By Sarah Hall, Managing Director, Sarah Hall ConsultingPublic relations almost always makes the top ten of the most stressful jobs despite not being a front line role where people's lives hang in the balance.
In communications and public relations there’s no longer a clear distinction between work and play, day and night.
Mobile devices and tablets bridge the gap between the working day, and evenings and weekends. Social media means you’re as likely to be friends with your boss, colleague, or client as you are with anyone else. You may also be community managing into the early hours.
The result has been a significant and persistently negative impact on practitioners’ mental health.
A white paper published by #FuturePRoof for the PRCA in March this year reported that public relations professionals were experiencing a range of symptoms in the workplace from absent-mindedness and anxiety to anger and depression.
Attributing factors included financial pressures; service delivery – from being always on to constant deadlines; office politics, culture and poor line management; trauma, particularly in emergency services; and a lack of respect and understanding for public relations.
Normalising the conversation
Thankfully initiatives like #FuturePRoof and – on a much wider scale – Mental Health Awareness Week are helping normalise the issue and signpost to solutions.
PR professionals are finally speaking out about the challenges they face and proactively looking for ways to manage stress.
Respondents within the #FuturePRoof report cited a wide variety of means for managing their wellbeing. These included health and fitness including cycling, running, swimming, walking and yoga. Meditation and mindfulness also ranked highly.
Other techniques included ring fencing family time, socialising, limiting technology, sleep and moderating alcohol and managing diet.
Mechanisms for managing prolonged periods of mental illness included counselling, cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT) and psychotherapy, and medication.
Prevention better than cure
Employers also have to take responsibility for their staff and organisational culture, and proactively create a positive and healthy workplace.
There is work to do; almost 60% of #FuturePRoof survey respondents said they would be uncomfortable or very uncomfortable discussing their mental health with a line manager.
Many practitioners were also unaware whether their sickness policy at work specifically addressed mental health. 53.3% said they were unaware; 14.2% reported that it did; and 32.5% reported that it did not.
According to Carol Featherstone, a Relate-trained counsellor and therapist, even small steps can change things for the better:
“Being thoughtful about daily practices and what is expected of team members can make a big difference. No longer are weekends and evenings sacrosanct, especially in an industry such as public relations, where it’s almost expected people are on call 24/7.
“Big organisations very often have things in place like Occupational Health and Employee Assistance Programmes or even a counsellor on site. Where that’s not possible, organisations need to try and put a preventative procedure in place.
“Individuals need to be self-aware about whether they’re seriously stressed and get help. Managers should be alert to employees’ behaviours as the clues will be there. There will be poor performance and people taking long periods off sick.”
Best practice for managing mental
health and wellbeing
Here are five recommendations for managing mental health and wellbeing from the #FuturePRoof report. They work for managing the mental health of your wider workforce, not just your comms team. Everyone will thank you for it.
Make mental health and wellbeing a priority issue within the management team.
Ensure company policies and procedures cover sickness due to mental health and provide clear signposting and training to all employees and managers on these.
Removing the stigma around the issue of mental health in the workplace will have the single biggest impact on positive outcomes. Create safe environments for staff to talk.
Respect the boundaries between the personal and work lives of your employees that may otherwise have been eroded by mobile technology.
Examples of proactive support include employee assistance programmes, subsidised exercise, mental health awareness training and wellness action plans.
