Buddy says:  Yes, rising levels of work related stress have prompted new guidance to help employers manage stress effectively.  The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) has published three new guides, in association with the Health and Safety Executive (HSE).  The guides are tailored to the needs of line managers and HR professionals to help organisations combat work related stress.

Employer information

The new guidance draws on 19 key management behaviours that play a vital role in preventing, identifying, and tackling stress effectively.  The behaviours have been used to create a framework enabling line managers to work on the skills required to reduce and prevent stress at work.

The guides are free to download from www.cipd.co.uk/guides.  The key management behaviours focused on in the guides include:

• Managing workload and resources - requiring managers to monitor team workload and refuse to take on additional work when the team is under pressure.
• Empowerment - requiring managers to trust employees to do their work and give employees responsibility.
• Accessible and visible - requiring managers to make time to talk to employees and avoid being constantly at meetings.
• Expressing and managing own emotions - requiring managers to have a positive approach and avoid acting aggressively or losing their temper with employees.
• Communication - requiring managers to communicate clear goals and objectives and avoid holding meetings behind closed doors.

Ben Willmott the CIPD Employee Relations Adviser commented that “Good people management can help to prevent most of the problems causing stress at work, such as lack of control over workload.  If managers set clear goals, communicate with clarity, consult, provide feedback and recognition and develop and coach their teams, stress is much less likely to become a problem.”

Workplace stress is an extremely common cause of long-term absence and also damages employee morale and productivity which can lead to high staff turnover.  Employers that fail to manage stress are also vulnerable to litigation and potentially high compensation payouts.  Accordingly the guides should provide employers with welcome assistance and guidance when dealing with workplace stress.