealth.co.uk

During the first weeks of lockdown I would regularly see someone parked up along our road, facing the wall where the cemetery is, just focusing on reading their book, perhaps over the wall was the place of their loved one’s grave. Like most places, all the cemeteries were closed. It was the only way to say goodbye.  It was heart-breaking to see.

The gradual loosening of restrictions means cemeteries have thankfully opened up for rituals of bereavement to take place. But in this period of Covid-19 there continues to be a situation of ‘complicated grief’ where people don’t have the usual chances to say goodbye; the sudden nature of the illness, the limitations on visiting homes and hospitals; not always being able to attend a funeral especially if you’re in a vulnerable group, or the eerie experience of a socially distant funeral. The necessary process of grief can feel stunted and unfulfilled.

The awkward and extraordinary nature of bereavement at a time of a pandemic radiates out further across networks of families and work colleagues – it’s not possible simply to express sympathy and return to the flow of normal life; the bereavement is related to us all, the situation we’ve all been in.  

In this and other ways, Covid-19 has led to a collective kind of grief. Because we’ve all lost something from the way we live our lives, and expect changes that mean nothing will be exactly the same as before. Feelings of loss are likely to only crystallise further as lockdown eases and we return to something like normal routines – the differences will bite: not being able to commute on public transport in the same way, to mix at work, or look forward to socialising in the usual ways in the evenings and weekends.

In the Victorian era death was a subject of great reflection, discussion and ceremony, while talking about sex was taboo. Now, in the 21st century, we have the reverse. Death is one of the most difficult things to talk about, an unmentionable that perhaps we feel shouldn’t be dwelled on too long.

However, our collective grief, that sense of dealing together with a common crisis, hopefully means a lessening of stigma attached to bereavement. We’ve all needed to talk about fears and how we’ve been affected. It is understood that there is a process for bereavement, the typical phases – of shock, denial, depression, anger – but it’s not a linear pathway, we move through dynamically, and all have different triggers of memory and what affects us – something seen on TV, a piece of music, speaking to a loved one. Complicated grief only makes it all more difficult. It is worth emphasising that moving through the grieving phases is always helped by talking, and by looking for and focusing on the things that bring comfort: and work and work colleagues are very often part of that.

EAPs are very important at this time as a service for talking, as an outlet that’s confidential, making it easier to find ways of talking about death and bereavement. And while the numbers of cases of the virus have declined, the effects of loss of people we’ve known, of coming to terms with lost areas of people’s lives, the familiar, will be long-lasting. 

The increasing pressure of work under lockdown

Whether they’re furloughed or working from home, the pandemic is ratcheting up pressures for UK employees.

A Canada Life study has flagged increasing ‘presenteeism’, with more than a third of staff surveyed saying they’d continued to work while they were ill. Around a half had felt a greater need to be ‘present’ while WFH. Staff pointed to the pressures from higher workloads during lockdown, a lack of feelings of security and the threats from redundancy.

Another study, this time for KnowBe4, has pointed to furloughed workers unable to detach themselves from their responsibilities. 70% of people in their survey admitted to having been checking their work emails; 40% to responding to work emails: worried they were missing out on time-sensitive messages; wanting to avoid returning to an email mountain on their return to work; or just afraid of falling behind. Employees most likely to break furlough rules because of their anxiety worked in HR, education and IT.

“While HR are still able to contact staff to check on how they’re doing and keep them informed of developments in the organisation, furloughed staff who take part in any business activity are jeopardising their employer’s entitlement to state aid,” says Eugene Farrell, EAPA chair.

“During this time of so many different pressures: around finances, insecurity, isolation, physical and mental health, an EAP is an invaluable resource. For anyone, furloughed or otherwise, at home or on the front line, there’s someone to talk to, with the expertise to unpick all the tangles of personal and work issues.”

Impact of Covid-19 pandemic on male mental health

Andrew Kinder, Vice Chair, EAPA and Professional Head of Mental Health Services, Optima Health 

Covid-19 could well be the breakthrough in male health we’ve needed, the extreme set of circumstances that makes opening up a necessity and talking to professionals as well as family and friends the essential norm.

Traditionally men have been the ‘hard to help’ group. Whether that’s GPs or EAPs, the experience has been the same. Women are more likely to share issues with people in their networks and more likely to book themselves in to access professional support early. Men tend to wait until a condition is chronic and there doesn’t appear to be any other choice. 

The typical ‘macho’ self-image that can go along with masculinity, that sense of invulnerability, has persisted through the pandemic with reports suggesting men are more likely to be breaking lockdown and social distancing rules. But Covid-19 has also meant men have experienced months of a new virus which has no absolutely no respect for masculine attitudes, no matter how strong or determined. Men have also appeared to be more susceptible. Being unaware of underlying health conditions, poor physical or mental health in general, has become nightmarishly threatening. And, perhaps most importantly, men used to feeling in control of their lives, their career, their independence, have lost potentially much of this.

This combination of risks and disruptions to normal routines is a unique opportunity for changing behaviours among men in particular. More men are reportedly seeing how getting help is a sensible, reasonable thing to do. Getting help early certainly makes a real difference. The Covid-19 period hopefully looks to be encouraging men to face up to their feelings, realising there is no way of putting them to one side and just getting on with things. Because it’s clear how everyone is sharing the same anxieties, having to cope with fear and uncertainty over the future, whether within families, through work conversations or over social media. That gives the potential that much of the stigma of talking about feelings has fallen away.

Getting more men to be aware of their mental health is vital, not only for working through tough times, but for their physical health and resistance to the virus. We know that people’s auto-immune systems are weakened by stress and anxiety: good mental health means stronger immunity.  

For men it’s important they stop putting energy and angst into what they can’t control (so many things when it comes to current living and working conditions). There’s no purpose or value to worrying about future plans, even job security. Instead mental attention needs to be focused on what can be achieved today and tomorrow, what is going to help: a virtuous circle of physical health, good exercise, diet and sleep routines to begin with. Learning a new skill, focusing on what tasks can be done at work, finding a new hobby is ideal. With online content there’s also so much choice – and now’s exactly the time when men shouldn’t be bothering with conforming to gender stereotypes. Trying cooking, arts and crafts, playing an instrument can all contribute to building up mental wellbeing. As a consequence we don’t dwell but stay in control of what we can, and enjoy being the best we can be. 

The recovery period is also going to be the right time for men to start putting together a list of the people they can get help from, whether just in their heads or on paper: the list that confirms how they don’t have to go through problems alone, there’s always someone to talk to. It’s a chance to think more widely. Friends and family, the EAP, but also work colleagues, line manager, union rep. 

Conversations asking for help don’t have to be by phone or in person. Increased use of video calls and messaging by IT in general can make getting support easier for men. The anonymous nature of an EAP is, in itself, an important factor.  As men seek support for themselves they can also look to provide support to others.

Let’s just hope that the lessons from Covid-19, the experience of needing and finding reassurance, the rewards of being open about feelings, are the beginning of hopefully a shift in male culture, not a blip. The cataclysmic nature of global events seems to make that very likely.
You can read more about supporting male mental health in Positive Male Mind. Written by Andrew Kinder, Professional Head of Mental Health Services, Optima Health and Dr Shaun Davis, Global Director of Safety, Health, Wellbeing and Sustainability at Royal Mail, the book seeks to end the stigma around mental health vulnerability in men and includes a section on addressing male mental health in the workplace.