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As part of the growing national campaign to address the stigma around Mental health, we have partnered with local charity, Lancashire Mind to provide our colleagues with a Wellbeing service which helps to improve wellbeing, provide skills / tools to use in all aspects of day to day life and raise awareness.
Who are Lancashire Mind?
Lancashire Mind are our local mental health experts. Their vision is to promote mental wellbeing for all, and they have worked across the county for over 25 years to build a happier, healthier Lancashire. Everyone has mental health, just as we all have physical health (whether it be good or not so good) and mental health problems are part of life. Lancashire Mind find positive ways to make people feel valued and live well.
Together, we conducted a wellbeing survey in March and Lancashire MIND provided some interesting statistics based on the feedback…
76% of Service Care Solutions employees completed this survey anonymously and, of those people:
•41% expressed they themselves or a family member are experiencing poor mental health
•1 in 5 people are currently supporting someone who is experiencing poor mental health
•80% of respondents measured a wellbeing score of “Average” or “Above Average”
•90% rated either “Quite Happy” or “Very Happy” being at work
From this, we recognised just how important wellbeing is, especially working in such a busy, fast paced environment and sometimes a game of ping pong or pool with a colleague just isn’t going to help.
What are we doing about it?
We are the first business to trial a “drop-in” service with Lancashire Mind, whereby their trained wellbeing coach, Bryony, attends every 2 weeks for the afternoon. She has 30-minute appointment slots and colleagues can email or text her confidentially to book these appointments. She is based in a meeting room away from the main office space and the area is kept private to maintain the level of confidentiality promised to colleagues. If recommendations are made by Bryony that the business can support and help the employee in any way, the individual will need to give their consent for this feedback to be provided.
So what is Wellbeing Coaching?
Wellbeing Coaching focuses on the individual’s present needs rather than looking into the past. Together, in a collaborative relationship, the coach helps to identify the individuals wellbeing goal and explores what steps to take to reach the goal. Coaches can help you to understand, for example, your mental health, develop coping strategies to manage your mental health and develop changes in your routine that may have a positive influence on your wellbeing.
This differs from counselling, which involves the counsellor listening to you and helping to gain a better understanding of feelings and thought processes. Therapists respond empathetically and without judgement.
It is also a different approach to cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT) which is a collaborative, short-term psychotherapy treatment that focuses on identifying, understanding and changing thinking and behaviour patterns that can help change how you feel. CBT involves learning to challenge your habitual thoughts, triggered by a situation, and develop alternative, realistic thoughts that slow down or change your emotions, behaviour and physical symptoms.
We have had two afternoon sessions so far with almost all of the 16 appointment slots fully booked, which shows a fantastic take up from throughout the business. We gathered some anonymous feedback from attendees and 100% said they would recommend an appointment to a colleague. We also asked Bryony for her feedback on how the sessions have been going and she told us:
"The drop in is going really well, people are able to come and offload about any issues which they feel are impacting their wellbeing in a confidential and safe space. Using the consent form designed by Service Care Solutions, we can then discuss how we can help the individual overcome any work issues and sit in on a meeting with a line manager to help facilitate conversations. Hopefully, we will continue to work together and offer flexible support for the employees and see them being able to better self-manage anything that they feel may impact their emotional health and wellbeing."
With four more sessions to go over the next eight weeks, we hope this combined support will enable people to make positive changes to their lifestyle both at home and at the workplace.
If you are looking for a job and you would like to work for a company that is forward-thinking and caring company, please contact our HR department for details of current vacancies.
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