Reducing the stigma of mental illness with digital treatment options

With mental health becoming a subject that is more relevant in workplace cultures, employers are realizing that providing resources regarding mental health could benefit employees' health and productivity. One in four people are affected by a mental health disorder during their life, and it's important for employers to provide as many resources for their employees. Read this blog post to learn how providing resources for employees could help long-term.


Mental health has become a global epidemic, and employers are quickly becoming aware of how important it is to provide resources for workers who may be struggling.

“We’ve gone through an evolution from where mental health wasn’t being addressed at all within the workplace to a point today where there is a far higher level of awareness,” says Ken Cahill, CEO of SilverCloud Health, a digital mental health company. “But we have to move from that to providing an actionable plan and a solution within the workplace.”

One in four people will be affected by a mental health disorder during their life, and 450 million people have mental health issues, according to the World Health Organization. The financial drain on the workplace is staggering: mental illness accounts for $194 billion in lost revenue per year due to increased healthcare costs, lost productivity and absenteeism, according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness.

“People aren't being given the toolkits to help them handle the key challenges that are there in life,” Cahill says. “Those [challenges] will leak into the everyday work environment.”

Despite the growing number of people living with mental health disorders, finding accessible and affordable treatment is often a barrier to getting help. Two-thirds of people with mental disorders never seek treatment from health professionals, according to WHO.

“The level of acceptance around mental health is improving, but the system is getting worse — our access to mental health professionals, psychiatrists and others is getting worse,” says Michael Thompson, president and CEO of the National Alliance of Healthcare Purchaser Coalitions.

SilverCloud hopes to ease the burden through their benefits platform, treating mental health needs through online modules, journaling and coaching.

“It’s very much about the full spectrum of care — challenges around work-life balance, resilience, sleep, financial debt, anxiety and depression,” Cahill says. “What we're delivering to the organization is a full end-to-end solution, and everyone can access it.”

SilverCloud uses techniques backed by cognitive behavioral therapy, one of the most common forms of treatment. Users start by taking a short quiz, which identifies a variety of risk factors associated with their mental health and assigns them various program modules 30 to 40 minutes in length. Users also have access to in-person coaches who can personalize and suggest other modules and features, depending on their needs.

Cahill says SilverCloud can be used in conjunction with in-person therapy and other mental health treatments, but 65% of users report a clinically significant improvement in the reduction or severity of their symptoms, in line with person-to-person therapy outcomes. Currently, over 200 healthcare, payor and employee benefits organizations are working with SilverCloud. Express Scripts and Mercer Canada will soon be able to get access to the company’s digital mental health platform as well.

SilverCloud is part of a growing group of digital mental health providers hoping to meet the demands of employees placing a high priority on accessible, tech-based mental health benefits. Benefitfocus includes access to Happify through their BenefitsPlace platform. The mental health app uses gamification to teach mood training. Additionally, Cisco recently partnered with Vida, a chronic care app, to offer teletherapy through its digital coaching platform.

Cahill says the focus on the importance of good mental health will push employers to keep fighting for these critical resources.

“The reason we all hold down a job, work as functioning members of society, hold on to relationships and those kinds of things are the result of good mental health,” he says. “There’s still work to be done, but the strides that have been made are a real sea change from where we were two or three years ago.”

SOURCE: Place, A. (31 January 2020) "Reducing the stigma of mental illness with digital treatment options" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.benefitnews.com/news/reducing-the-the-stigma-of-mental-illness-with-digital-treatment-options


How to Leave Work at Work

Bringing work home after a workday is a common factor that disrupts family time, and even causes more mental stress.  In order to maintain a work-life balance, it's important to know that there is a way to leave your work life, at work. Read this blog post to learn simple tips on how to keep a healthy balance between work and home-life.


Some jobs have very clear lines between when you’re “on” and when you’re “off,” while in others the lines are blurred — or potentially nonexistent. That makes not being distracted by work, especially mentally, a major challenge.

This can lead to sitting at dinner while your daughter tells a story about her day, but instead of hearing her you’re wondering whether an email from your boss came through. It can mean exchanging the time you could have spent on sleep, exercise, or talking with your spouse glued to your laptop. And it can look like keeping your work life in order, while your finances or home are a mess because you don’t take time to pay bills, plan for retirement, or tidy up.

As I shared in my article on boundaries, what is possible can vary depending on your particular job, work culture, and coworkers. But in most cases, you can reduce how distracted you feel by work during times when you’re not working.

As a time management coach, I’ve found these four steps can help. I encourage you to challenge yourself to gradually implement these changes and see how much you can leave your work at work — both physically and mentally — in 2020.

Step 1: Define “After Hours”

If you have a traditional 9-to-5 job, your hours are set for you. But if you work in an environment with flexible hours, you’ll need to think through when you want to be on and off the clock. If your employer has a certain number of hours that you’re expected to work each week, start by seeing how to fit those hours around your fixed personal commitments, like taking your kids to school or extracurricular activities, making a certain train, or attending an exercise class you really enjoy. When do you need to start and stop to put in the proper work time?

On the other hand, if your company doesn’t have a specific amount of time that you need to work — say, you freelance or have a results-only work environment — but your job still takes over almost all of your waking hours, take the reverse approach. Think through how many hours you want for activities like sleep, exercise, family, friends, cleaning, finances, etc. Then see how much time you need to reserve on a daily and weekly basis to fit in those personal priorities. That then defines the parameters of when you want to be “off hours.”

Step 2: Have Mental Clarity

Next, make sure you have mental clarity on what needs to get done and when you will complete it. This includes having a place where you write down the many tasks that you need to do, whether that’s in a notebook, a task management app, a project management system, or in your calendar. The important point is that you’re not lying in bed at night trying to remember everything on your mental to-do list.

Then once you have this list, plan out your work. That could mean setting aside time in your schedule to work on a report in advance, putting time in your calendar to prep for your next day’s meetings, or just plotting out specific hours that you will reserve for getting your own work done versus attending meetings or responding to other people’s requests. This planning reduces anxiety that something will fall through the cracks or that you’ll miss a deadline.

The final part of increasing your mental clarity is to have an end-of-workday wrap-up. During this time, look over your daily to-do list and calendar to make sure that everything that absolutely must get done — specifically, those tasks that had a hard deadline — were completed. You also can do a quick scan of your email to ensure any urgent messages are attended to before you leave the office. For some people, it works well to do this as the last thing they do that day, say 15 to 30 minutes before heading out. For others, it’s better to put a reminder in their calendars for an hour or two before they need to leave. This gives them a more generous time period to wrap items up.

Step 3: Communicate with Your Colleagues

In some job situations, you can set a definite after-hours boundary like, after 6 pm, I’m offline. But in other situations, the lines are much blurrier.

For those in situations where you can have a clear dividing line between work and home, I would encourage you to directly communicate that with your colleagues. For example, you might say, “I typically leave work at 6 pm, so if you contact me after that time, you can expect to hear back from me sometime after 9 am the next business day.” Or in some cases your actions can simply set that tone. If they never hear from you between 6 pm and 9 am, that will set the expectation that you’re not available.

