We’re delighted to announce we now have three fully-qualified Mental Health First Aiders on hand to encourage positive wellbeing across both Jiraffe and Jenx. As part of International Stress Awareness Month we spoke to our Mental Health First Aiders on the importance of mental health and well-being in the workplace.
International Marketing Executive Katy Furlong, Design Engineer Jack Wilson and Leading Operative Craig Senior recently completed the 2-day long online course where they learnt vital key skills around how to spot signs of mental health issues, how to manage employees’ concerns and stresses and how to advise them on next steps on how to deal with any issues.
Katy said: “I used to think of mental health in relation to an illness or in line with diagnosed conditions, when in fact it is a state of wellbeing and alongside physical health, mental health does in fact define our ‘health’.
“Stress can have a detrimental effect on an individual’s mental and physical wellbeing. It can contribute to an individual experiencing irritability, lack of concentration, change in diet and exercise all of which will change an individual’s happiness levels.
“These symptoms of stress will undoubtedly be bought into or even triggered within the workplace (sometimes subconsciously), resulting in an individual unable to focus on tasks, communicate effectively or be in a physically healthy state to complete their job.”
As part of the course, Katy, Jack and Craig learnt about ‘stress containers’ – a unique model designed to help visualise how we all have a unique tolerance to stress and as a result all have different coping strategies which can take time to identify.
Katy added: “Picture it as a bucket being filled up with water representing daily worries and activities. Everyone is unique and will have a different sized bucket, depending on vulnerability to stress and additional factors – such as previous trauma. The smaller an individual’s container, the quicker it will overflow.
“Attached to everyone’s bucket is a tap. Regular helpful coping strategies like exercise or mindfulness can help an individual ‘turn the tap on’ and release water from the container to make room for future stresses.
“It’s also important to identify unhelpful strategies such as drugs and alcohol, which will feed water from the tap directly back into the container meaning stress is never fully released.”
Karen Grace, HR Manager, said: “We are committed to maintaining a good level of awareness amongst all our colleagues regarding the importance of looking after our own and each other’s wellbeing both inside and outside of the workplace.
“Training has been a big part of this commitment and building a team of qualified Mental Health First Aiders has been important for our business ensuring that all our colleagues can be signposted to the best possible help when needed.
“This facilitates an open culture in which talking about our mental health is not just accepted, but is actively encouraged. All our colleagues have the opportunity to build their own unique Wellness Action Plan which can really help individuals to feel a sense of ownership over their own wellbeing whilst feeling supported to share this with their line manager and colleagues should they wish to.”
Holly Jenkins, Director at Jiraffe, said: “At Jiraffe and Jenx, we are committed to ensuring our employees maintain positive wellbeing. This has been even more important during the last 14 months whilst people have been working from home.
“The introduction of Mental Health First Aiders is not only to support those who may be showing signs of stress, but to also support individuals who may have a diagnosis of a mental illness by offering confidential support.
“I’m proud to say that all managers have received ‘Mental Health Aware’ training to support their individual teams, and that we’ve branched out our range of internal communications from newsletter updates, wellbeing emails, a wellbeing workshop and the support of line managers, to ensure we’re present and open when someone is in need.”
For more information about understanding and managing your stress levels, head to: https://www.stress.org.uk/.
