How to deal with stress

Here's how we tackle stress to create a healthier working environment

Stephanie Horton is the managing director of River Canal Rescue. Set up in December 2000, it's a 24-hour national breakdown and recovery service for boats on UK waterways. During the peak summer months of 2004, Horton noticed her call-out engineers were suffering from stress. She explains the measures put in place to create a healthier working environment.

What I did

Acknowledge the problem

"We get peak periods when our engineers attend several calls in one day, often in different parts of the country. Other days they might only get one call, but this could come at 6am or 6pm. This limits where they go and what they do and can contribute to feeling stressed.

"I discovered our staff were feeling stressed through our appraisal system. We also had one engineer who left - because of stress and other health problems. I realised we needed to tackle it because delivering a high standard of service is a priority and this is compromised if we have stressed engineers or lose them at peak periods. It can be hard to find suitable recruits and normally takes three months to train them."

Introduce stress-reducing initiatives

"The first thing I did was introduce monthly meetings where the managers sit down with each employee to discuss how things are going. This helps cut stress because people don't bottle things up and it also makes them feel valued.

"Starting this summer, we're introducing time-out days. Each engineer will be given five individual time-out days to use during our peak periods, in addition to their holiday allowance, that they can take at 24 hours' notice. Any extra work will be given to contractors to avoid creating more stress for the rest of the team.

"The days are designed to prevent employees from throwing sickies - although that was never a real problem - the key is that it is self managed by the individual, because they know better than we do if things are getting to much. Knowing the time off is there and that we trust them can help reduce stress."

Monitor the situation

"We are already seeing the benefits of the monthly meetings and although the time out days haven't taken effect yet, knowing we will be doing something to tackle stress this summer is appreciated by our employees. It has also been a selling point to new recruits.

"Now I know how stress can affect the business, I also keep an eye out for signs that our employees are under pressure - such as if they show up for work looking haggard or seem to be losing motivation."

What I'd do differently

"I would have introduced the monthly meetings much earlier. Although there was always an informal plan to do this, and I encourage all staff to come to me with their problems, if you don't make it a formal arrangement it is easy to keep putting it off."

Subjects covered in this guide

• Introduction
• Why tackling stress in your business is important
• Common causes of stress at work
• Assess whether stress is a problem for your business
• Identify signs of stress in employees
• Tackle the causes of workplace stress
• External causes of stress
• Stress-management training and counselling
• Dealing with your own stress
• Here's how we tackle stress to create a healthier working environment