But for others, who have jobs that require more constant connectivity, you may want to set some guidelines to control how people reach you, thereby reducing unwanted interruptions. For example, you could say, “It’s fine to text me during the day with questions, but after 6 pm, please send me an email instead of a text unless the situation is truly urgent.” Similarly, if you have a very flexible schedule where you take extended breaks during the day for things like going to the gym or picking your kids up after school, encourage people to reach out to you in specific, preferred ways that you establish. For instance, “There are some times during the day when I may be away from my computer. If you need a fast response, call or text me.” In these scenarios, you’ll know that only the most important work will take you away from your personal or family obligations via an urgent call or text, and you can turn your attention to non-urgent work once you have the bandwidth.

Step 4: Get Work Done at Work

It may seem crazy to say this, but I want to encourage you to give yourself permission to do work at work. For many, they perceive “real work” as something they reserve for post-5 or 6 pm, after everyone else has left the office or for after they’ve tucked their kids in bed for the night. People have this mindset because this time can seem like the few precious hours where no one is dropping by your office or asking you for anything immediately. But if you want to stop feeling distracted by work after hours, you need to actually do your work during the day.

Completing the actions under the mental clarity step will take you a long way forward in that process. Really guard your time. Put in time for project work. Place time in your calendar to answer email. And if follow-through requires going to a place other than your office to work, do it. Make and keep meetings with yourself to knock off tasks. It’s exceptionally difficult — if not impossible — to not be distracted about work when you’re stressed out because you haven’t gotten your work done.

And if you must (or want to) do some work outside of your standard day, make sure that you timebox it. For example, I will work from 8-9 pm tonight then stop. Or, I’ll put in three hours on Saturday from 1-4 pm, but then I won’t think about work before or after. It’s much better to designate a time and stick with it than it is to think about work all night or all weekend and do nothing.

As individuals, we need a mental break to do our best work, and taking time for ourselves — without the distraction of work — can help us become our best selves. I can’t guarantee that thoughts about work will never cross your mind, but with these four steps, you can reduce how much you’re distracted by work after hours.

 

SOURCE: Saunders, E. (03 February 2020) "How to Leave Work at Work" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://hbr.org/2020/02/how-to-leave-work-at-work


The New Analytics of Workplace Culture

Workplace cultures vary significantly depending on the workplace itself. With new technology and various ways to analyze employees' viewpoints on their workplaces' culture, new ways are being implemented to analyze and measure cultures around different businesses. Read this blog post to learn more about different methods to process employees' thoughts behind their workplace culture.


A business's culture can catalyze or undermine success. Yet the tools available for measuring it—namely, employee surveys and questionnaires—have significant shortcomings. Employee self-reports are often unreliable. The values and beliefs that people say are important to them, for example, are often not reflected in how they actually behave. Moreover, surveys provide static, or at best episodic, snapshots of organizations that are constantly evolving. And they're limited by researchers' tendency to assume that distinctive and idiosyncratic cultures can be neatly categorized into a few common types.

Our research focuses on a new method for assessing and measuring organizational culture. We used big-data processing to mine the ubiquitous "digital traces" of culture in electronic communications, such as emails, Slack messages and Glassdoor reviews. By studying the language employees use in these communications, we can measure how culture actually influences their thoughts and behavior at work.

In one study, two of us partnered with a midsize technology company to assess the degree of cultural fit between employees and their colleagues on the basis of similarity of linguistic style expressed in internal email messages. In a separate study, two of us analyzed the content of Slack messages exchanged among members of nearly 120 software development teams. We examined the diversity of thoughts, ideas and meaning expressed by team members and then measured whether it was beneficial or detrimental to team performance. We also partnered with employer-review website Glassdoor to analyze how employees talk about their organizations' culture in anonymous reviews to examine the effects of cultural diversity on organizational efficiency and innovation.

The explosion of digital trace data such as emails and Slack communications—together with the availability of computational methods that are faster, cheaper and easier to use—has ushered in a new scientific approach to measuring culture. Our computational-lingustics approach is challenging prevailing assumptions in the field of people analytics and revealing novel insights about how managers can harness culture as a strategic resource. We believe that with appropriate measures to safeguard employee privacy and minimize algorithmic bias it holds great promise as a tool for managers grappling with culture issues in their firms.

The Studies

Our recent studies have focused on cultural fit versus adaptability, the pros and cons of fitting in, cognitive diversity and the effects of diversity on organizational performance. Let's look at each in detail.

Fit versus adaptability. When managers think about hiring for cultural fit, they focus almost exclusively on whether candidates reflect the values, norms and behaviors of the team or organization as it currently exists. They often fail to consider cultural adaptability—the ability to rapidly learn and conform to organizational cultural norms as they change over time. In a recent study two of us conducted with Stanford's V. Govind Manian and Christopher Potts, we analyzed how cultural fit and cultural adaptability affected individual performance at a high-tech company by comparing linguistic styles expressed in more than 10 million internal email messages exchanged over five years among 601 employees. For example, we looked at the extent to which an employee used swear words when communicating with colleagues who themselves cursed frequently or used personal pronouns ("we" or "I") that matched those used by her peer group. We also tracked how employees adapted to their peers' cultural conventions over time.

We found, as expected, that a high level of cultural fit led to more promotions, more-favorable performance evaluations, higher bonuses and fewer involuntary departures. Cultural adaptability, however, turned out to be even more important for success. Employees who could quickly adapt to cultural norms as they changed over time were more successful than employees who exhibited high cultural fit when first hired. These cultural "adapters" were better able to maintain fit when cultural norms changed or evolved, which is common in organizations operating in fast-moving, dynamic environments.

These results suggest that the process of cultural alignment does not end at the point of hire. Indeed, our study also found that employees followed distinct enculturation trajectories—at certain times in their tenure demonstrating more cultural fit with colleagues and at other times less. Most eventually adapted to the behavioral norms of their peers, and those who stayed at their company exhibited increasing cultural fit over time. Employees who were eventually terminated were those who had been unable to adapt to the culture. Employees who left voluntarily were the most fascinating: They quickly adapted culturally early in their tenures but drifted out of step later on and were likely to leave the firm once they became cultural outsiders.

To further assess how cultural fit and adaptability affect performance, Berkeley's Jennifer Chatman and Richard Lu and two of us surveyed employees at the same high-tech company to measure value congruence (the extent to which employees' core values and beliefs about a desirable workplace fit with their peers) and perceptual congruence (how well employees can read the "cultural code" by accurately reporting the values held by peers). We found that value congruence is predictive of retention—employees with it are less likely to voluntarily leave the company—but is unrelated to job performance. We found that the opposite is true of perceptual congruence: It is predictive of higher job performance but unrelated to retention. These results suggest that companies striving to foster a stable and committed workforce should focus on hiring candidates who share similar values with current employees. Employers needing people who can quickly assimilate and be productive should pay greater attention to candidates who demonstrate the ability to adapt to new cultural contexts.

