HEALTHY WORKPLACE with Kae S. Roberts


SHIFTING THE FOCUSI


recently read an article that identified a shift in focus regarding workplace health and wellness initiatives. It detailed how organizations that have long addressed and in- troduced programs that pro- mote wellness of the body are now shifting their focus to introducing initiatives that address wellness of the mind.


Entitled “Productivity and Balance Strategist at Pause- Works,” the author,


Patricia


Katz, states: “These are areas harder to measure (and tougher to talk about), but they are every bit as im- portant to productive workplaces as an emphasis on healthy bodies.” In the spirit of manifesting a workplace where the healthy, thriving minds of the employees are not compromised by the undesirable and sometimes bullying be- haviour of workplace colleagues, I couldn’t agree more with the author’s assertions. These areas are indeed much harder to measure, and moreover even tougher to talk about, but if we are to move be- yond the survival mentality in the work- place that sees so many employees operating from an internal state of “danger” (fear) as opposed to an internal state of “safety” (courage), we must be willing to engage and stay in the tough conversations. Emotionally unwell em- ployees eventually lead to physically un- well employees; in turn, an unwell employee complement leads to an unwell organization because the organization is the employees, and in the absence of them the organization could not exist. Organizational leaders can best demonstrate their genuine commitment


12 SECURITY MATTERS • WINTER 2011


to employee wellness not just by making a wellness journey available to their staff, but by joining them on the journey.


It


must be a mutually experienced journey. Every employee wants to work in an or- ganization that genuinely wants its em- ployees to enjoy an environment that propagates a culture of respect, compas- sion, caring and interest. This experience happens in the absence of demeaning, humiliating, bullying behaviour in the workplace. The truth is the employee be- having undesirably is feeling no more safe than the targeted colleague. That’s the tough conversation that needs to be held. Not just that people are behaving in a manner that sees them being perpetrator or victim, rather, why are they behaving that way? That tough conversation has to rise above the level of the behaviour (the doing) and we must start having the con- versations about where else and why else they respond to their world in their re- spective ways.


Emotionally unwell employees eventually lead to physically unwell employees, which is why organizations need to concentrate on healthy minds, just as much as healthy bodies


Organizations can declare that it is safe for their employees to speak up and out against undesirable behaviour, and if the safe space to speak does not originate from inside the em- ployee, they won’t trust the space that exists outside of them. When they operate from an internal state of thrival, will the organization operate from that state, by default?


In the context of our day-to- day experience of the workplace, the conversation with our employees has to start with the question. “Do you experience your workplace as safe and if not, where does the experience of, not being safe, origi- nate from?” That’s a tough conversation, and in the absence of creating opportu- nities for employees to explore it, we will beat around this bush for the next 100 years and in spite of all the policies and programs that purport to ensure the workplace is a respectful one, people will continue to experience it as not that. In the context of your day-to-day experience of the workplace, the question posed should be “Do you experience your work- place as safe and if not, where does the experience of “not being safe” originate from for you?”


Kae S. Roberts is a former police sergeant with the Ot- tawa Police Service and the founder of Awakening Wave, Organizational Evolution (www.awakeningwave.ca),


which specializes in harassment/discrim- ination workshops and training programs, as well as offers diversity in the workplace and personal wellness seminars.


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