How to Prevent the Need for Stress Leave
Considering taking a stress leave from work? What is stress leave, why more people are taking them and what we can do about it.
What is Stress Leave?
Stress leave is taking a medical leave of absence from work and typically needs to be supported by your doctor with a medical note for your employer. This leave may be paid or unpaid depending on your kind of employment and benefits. Currently 30% of disability claims are related to a mental health illness.
Why are employees taking stress leave?
Stress leave has been on the rise over the past few years, particularly coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic as 68% of people report struggling with increased mental health concerns and heightened stress levels. Many employees were working from home and experienced increased workload and isolation. Challenges in maintaining work-life balance also greatly contributes to higher levels of stress and mental health symptoms as employees struggle to take care of themselves in a meaningful way.
3 Reasons Employees are Taking Stress Leave:
Increased demands with decreased support.
Increasing the workload and expectations of employees quickly becomes unsustainable when supports aren’t put in place – think connection to colleagues & team members, access to systems & programs, and open communication for feedback when things are becoming overwhelming.
Reduced Work-Life Balance.
Between our work hours, time for our families, taking care of our basic needs like groceries, cooking meals and cleaning, people are having difficulty creating any time for basic self-care. Whether this is getting outside, engaging in exercise or movement, ensuring we are sleeping enough and eating well, too often these basic needs are being put on the back burner. Over time, this leads to overwhelm and burn out.
Challenging Workplace Dynamic.
The culture of the company matters! When systems aren’t created to support employees friction builds quickly, leading to increased interpersonal issues, decreased productivity and motivation, and over time, increased turnover in the company.
What is the impact of Stress Leave on Companies?
When employees are taking stress leave it is impacting the companies in several ways. Initially companies are tasked with managing the employee’s workload during the leave, leading to either over-burdening other employees or taking on the financial burden of hiring and training someone to fill in their position. Long term however, the impact is even greater. When employees are taking stress leave there is always the risk they will not return to their position, leaving the company to fill this role, potentially without the opportunity for a planned hand-over. An often over-looked but broad impact of an employee on stress leave is the impact on the company culture. The need of your employees to take a leave signals that people are overwhelmed, under-resourced and feeling defeated. This takes a toll on morale and can have the effect of signaling that the workplace is not feeling sustainable long term.
How can we prevent stress leaves?
We can begin to increase preventative, rather than reactionary, programs and services. Many companies have begun to re-evaluate and increase the extended health benefits they are providing, but it doesn’t have to be limited to this. Companies can become more flexible and responsive to employee needs (think compressed work weeks, use of discretionary personal leave days, hybrid home and office work plans). Outside of structural changes, companies can also be really proactive about mental health and wellness. Offering workshops and trainings in house increases access and engagement for your employees who may be struggling.
Bring the resources to them!
Looking for modern mental health and wellness programs?
Check out Scott Sheere Wellness corporate workshops and book a preventative workshop for your team today! We cover topics like:
Education on the nervous system and the stress response
Employees’ unique warning signs for stress and burnout
Creating a resource toolkit for bio-hacking the nervous system
Building mental health resiliency through skills practice