The benefits of not fitting in. When might it better to hire a cultural misfit? People who see the world differently and have diverse ideas and perspectives often bring creativity and innovation to an organization. But because of their outsider status, they may struggle to have their ideas recognized by colleagues as legitimate. In a recent study two of us conducted with V. Govind Manian, Christopher Potts, and William Monroe, we compared employees' levels of cultural fit with the extent to which they served as a bridge between otherwise disconnected groups in the firm's internal communication network. For instance, an employee might have connections with colleagues that bridge both the engineering and sales departments, allowing her to access and pass on a greater variety of information and ideas.

Consistent with prior work, we found that cultural fit was, on average, positively associated with career success. The benefits of fitting in culturally were especially great for individuals who served as network bridges. When traversing the boundary between engineering and sales, for example, they could hold their own in technical banter with the former and in customer-oriented discourse with the latter. People who attempted to span boundaries but could not display cultural ambidexterity were especially penalized: They were seen as both cultural outsiders and social outsiders without clear membership in any particular social clique. However, we also identified a set of individuals who benefited from being cultural misfits: those who did not have networks spanning disparate groups but instead had strong connections within a defined social clique. By building trusting social bonds with colleagues, they were able to overcome their outsider status and leverage their distinctiveness. These results suggest that an effective hiring strategy should strive for a portfolio of both conformists—or at least those who can rapidly adapt to a company's changing culture—and cultural misfits.

Cognitive diversity. Proponents of cultural diversity in teams presume that it leads to cognitive diversity; that is, diversity in thoughts and ideas. But the findings about whether cognitive diversity helps or hinders team performance are inconclusive. Part of the problem is that these studies use imperfect proxies for cognitive diversity, such as diversity in demographics, personalities or self-reported beliefs and values. Moreover, this line of research has rarely looked at how diversity is actually expressed in communications and interactions, which is problematic given that team members are sometimes reluctant to share their real feelings and opinions. Finally, cognitive diversity is often assumed to be static, even though we know team dynamics frequently change over a project's life cycle.

In a new study, which two of us conducted with Stanford researchers Katharina Lix and Melissa Valentine, we overcame these challenges by analyzing the content of Slack messages exchanged among team members of 117 remote software-development teams. We identified instances when team members discussing similar topics used diverse meanings, perspectives and styles, and then analyzed the impact of that diversity on performance. For example, in discussions of customer requirements, different interpretations of the desired look and feel of the user interface in some cases led developers to talk past one another and fail to coordinate, but in other cases sparked creative new ideas.

Our results indicate that the performance consequences of cognitive diversity vary as a function of project milestone stages. In the early stages, when the team is defining the problem at hand, diversity lowers the chances of successfully meeting milestones. During middle stages, when the team is most likely to be engaged in ideation, diversity increases the likelihood of team success. Diversity becomes an obstacle again toward the end of a project, when the team is deep into execution.

Cultural diversity and the organization as a whole. We've seen that there are trade-offs associated with diversity in teams, but how does it affect the performance of entire organizations? Conventional wisdom holds that firms must choose between a homogeneous, efficient culture and a diverse, innovative culture. A homogeneous culture improves efficiency and coordination, the theory goes, because employees agree about the norms and beliefs guiding work, but the benefits come at the expense of fewer novel ideas about how to accomplish tasks. In contrast, a heterogeneous culture sacrifices the benefits of consensus in favor of healthy disagreement among employees that can promote adaptability and innovation. The evidence supporting this thinking, however, is scant and inconclusive.

In a recent study, we analyzed the language that employees used when describing their organization's culture (for example, "our culture is collaborative," "our culture is entrepreneurial," and so on) in anonymous reviews of nearly 500 publicly traded companies on Glassdoor. We first measured the level of interpersonal cultural diversity, or disagreement among employees about the norms and beliefs characterizing the organization. We found that interpersonal cultural diversity makes it difficult for employees to coordinate with one another and reduces the organization's efficiency as measured by return on assets.

We then measured the organizations' level of intrapersonal cultural diversity. Those with high intrapersonal cultural diversity had employees with a large number of cultural ideas and beliefs about how to accomplish tasks within the company (measured as the average number of cultural topics that employees discussed in their Glassdoor reviews). For instance, employees at Netflix conceptualized the work culture in terms of autonomy, responsibility, collaboration and intense internal competition. We found that organizations with greater intrapersonal cultural diversity had higher market valuations and produced more and higher-quality intellectual property via patenting, evidence that their employees' diverse ideas about how to do work led them to be more creative and innovative.

This suggests that organizations may be able to resolve the assumed trade-off between efficiency and innovation by encouraging diverse cultural ideas while fostering agreement among employees about the importance of a common set of organizational norms and beliefs. Again, consider Netflix: Although "multicultural" employees contributed to the company's diverse culture and drove innovation, the culture was nonetheless anchored by core shared beliefs, such as the importance of radical transparency and accountability, which help employees coordinate and work efficiently.

Implications for Practice

How can these findings inform leaders' understanding of culture as a tool for improving the performance of employees, teams and the broader organization?

First, managers can increase retention by hiring candidates whose core values and beliefs about a desirable workplace align well with those of current employees. However, too much emphasis on cultural fit can stifle diversity and cause managers to overlook promising candidates with unique perspectives. Hiring managers should look for candidates who demonstrate cultural adaptability, as these employees may be better able to adjust to the inevitable cultural changes that occur as organizations navigate increasingly dynamic markets and an evolving workforce.

Hiring managers should also not overlook cultural misfits. They can be wellsprings of creativity and innovation. But to make sure they flourish inside the organization, managers should consider assigning them to roles in which they are likely to develop strong connections within particular social groups. That's because misfits need the trust and support of colleagues to be seen as quirky innovators rather than outlandish outsiders.

Second, leaders should be mindful that the expression of diverse perspectives in teams needs to be managed. Cognitive diversity is essential for generating novel, innovative solutions to complex problems, especially during the planning and ideation phases of a project. However, the expression of diverse perspectives can quickly become a liability when the team needs to focus on execution and meet looming deadlines. It is during these times that team members have to unify around a common interpretation of the problem and come to agreement about what needs to get done to solve it. Leaders must be adept at switching back and forth, learning when and how to promote the expression of divergent opinions and meanings and when to create a context for convergence.

An important distinction is warranted here. The term "diversity" is often used to connote variation in the demographic makeup of a firm's workforce. This has been particularly the case in recent years, as companies have tackled pernicious problems such as the underrepresentation of women and minorities in decision-making positions in organizations. In our work, we use "cultural diversity" to refer to variation in people's beliefs and normative expectations, irrespective of their demographic composition. As we pointed out earlier, demographic and cultural diversity are related, but a demographically homogenous group may be culturally diverse, and vice versa. Our research on cultural diversity is relevant to but ultimately independent of efforts to increase gender, race and ethnic diversity in firms.

