Wellfest and a wish list

We’ve had a great UCU recruitment week here in Southampton, cleverly aligned with #MentalHealthAwarenessWeek so that we could highlight our local campaign priority about workloads and wellbeing. Thanks to all of you who visited our info stand and took part in the events. On the info stand at Highfield we asked people to tell us – via a post it note – how the University could help staff wellbeing. We were delighted to talk with the Interim VC Mark Spearing and some members of the senior management team, and we also got lots of feedback and ideas from staff and students.

Staff spoke of the need to feel able to balance the quality and quantity of work, but also how difficult it was to take regular breaks, and how often they felt guilty and stressed about their workloads. Talking with students it was clear that they are acutely aware of our workloads, indeed some shared that they didn’t feel able to come forward because they felt they were too much of a burden on staff. One post it note said “As a student I think that staff are overstretched and struggling to support students” – this is not what any of us want. Others commented that they have seen lots of staff leave and not being replaced, and said how disruptive this was, an indictment of the repeated rounds of cuts and reorganisations we have experienced.

Here’s a few of the ideas and comments from the UCU message board.

Things that might help:
• Counselling for staff (face to face) and mental health first aiders
• Massage
• Flexible working/ working from home (where reasonable)
• Lunchtime mindfulness session held somewhere peaceful
• Chill out/ Sleep Zone

Actions suggested to address the problems:

• A workload audit – look at workload implications for all new systems and processes.
• Cover for staff on long time sick. More temps!!!
• Stop cutting staff numbers / replace staff when they leave
• Stop the culture of working and emails 24hrs a day!
• Policy of no emails on home phones!
• Tell temporary staff all the details of their job

And instead of ‘Work-life Balance’ one comment requested ‘Work-Life Separation’ – How many of us feel able to achieve this? Others spoke of the need for respect for the diversity of staff and student expectations, experiences, and emotional triggers, and the need to work with a spirit of generosity to address the mental health challenges people face. Mental Health Awareness Week and Wellfest are small parts of our journey to improve mental health and wellbeing. We hope there will more attention to the problems caused by excessive workloads and, importantly that there will be action in coming months to improve the mental health and wellbeing of our staff.

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