02 April 2022
Workforce well-being in construction
Business asset or business risk?
We know that a business is built on its people, right? What comes out of a business ultimately pays the bills, but that output is created and delivered by our people. Put simply, ‘well-being’ at work is about knowing what makes people thrive, whilst understanding and addressing those things that get in the way. Risk management focuses on understanding what could go wrong in a company, whether the risks can be managed, how they might impact and taking action to avoid.
The well-being of any workforce is vital to the degree of success (or failure) of a business.
How we feel about our work, our role, our boss, our relationships, our overall well-being, is a business asset. Conversely, the things getting in our way are business risks. Some of the big drivers of poor well-being in construction include occupational stressors such as time pressures to complete on time and on budget, leadership competencies and behaviours, long working hours (and often, frequent travelling) and job insecurity. All of these can negatively impact an employee’s mental health and well-being. Added to which the culture can negatively influence if and how someone is both supported and/ or reaches out for support – resulting in so many suffering in silence.
Suicide rates amongst construction workers more than 3 times higher the national average
"there is still a long way to go to truly change hearts and minds – ensuring the drivers of poor well-being are addressed, as well as ensuring the right support reaches the right people at the right time"
Interest in employee mental health & well-being has skyrocketed in recent years – even more so with the advent of Covid-19
The pandemic has not only reshaped how and where we work, but how we feel about our work. It’s had a significant impact on the well-being of workforces globally and has accelerated trends in workplace well-being. For example, last year’s IES Working at Home Wellbeing Survey showed around a third of people reported increased pressures at work; almost half said that they didn’t have time to get their work done and a similar number reported increased levels of fatigue. In construction, uncertainty regarding job security and changes in routine and structure as well as increased exposure to the virus are just some of the additional challenges our people have faced. The latest Health & Safety Executive data shows the rate of self-reported work-related stress, depression or anxiety has continued to increase year on year for the past two-decades, and depending on which study you look at, levels of burnout caused by chronic stress are on the rise. At a broader societal level, the Eurofound European Quality of Life Survey showed us that more than half of the population being at risk of depression, compared to 22% five years ago. So how do we typically address employee well-being at work? How do we know what things get in the way for our people? Do we confine ‘well-being’ to a series of benefit and reward initiatives such as helplines and apps and hope they do the trick? Or, do we establish and address the actual drivers of the issues? Over the past decade, the industry has taken big steps to destigmatise mental health in construction and improve access to support. Work of bodies like the Health in Construction Leadership Group, Mates in Mind and the Lighthouse charity have all played important roles in getting us to where we are today – but there is still a long way to go to truly change hearts and minds – ensuring the drivers of poor well-being are addressed, as well as ensuring the right support reaches the right people at the right time. Furthermore, whilst there are some exemplar construction companies providing mental health and well-being support to their own workforce, how often do these reach down through the supply chain?
Duty of care
Poor mental health, including stress, is the most common reason for long-term absence - and a leading cause of short-term sickness.
The biggest drivers of stress are work-related factors – i.e. the ones construction companies have a duty of care to identify and put in place reasonable adjustments to fix. These include workload, management style and (more recently) the challenges created through homeworking – and importantly, they represent the greatest people risks to any business in terms of staff turnover and productivity. Many employers have prioritised the well-being of their people throughout the pandemic - with more focus on employee support services such as helplines and training for example. However, generally speaking, what I’m finding is the increased focus has further highlighted to businesses that support services alone, don’t address the problem - or importantly, help a business actually understand what problems they’re trying to address. If the actual drivers of poor well-being are that my people are frequently working to tight deadlines; don’t feel their work demands are achievable; don’t have all the necessary skills to perform their job; maybe they feel subjected to unacceptable behaviours on site; or don’t feel they’re concerns are listened to or addressed and so on – and these represent just some of the challenges on sites – How beneficial is providing access to an externally provided support service in isolation going to be? There still remains little evidence to demonstrate the effectiveness of externally provided support services in construction – and we tend to think of ‘support’ in terms of third-party solutions such as helplines or Occupational Health for example – but these are largely only addressing identified problems at point of need, and preventing them. What we need to do is have sufficient information about our people so that construction companies can make informed decisions about the most effective supports – and this will effect areas such as ways of working, job design, job flexibility, leadership competencies and behaviours etc. The main focus of a good mental health & wellbeing strategy wants to focus on the drivers – from good leadership, effective people management, positive work-culture, optimal job design, effective communication, learning and development opportunities etc. - whilst ensuring the support services are fit for purpose.
Stephen Haynes, the author, is a Director in the Gallagher People Experience team, and former Head of Programme for the construction mental health charity, Mates in Mind.
individuals across the sector work with Mates in Mind
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