Third, leaders should foster a culture that is diverse yet consensual in order to promote both innovation and efficiency. Such a culture is composed of multicultural employees who each subscribe to a variety of norms and beliefs about how to do work. These diverse ideas help employees excel at complex tasks, such as dreaming up the next groundbreaking innovation. Managers should encourage employees to experiment with different ways of working—extensive collaboration for some tasks, for example, and intense competition for others. At the same time, a culture should also be consensual in that employees agree on a common set of cultural norms—shared understandings—that helps them successfully coordinate with one another. Leaders can signal the importance of these norms during onboarding and in everyday interactions, just as leaders at Netflix do by rewarding employees for sharing their mistakes with colleagues in order to promote beliefs about the value of transparency.

A New Management Tool

Many of the tools we used in these studies are off-the-shelf products, and there is great potential for managers to use them to help solve practical challenges inside organizations. For instance, Stanford Ph.D. candidate Anjali Bhatt is working with two of us to demonstrate how language-based culture measures can be used to anticipate the pain points of post-merger integration. We are studying the merger of three retail banks, and analysis of emails has revealed stark differences in the rates of cultural assimilation among individuals. Such tools can be used diagnostically to assess the cultural alignment between firms during premerger due diligence, as well as prescriptively during integration to identify where and how to focus managerial interventions.

Yet the accessibility of these tools also raises important ethical concerns. In our work, we maintain strict employee confidentiality, meaning that neither we nor the organization is able to link any employee to any specific communication used in our studies. We also strongly advise against using these tools to select, reward or punish individual employees and teams, for at least four reasons: Accurately predicting individual and team performance is considerably more challenging than estimating average effects for broad types of individuals and teams; culture is only one of many factors influencing individual and team performance in organizations; algorithmic predictions often create a false sense of certainty in managers; and finally, giving any algorithm undue weight can have unintended consequences—for instance, exacerbating human biases that negatively affect women and members of underrepresented social groups.

Algorithms make estimates, but it is ultimately humans' responsibility to make informed judgments using them. Managers must be vigilant about keeping metadata anonymous and must regularly audit algorithmic decision-making for bias to ensure that the use of language-based tools does not have unintended adverse consequences on culture itself—for instance, by breeding employee distrust.

These important ethical questions notwithstanding, we believe that these tools will continue to generate insights that allow managers to finally manage the culture as a strategic resource, and ultimately lead to more culturally diverse and inclusive teams and organizations.

Matthew Corritore is an assistant professor of strategy and organization at McGill's Desautels Faculty of Management. Amir Goldberg is an associate professor of organizational behavior at Stanford's Graduate School of Business. Sameer B. Srivastava is an associate professor and the Harold Furst Chair in Management Philosophy and Values at the University of California, Berkeley's Haas School of Business. He and Goldberg codirect the Berkeley-Stanford Computational Culture Lab.

This article is reprinted from Harvard Business Review with permission. ©2019. All rights reserved.

SOURCE: Corritore, M.; Goldberg, A.; Srivastava, S. (07 January 2020) "The New Analytics of Workplace Culture" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/technology/pages/the-new-analytics-of-workplace-culture.aspx


Need a Morale Booster? Therapy Dogs Can Help

Work is stressful by itself, but with added layers of stress from having to process outside emotions and hardships, it becomes difficult to give the best service that is should be offered. Allowing a therapy dog in the workplace can help employees reduce stress, and become calmer throughout the day. Read this blog post to learn more about how therapy dogs in the workplace can be beneficial to the work environment.


The Evergreen Health services facility in Buffalo, N.Y., is buzzing with anticipation several days before Stella arrives. Some staff even seek out Matthew Sydor, the director of housing and retention services at the health care agency, days ahead of time to confirm her arrival. Others have requested a calendar invite from him so they can plan their day around her visit.

The middle-aged golden retriever is a certified therapy dog, and her visits are a hit with employees.

Therapy dogs are common in what Sydor describes as the "helping" fields. Bringing therapy dogs into any workplace, he says, is an opportunity to break up the day for employees and give them something to look forward to at no cost.

"At our agency we work with many people who have gone through traumatic experiences. All work is stressful, but layers of stress are added when you are helping others to process their own emotions and hardships," he explained. "The compounding stress makes it difficult to best serve our patients at a high level. Having a therapy dog in the building helps staff to participate in a self-care activity."

Stella's owner, Krista Vince Garland, Ph.D., is an associate professor of exceptional learning at Buffalo State College. The pair specializes in animal-assisted interventions in educational settings but are receiving an increasing number of requests to visit local workplaces.

"Everyone who visits Stella has the same comments: 'I feel so much better. She's brightened my day,' " Vince Garland said. "Aetna also did a study in 2017 that shows tremendous promise on the benefits of therapy dogs in the workplace. Employee sick days were down, morale was up and interactions among co-workers increased."

Having dogs in the workplace isn't a new concept, but it's a concept that hasn't been widely embraced. Only about 11 percent of companies in the United States allow pets in the office, according to the Society for Human Resource Management Employee Benefits 2019 survey.

Paul LeBlanc is the founder and CEO of Zogics, a Massachusetts-based fitness, cleaning and body care company. S'Bu, a Rhodesian Ridgeback, was LeBlanc's first employee.

"When you look at [Inc. magazine's] list of best places to work, 47 percent of those companies allow dogs in the office," he said. "Studies have shown that petting a dog for five to 10 minutes causes a reduction of blood pressure and the dogs have calming effects on people."

But not all employers are ready to go "all-in" like Zogics. For these workplaces, therapy dogs are a viable alternative. Sydor and Vince Garland share insight into what has made their partnership successful and offer tips any business can use.

Communicate. No one likes a surprise, even if it's a friendly four-legged canine. Talk with staff first to address any questions or concerns. Arrange a quick meet-and-greet to give the dog a chance to get used to the environment before interacting with employees.

"This also gives the administrator a chance to touch the dog and make sure it is clean and well-groomed. Therapy dogs are required to have a bath within 24 hours of any visit," Vince Garland said.

Distributing a fact sheet helps with the introduction of a therapy team. Once a visit is established, send a reminder a day prior.

"I suggest telling your staff why you're bringing therapy dogs in and advertise it as much as possible to employees," Sydor said.

Verify credentials. Ask about the team's training. Certifications are not required of service dogs and emotional support dogs. However, therapy dogs must complete training. Stella is an American Kennel Club (AKC) Good Citizen and has earned certifications through Therapy Dogs International and the SPCA Erie County Paws for Love.

"There's a lot of fake information out there. If someone is shy about sharing that information, that's a clue that more discussion is needed," Vince Garland said.

Sydor added, "We found Krista and Stella through Erie County SPCA's Paws for Love, and it has been a great partnership. They hold liability insurance for any damage that may occur. All dogs are well-trained, and the handlers are consistent with how they conduct their work."

Acknowledge cultural differences. "Care must be taken to respect cultural sensitivities," Vince Garland said. "Some cultures regard dogs as unclean, others view dogs as nuisances, while others believe spirits may appear as animals."

Designate a point of contact. This person handles scheduling visits, interacting with the team, and confirming vaccinations and liability insurance. The ideal individual works well with people and is animal-friendly, according to Vince Garland.

Create a space for the team. Not everyone will embrace dogs. Designating space separate from the main workflow respects the space of those employees who choose not to interact with the dog.

"Evergreen has given us a room for visits," Vince Garland said. "By being out of the flow, we're able to meet with staff who are interested without making others feel uncomfortable."

SOURCE: Navarra, K. (13 January 2020) "Need a Morale Booster? Therapy Dogs Can Help" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/benefits/pages/need-a-morale-booster-therapy-dogs-can-help.aspx


Marijuana and the Workplace: What’s New for 2020?

With various states legalizing the medical use and recreational use of marijuana, employers are starting to question the exceptions regarding drug-testing and the marijuana laws towards new hires and current employees. Though there are several questions and concerns being raised, this may become a new trend throughout different states. Read this blog post to learn more about what employers are doing with new state laws.


Employers have been grappling with confusing marijuana laws for years—and the rules are getting tougher to navigate as more states add employment protections.
Kathryn Russo, an attorney with Jackson Lewis in Melville, N.Y., feels that there are so many new developments with drug-testing and marijuana laws, it's hard for employers to keep up. Starting in 2020, some locations will prohibit employers from screening new hires for marijuana or refusing to hire applicants based on a failed pre-employment marijuana screen—though there are exceptions for safety-sensitive positions. This may be the new trend, Russo said.

Here's what employers need to know about the changing landscape for weed and the workplace in the year ahead.

Legalizing Recreational Use

Although all marijuana use is still illegal under federal law, at least 33 states allow medical use, and 11 of those states and Washington, D.C., also allow recreational use.

On Jan. 1, Illinois became the 11th state to legalize recreational marijuana use, and employers are still figuring out what the new law means for the workplace.

"When the act was initially passed, employers expressed concern that they might have to prove an employee was under the influence of cannabis when an employee failed a drug test," said Jennifer Colvin and Michael Furlong, attorneys with Ogletree Deakins in Chicago. "Employers also expressed concern regarding whether they could conduct random drug tests."

So Illinois lawmakers approved an amendment clarifying that employers can conduct reasonable drug and alcohol tests, including random tests, and may discipline, fire or refuse to hire a worker who fails.

"Despite this employer-friendly amendment, workplace drug policies still must be both reasonable and nondiscriminatory," Colvin and Furlong said. Notably, the amendment didn't define a "reasonable" policy.

More states are expected to approve—or attempt to approve—recreational cannabis use in 2020. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said he's making it a priority.

"This year, let's work with our neighbors New Jersey, Connecticut and Pennsylvania to coordinate a safe and fair system, and let's legalize adult use of marijuana," he said in his 2020 State of the State address on Jan. 8.

Limiting Pre-Employment Drug Screens

Another big trend that's taking shape in 2020 involves limits on pre-employment marijuana screening. On Jan. 1, a Nevada law took effect barring employers from considering a pre-employment marijuana test result, and beginning May 10, a New York City law will prohibit employers from conducting pre-employment marijuana tests. Both laws have exceptions for safety-sensitive positions and jobs regulated by federal programs that require drug testing.

Even states that allow employers to refuse to hire job applicants who fail drug tests may require employers to take specific steps before rescinding a conditional job offer.

Some states have laws prohibiting employers from discriminating against workers who use lawful products while they're off duty. Such laws were enacted to protect tobacco users from discrimination, said Jennifer Mora, an attorney with Seyfarth Shaw in Los Angeles, but whether those laws protect off-duty use of a product that remains illegal under federal law is questionable.

Protection for Registered Medical Patients

More states are also passing laws that prohibit employers from discriminating against employees because they are authorized medical-marijuana patients or caregivers of patients.
"In those states, employers may be required to engage in the interactive process to accommodate the use of medicinal marijuana off duty," said Anne-Marie Welch, an attorney with Clark Hill in Birmingham, Mich.

A reasonable accommodation may not be available for a given job, but employers should make a good-faith effort to find one, such as granting time off or altering shifts while the worker is medicated.

Employers should note that they don't have to accommodate on-the-job use or intoxication, even in states where they can't fire or refuse to hire a worker simply for being a registered medical-marijuana user.

But determining how to proceed if an employee has used medical marijuana varies by state, explained David Morrison, an attorney with Goldberg Kohn in Chicago. For instance, in Arkansas, employers may discharge employees based on a good-faith belief that the employee was impaired by medical marijuana on company property or during work hours, but a positive drug test alone is not sufficient grounds for a good-faith belief. The employer also needs to observe something in the worker's conduct, behavior or appearance that indicates intoxication or receive information from a reliable person about the worker's impairment. A positive drug test, however, may be sufficient to bar an employee from working in safety-sensitive positions, Morrison noted.

Alaska, Arizona, Delaware and Minnesota state laws also prohibit employment discrimination against qualified medical-marijuana users.

In contrast, employers in some states, such as California, Colorado, Michigan, Montana, Ohio and Oregon can fire employees who test positive for marijuana, even if the use was off-duty and for a medical condition.

"While many states address these issues in their statutes, state courts also have weighed in," Morrison said. In New Jersey, an employer did not have to waive a post-accident drug test for an employee who was a registered medical-marijuana user.

Although marijuana use is not covered by the federal Americans with Disabilities Act, employees may be able to bring state-law discrimination claims. Courts in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, for example, have allowed such claims in recent years, though older court decisions in California and Colorado dismissed state-law claims as pre-empted by federal laws prohibiting marijuana use.

Consider the Job and Business

So what should employers do in light of these differing laws? "You have to consider the needs of the business, in addition to any applicable state laws," Welch said. Federal contractors, drivers and workers in other safety-sensitive positions may be subject to drug-free workplace laws, whereas general office workers may not. Employers that are struggling to fill vacant positions might want to relax their standards.

"More and more employers appear to be treating marijuana use like alcohol use and allowing recreational off-duty use," Welch observed.

SOURCE: Piazza-Nagele, L. (17 January 2020) "Marijuana and the Workplace: What’s New for 2020?" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.shrm.org/ResourcesAndTools/legal-and-compliance/state-and-local-updates/Pages/Marijuana-and-the-Workplace-New-for-2020.aspx


Starbucks Unveils Mental Health Initiatives for Employees

Did you know: One in Five United States adults experiences mental illness. According to the World Health Organization, work is good for mental health but a negative environment can lead to physical and mental health issues. Starbucks has announced that they have launched an app for its employees to improve their mental health along with their anxiety and stress. Read this blog post to learn more about how Starbucks is creating mental health benefits for their employees.


Starbucks has launched an app to help its employees improve their mental health and deal with anxiety and stress.

The global coffee company also announced it will be retooling its employee assistance program based on feedback from employees and mental health experts. It plans to offer training to its U.S. and Canada store managers on how to support workers who experience a mental health issue, substance-abuse problem or other crisis.

Every year, one in five U.S. adults experience mental illness and one in 25 experience serious mental illness, according to the National Alliance on Mental Health. And more people are killing themselves in the workplace, according to the Washington Post. The number of such suicides increased 11 percent between 2017 and 2018. Employers, the Post reported, "are struggling with how to respond."

Business Insider reported that some Starbucks employees it interviewed about the initiatives said much of their stress comes from the company cutting back on hours and relying on employees to work longer shifts with fewer people and no pay increase.

The World Health Organization points out that while work is good for mental health, a negative environment can lead to physical and mental health problems. Harassment and bullying at work, for example, can have "a substantial adverse impact on mental health," it said. There are things employers can do, though, to promote mental health in the workplace; such actions may also promote productivity.

SHRM Online has collected the following articles on this topic from its archives and other sources.

Starbucks Announcements Its Commitment to Supporting Employees' Mental Health 

The company released a statement Jan. 6 about additions to its employee benefits and resources that support mental wellness.

"Our work ahead will continue to be rooted in listening, learning and taking bold actions," it said. In the past, that has included tackling topics such as loneliness, vulnerability "and the power of small acts and conversation to strengthen human connection."
(Starbucks)

Mental Illness and the Workplace  

Companies are ramping up their efforts to navigate the mental health epidemic. Suicide rates nationally are climbing, workers' stress and depression levels are rising, and addiction—especially to opioids—continues to bedevil employers. Such conditions are driving up health care costs at double the rate of illnesses overall, according to Aetna Behavioral Health.

Starting workplace conversations about behavioral health is challenging because such conditions often are seen as a personal failing rather than a medical condition.
(SHRM Online)   

Research: People Want Their Employers to Talk About Mental Health 

Mental health is becoming the next frontier of diversity and inclusion, and employees want their companies to address it. Despite the fact that more than 200 million workdays are lost due to mental health conditions each year—$16.8 billion in employee productivity—mental health remains a taboo subject.
(Harvard Business Review)   

Viewpoint: Addressing Mental Health in the Workplace 

Companies are reassessing their behavioral health needs and are looking to their health care partners for creative, integrated and holistic solutions. Many are turning to employee assistance programs for help.
(Benefits Pro)  

4 Things to Know About Mental Health at Work 

Kelly Greenwood graduated summa cum laude from Duke University with degrees in psychology and Spanish. She holds a master's degree in business from Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management, contributes to Forbes magazine and is editor-at-large for Mental Health at Work, a blog on Thrive Global.

She also is someone who has managed generalized anxiety disorder since she was a young girl. It twice led to debilitating depression. She shared four things she wishes she had known earlier in her life about mental health.
(SHRM Online)   

Employers Urged to Find New Ways to Address Workers' Mental Health 

An estimated 8 in 10 workers with a mental health condition don't get treatment because of the shame and stigma associated with it, according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness. As a result, the pressure is growing on employers to adopt better strategies for dealing with mental health.
(Kaiser Health News)  

Mental Health 

Depression, bipolar disorder, anxiety disorders and other mental health impairments can rise to the level of disabilities under the Americans with Disabilities Act that requires employers to make accommodations for workers with such conditions.

This resource center can help employers understand their obligations and address their workers' mental health.
(SHRM Resource Spotlight)

SOURCE: Gurchiek, k. (14 January 2020) "Starbucks Unveils Mental Health Initiatives for Employees" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/benefits/pages/starbucks-unveils-mental-health-initiatives-for-employees.aspx


New employee retention tool has four legs and goes 'woof'

The term "a dog is a human's best friend" can get thrown around, but what if dogs lead to increased productivity and less stress? Read this blog post to learn how allowing dogs at work can benefit employee productivity.


There are so many reasons to allow dogs in the workplace, from increasing production and morale to decreasing absences.

And while financial institutions have not traditionally offered such an employee benefit, there are plenty of banks and fintechs that are leading the way in the industry.

For example, JPMorgan Chase not only allows dogs into its branches, but it also hands out dog treats. Wells Fargo is another company with a great pet policy. In fact, Wells Fargo has a host of dogs that have been part of various offices throughout the years.

Other companies are going the extra mile, and providing dog parks on-site or dedicated walking areas for their four-legged colleagues. The online small-business lender Kabbage is well known for its laid-back work culture, including casual dress code, beer on tap and a dog-friendly policy.

Perhaps one of the most pet-friendly companies is Redtail Technology, which is named after the founder Brian McLaughlin’s dog. Not only does the company encourage people to bring their dogs to work, it also has a dog park, and a Slack channel for employees to message each other when they’re about to take their dog out for a play.

Still skeptical about this approach? Here are five scientifically backed reasons that allowing dogs into the office can benefit employees.

First, allowing people to bring their pet along with them to work actually helps to decrease stress for not just them, but everyone in the workspace. Washington State University found that petting a dog for just 10 minutes can help to reduce stress.

Playing with or petting a dog can increase the levels of oxytocin, a stress-reducing hormone; and decrease the levels of cortisol, a stress hormone.

A team of researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University carried out a study that compared three groups of employees: those who brought their dogs to work, those who had dogs but left them at home those who didn’t own a dog. The lead of the study, Randolph Barker, said that "the differences in perceived stress between days the dog was present and absent were significant. The employees as a whole had higher job satisfaction than industry norms."

Second, when staff bring their dog to work, they will need regular walks throughout the day, which will encourage people to be active. Being physically active not only gives people the satisfaction that naturally comes with exercise, but it will also increases productivity.

Each time someone exercises, new mitochondria produce more energy known as ATP. This gives people more energy physically and for the brain, which boosts mental output and productivity.

Third, workplaces that allow dogs into their offices usually find that employees are more cooperative with each other, and that they have better working relationships. Dogs increase morale and bring a more fun and positive outlook to office life, which encourages people to be friendlier to each other.

Dogs are a common interest between many different people from all walks of life, so having some common ground can help people to connect. Central Michigan University found that when a dog is in the room with a group of people, they are more likely to trust each other and collaborate together effectively.

Fourth, actively encouraging staff to bring their pet to work will foster a really good relationship between employer and employee. It will help to make employees feel valued and increase the likelihood they'll stay long term at the company.

The more satisfied people feel in their job role, the less likely they are to search for work elsewhere, making employee retention rates higher, according to one study.

Fifth, allowing staff to bring their pet to work increases their job satisfaction and reduces stress, which in turn will mean that they are less likely to become ill and need time off work. This can have an added effect on other employees in the business too. With the positive, stress-reducing nature that dogs bring to an office, people will be less likely to take time off.

With such benefits already working for some financial companies, hopefully others will start to catch up with these pet-friendly policies soon.

SOURCE: Woods, T. (09 January 2020) "New employee retention tool has four legs and goes 'woof'" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.benefitnews.com/opinion/pet-friendly-policies-as-employee-retention-tools


5 talent trends to watch in 2020

Although 2020 is a new year, talent may still seem comparable to previous years' trends. In 2020, employers can expect to see talent management move into a more proactive role. Read this article to learn about the five talent trends to watch for in 2020.


2020 may herald a new year (and decade), but today's talent trends will likely seem familiar.

Employer branding, diversity and inclusion, empowering managers and developing employees all remain priorities for talent pros. For example, HR Dive identified "talent acquisition panic" as one of the driving forces of 2019 — and while recruiting won't necessarily remain in a panic state, most experts agree that it will be a strategic focus for all company leaders in 2020.

But experts also said that certain trends may rise in importance in the new year, and five, in particular, will likely stand out.

Talent management will move from reactive to proactive
The workforce now encompasses a large swath of employees, independent contractors and even robots, requiring a new approach, Michael Stephan, Deloitte's US human capital leader, told HR Dive in an interview. "It's going to change the way HR business partners approach … workforce planning," he said. "Not just how many heads you need, but 'where is the best place to access this particular talent?'"

That means employers will need to move from reacting to talent needs to anticipating them, Mark Brandau, principal analyst at Forrester, told HR Dive. "Most organizations look at it from a reactive perspective and not enough time is done on planning," he said.

Expect more proactive talent strategies that encompass tech's undeniable impact on work. Kristen Ruttgaizer, director of human resources at Igloo Software, agreed that employers will have to put more effort into initiatives that draw candidates in over time, such as solid employee experience.

Diversity and inclusion efforts provide a good example of what this shift may look like, as a successful D&I initiative requires that an employer address "the entire employee life cycle," according to Randstad US's report on 2020 trends. Talent is no longer about simple efficiencies; it's now a driving force for C-suite decision-making, Stephan explained.

Contingent hiring will be more integrated
While employers may no longer be in panic mode about talent acquisition, the rise of contingent worker hiring has complicated recruiting by introducing a new variable: When you need more help, do you hire an employee or bring on a contractor?

Employers are "trying to figure out the workforce ecosystem or strategy that cuts across the different sources," Stephan said. "They realize how important figuring out that ecosystem is to that future strategy. They're in rapid investment mode."

In other words, recruiters are starting to press third-party vendors to provide offerings that would allow them to see both employee and contractor availability from the same place, Brandau said. "Why aren't they in the same place and with a nod toward skills?" he said.

Some of this transition also may include adopting development structures that create "gig-like" models within an employed workforce, WorldAtWork's CEO Scott Cawood said in his Top 7 Workplace Predictions emailed to HR Dive, giving workers opportunities to work on a project-by-project basis and understand how their career will develop in the long-term.

'Super jobs' will become more prevalent
Employee learning and talent management are more intertwined now than ever; learning was the No. 1 trend in one of Deloitte's 2019 human capital trend reports. But that push is driven in part by the looming talent shortage and heightening competition. As employers adopt tools that can do some of the work that talent would previously be hired to do —​ think robots in Amazon warehouses —​ they're also inadvertently creating "super jobs" that require skill sets that cross multiple domains, Stephan said.

"A package organizer now has to be an expert in robotic tech," he said. Someone who is managing fellow organizers may now have to combine those key leadership skills with minor capabilities in robotics. To make up that gap, employers began to lean heavily on employee development —​ but how does a company balance necessary development time without disrupting the work?

"People need to be able to do their job and have access to knowledge when doing their job," Stephan said. A global manufacturing company that works on elevators once had a 3,000 page manual, he explained. Now, employees can use an iPad to search for ways to resolve issues on the fly, educating the worker while keeping them productive.

"They're having to adapt to a really fast changing market," Brandau said.

It's not all tech-driven. The rise of super jobs also has forced employers to redefine leadership development and what it means to be a leader in an organization that requires each worker to have a broad swath of skills, Brandau added.

'Agility' will give way to 'adaptability'
Last year, "agility" was the buzzword of choice. But employers and experts have made a semantics shift toward "adaptability" as employers consider how to best prepare for the future of work.

"When you think of agility, you think of being able to bend an arm in a certain way," Brandau said. "But adaptability is an intelligence of...which way do I need to bend and why?"

The concept is not wholly different from agility, which requires an employer to be ready for the rapid changes descending upon the business world, but it does require an employer to more seriously consider how its people work and behave. "Adaptable is about living and breathing around networks," Stephan said.

A company's culture may need to adopt a philosophy about "failing fast and learning fast," he continued. After all, a workplace can't be "adaptable" if its people aren't ready — though Brandau predicts this will continue to be a hurdle for employers to overcome.

"You have to have a workforce that is ready to adapt to change. We hate change," he said. "Adaptive workforces thrive in change. How do you do this in real ways?"

Employers will have to use data to dive local —​ whether they're ready or not
To find talent faster, some employers have invested in data and "workforce sensing" to get a more accurate assessment of the local talent market. The pressure to do so —​ and quickly —​ has only risen in recent years as employers grapple with talent gaps. That data can inform the type of tech an employer needs or even a new location strategy, Stephan said. And that doesn't even account for HR's use of internal data to gauge employee experience.

Unfortunately, HR teams aren't exactly prepared for this deep dive, even if the branding around it has been centered on employee experience, Brandau said. "HR and these areas have not typically been very good at dealing with data," he added. "How are managers going to deal with an intelligent suite? They aren't ready for it."

Employers that want to improve their workforce sensing capabilities will need to invest serious time into understanding external data sources. Where are the "pockets of workforce capabilities"? "Our clients really aren't there yet," Stephan said. But this talent market might just push them there.

SOURCE: Moody, K. (08 January 2020) "5 talent trends to watch in 2020" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.hrdive.com/news/5-talent-trends-to-watch-in-2020/570026/


Even HR executives have to reinvent themselves to survive

New trends, technology, and modern changes are creating concerns for the trained level of HR professionals. With different changes continuously entering companies, HR professionals are having to go through different pieces of training. Read this blog post to learn about HR professionals having to learn about new and modernized paces.


HR chief executives by and large are ill-equipped to meet the needs of the modern workplace, according to a new report of 500 top executives.

The irony is the HR profession is perhaps entering a golden age for HR leaders, as the role shifts beyond administrative and process-related functions to work that is at the very core of a company’s business strategy to keep top talent.

And yet because the workplace is changing so fast to adapt to technological and demographic shifts, the study by SHRM and another insurance company found that the role of HR hasn’t been able to keep pace to train the latest generation of HR leaders.

Because work functions are constantly in flux, training and development can no longer be considered episodic events but instead will require perpetual reskilling to stay relevant. The study noted that between 2003 and 2013, more than 70% of the Fortune 1000 companies changed and were replaced by nimbler firms.

Most HR executives or chief people officers, or CPOs, will need to reskill to stay relevant — and do so quickly, according to HR People + Strategy, the group’s network of business and thought leaders in human resources.

“As the pace of innovation and technology in the workplace accelerates, CPOs will need to reinvent themselves,” says the study’s co-author Suzanne McAndrew, the global head of talent of another insurance company. “With disruption on the horizon, organizations will require strong, visionary people leaders who can think through the people and talent strategy, and work with management on the business strategy.”

Most executives “are not prepared,” McAndrew says.

“We’re only going to get things done if we have the right people, the right talent in the right functions with the right goals,” Upwork CEO Stephanie Kasriel says in the study. “That to me is the role of HR, to ensure that we have the right people strategy in order to inform the business strategy.”

The study reviewed key changes shaping HR functions for human resources leaders and also found:

•Virtually all respondents (99%) believe HR executives must have the agility and courage to change, yet only 35% said today’s leaders are prepared to respond.
•More than nine in 10 respondents (94%) say it’s important to explore the development of future HR leaders, but only about a third (35%) agree that future staff are receiving the training they’ll need to succeed.
•Only one-third of respondents (36%) are prepared to think about how technology can be used to execute work in the future; only a quarter (26%) say they have the technical acumen to evaluate new technologies.

HR leaders can do five things to help drive change, including acting as an advocate for change and agility, developing digital technology to improve HR functions, using automation to foster new skills and reinvention for staff, focusing on workplace culture and leadership and elevating HR decision-making to include more analytics, the study found.
Alexander Alonso, chief knowledge officer at SHRM, noted that HR executives have the greatest potential to foster the evolution of enterprises by building up their own expertise to meet future workforce demands.

Respondents also recognize much progress is still needed with digital enablement and understanding how to apply digital technology and automation in the workplace. Only 42% had a favorable opinion of their organization’s progress when it comes to embracing technology that builds a consumer experience for employees.

“While CPOs don’t need to be technology experts, they must understand how changing technology can impact work and the workforce,” says Ravin Jesuthasan, a managing director at another insurance company and co-author of the study.

SOURCE: Siew, W. (08 January 2020) "Even HR executives have to reinvent themselves to survive" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://www.employeebenefitadviser.com/news/even-hr-executives-have-to-reinvent-themselves-to-survive


The Post-Holiday Funk Is Real

Getting out of the post-holiday funk is a difficult task in itself. After a holiday season filled with parties, breaks, food and time off, it can be hard to snap back into work mode. Here are a few things you can do to get out of that holiday funk:


Somewhere around the third week in December work in many offices starts to slow down. There are holiday parties. Customers and clients may be harder to reach. Energy and motivation wanes. And many of us sign off from work completely to spend the holidays with friends and family.

And then January arrives, and it’s time to get back in the swing of things. But, after being out for a week or two, it can be hard to snap back into work mode. If you’re feeling sluggish and unmotivated, you’re not alone. There are several reasons for this kind of the post-holiday funk — and, fortunately, there are things you can do to get out of it as well.

Focus forward
It’s common around New Year’s Day to look back at the past year. Research on construal-level theory suggests that the more distant you are from anything in time, space, or socially, the more abstractly you think about it. Getting out of the office and looking at the whole year leads you to think about your contribution and not just the tasks you did. This is natural and healthy. After all, your contribution in the last year was not the 16,471 emails you sent, but rather the relationships you solidified, the projects you oversaw, and the collaborations you continued as a result of those emails.

But while you’re likely to be proud of some things you accomplished, you may also be thinking about some of your failures. These are often the source of many people’s New Year’s resolutions.

Of course, noticing last year’s failures can be disheartening. And around the new year, you may end up in a cycle of thoughts about what you could have done differently in the past. This kind of rumination can actually heighten feelings of depression and anxiety, which sap your motivation.

When you get back to work, it’s important to start looking forward to the new year rather than back on the past one. Treat the goals you want to accomplish as new challenges and a source of energy not a penance for things you didn’t get done last year. Focusing on the future — and seeing new opportunities to succeed — can help you to generate the energy to get started.

Get specific
Your reflections on the past year might also lead you to commit to making changes. This is a good thing but not if your commitments are abstract, like “be more productive,” “get a new job,” or “become a better leader.”

In fact, these abstract goals can be paralyzing. They’re simply too big to make meaningful progress toward. Instead, turn your goal into specific actions that when added up lead to the desired outcome. This kind of specific plan is called an implementation intention. It requires that you break the general goal down into tasks that can be put on your calendar.

This specificity has two benefits.

First, it requires you to think through what actually has to be done to achieve the goal. You may discover that you don’t know all the steps or that some of the steps are ones that involve skills you need to learn. In that case, you might want to find a mentor or coach who can help you.

Second, being specific forces you to grapple with your densely packed schedule. One reason why people often fail to achieve important goals is that they cannot find the time to perform the tasks that would lead to success. When you try to add new actions to your agenda, you are forced to figure out what can be moved, delayed, or delegated in order to put you on the road to following through on your commitment.

Make the right social comparisons
A third possible source of post-holiday funk is social comparison.

Humans don’t evaluate things on an absolute scale. Instead, we assess our success relative to some standard. Often, we do that through the process of social comparison, in which we compare ourselves to someone else.

There are two kinds of social comparisons. Upward social comparisons involve comparing yourself to someone better off than you are along a particular dimension. For example, you might see a high-school friend who just got a promotion, or a college friend who just bought a car that you dream of owning some day. These comparisons tend to make you feel bad about yourself, because they highlight what other people have that you don’t, whether it’s money, social standing, or particular relationships. Downward social comparisons are comparisons to someone worse off than you. These comparisons generally make you feel good about yourself and your situation.

Unfortunately, both kinds of comparison can sap your motivation. Upward social comparisons can frustrate you, knowing that other people you know are more successful, happier, or wealthier than you are. Because of the way people curate their social media, if you just look at where people are taking vacations or what they post about their jobs, it’s easy to believe that most people are doing better than you are, which may lead you to feel like giving up.

When you make downward social comparisons, you feel better about what you have and what you have accomplished, but you aren’t motivated to continue pushing forward. Instead, it makes you satisfied with where you are and, often, complacent. The energy you need to motivate yourself comes from being dissatisfied with something about the present, along with developing a plan to get what you want.

You can’t stop yourself from making social comparisons, but you can explicitly manage those comparisons to motivate you. For example, you can find a close rival — someone who is doing slightly better than you are along some dimension, but whose performance is close enough to your own that you can see how you could take some actions to reach their level.

You can also make social comparisons to your past self. Take a look at your trajectory. Recognize that even if you haven’t achieved all of your goals, you have improved over time. Use that recognition of your own growth to spur you to keep working to reach new heights.

No one wants to start the year off in a rut. And yet many of us begin January too focused on the past and feeling bad about what we have yet to accomplish. With some small changes in your perspective, though, you can hit the ground running in the new year.

SOURCE: Markman, A. (03 January 2020) "The Post-Holiday Funk Is Real" (Web Blog Post). Retrieved from https://hbr.org/2020/01/the-post-holiday-funk-is-real?ab=hero-subleft-3