Like for most employers, the Covid-19 pandemic has posed a range of operational and HR challenges for Yorkshire Water over the past year. As Susan Gee explains, proactively supporting employee health and wellbeing, including staff struggling with “long Covid”, has been at the heart of its response.
Prior to the pandemic, Yorkshire Water had an established track record of supporting employee health, safety and wellbeing. We have a committed and experienced in-house occupational health team, which is part of a wider health, safety, environment and security team. Both work effectively and collaboratively with our HR function, and are supported by our trade union colleagues.
Managing ‘long Covid’
In addition, a major commitment, and the big ambition at the centre of our business strategy, is to put people at the heart of everything we do. Early referral to OH is embedded in the sickness absence policy and, as such, managers are practised and compliant in referring employees to OH. Equally, managers are well-supported by HR in managing attendance.
A comprehensive suite of health promotion initiatives has been on offer for many years across the organisation; the projects are aligned with the public health agenda. In addition, there is a wellbeing strategic group, chaired by our health and safety director and supported with wellbeing representatives from every area of the business. This group meets quarterly to discuss future projects and highlight any issues that may impact on the wellbeing equilibrium of the organisation.
Before I get to detailing the wellbeing strategy we have in place to support employees who recovering from Covid-19 and, especially, “long covid”, it is important to understand how the organisation initially reacted to the pandemic from a business prospective. This has shaped, and continues to influence, how we are helping our employees to feel safe and well, and to thrive during this difficult time.
Managing through a pandemic
Research by Deloitte (2020) suggests that, during a crisis, resilient leaders should express empathy and compassion for the human side of the upheaval. To that end, the first priority of leaders should be safeguarding workers, ensuring their immediate health and safety, and their economic wellbeing.
A crisis, Deloitte argues, plays out over three timeframes:
- Respond. This is where a company deals with the present situation and manages continuity.
- Recover. This is where a company learns and emerges stronger.
- Thrive. This is where the company prepares for and shapes the “next normal”.
When the first March 2020 lockdown was announced, Yorkshire Water quickly enacted business continuity plans that enabled the business to function effectively.
However, it is well-known that “perfect” is the enemy of “good” during a crisis, when prompt action is often required. Like many organisations, we faced multiple challenges as we transitioned the bulk of our workforce from office-based working to remote home working, which included our call centre (which employs 700 people from our total of around 4,500).
Operationally, there were other external factors to consider. For example, our business function was already in escalation as we were still dealing with the impact of severe regional flooding that took place during the weeks beforehand. Moreover, a lot of our essential work requires employees to be in direct contact with our customers – in their homes, and in their businesses – and the nature of our work also involves a lot of contact with the public in general.
More widely, as a business we needed employees to have trust and confidence in our approach to supporting them; this required honesty and transparency from the outset.
The strategy, therefore, was multifaceted and involved collaborative working with our business leaders and the board. This included HR, OH and safety, communications and our trade unions. The key priorities were:
- People, their safety, health and wellbeing
- Clear communication
- Business continuity
Managing ‘long Covid’
Most people recover from Covid-19 relatively quickly and, by and large, within a two-week period. But for some, their health is compromised and they face more serious, long-term health issues – now often called ‘long Covid’ or post-Covid syndrome.
Long Covid can be a challenge, because it is very new and whilst some of the post-Covid symptoms have been identified, the list of complications appears to be continually expanding. Guidance, such as that from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, is also developing.
Referral to OH is the norm at Yorkshire Water and we have now assigned two dedicated HR advisors to work with managers and employees with all issues related to Covid-19.
Following referral to OH, there are a number of options available to our employees in terms of support. For example, we have a rehabilitation policy that allows an employees to return to work over a 12-week period. During this time an employee can work significantly reduced hours and have their duties adjusted to suit their physical and psychological capability. This might, for example, involve being temporarily moved into an alternative role.
In addition, we offer a physiotherapy service (provided by Connect Health), which is developing an e-learning package for our employees to support their musculoskeletal health whilst working from home. We are also using monthly management information detailing the demographics of physiotherapy referrals to help develop specific health promotion projects within the organisation.
Our physiotherapy provider can also support recovery from Covid-19 by offering rehabilitation support, which can include functional capacity assessment.
Challenges around mental health
At the start of the pandemic, 31% of the referrals to OH were for reasons related to mental health. By the end of January this year that figure had increased to 46%.
At Yorkshire Water, our approach to supporting employee health has always been person-centred and, while occupational health and HR policies are standardised to an extent, each person is uniquely assessed to determine what specific support they may need.
Referral to a range of talking therapies was already in place, but there was recognition that additional support needed to be available. So a 24/7 employee assistance programme, supported by Westfield Health was put in place. Importantly, this also supports our employees’ families, and is extended to our contract partners and their families. This facility provides financial and legal advice as well as emotional and mental health support.
We introduced the NHS Togetherall platform (previously known as the Big White Wall). We also offered employees free access to the Vitality Health app, which supports physical health but also includes access to the Headspace app and other mental health information and support. We’ve linked up with a firm in Denmark that offers a button-style tracker that you can wear which monitors how much daylight you are getting during your day.
Mental health first aid training is mandated for all of our managers and made accessible to all our employees. Prior to the pandemic, we had trained 1,700 employees and 260 of these employees have volunteered to be a listening support for colleagues struggling with their mental health.
In addition, we have put together a comprehensive health promotion calendar, which covers a wide range of topics, and has been accessible via Yammer, our internal communications Hive, as well as via some interactive video/teams’ workshops. Topics being covered by the programme include:
- Alcohol awareness
- Diabetes awareness
- Supporting mental health whilst working at home
- Obesity workshop and promotion of Slimming World vouchers
- The “16-days of action” domestic violence campaign (https://16daysofaction.co.uk/)
- Suicide awareness
- Interactive workshops with a GP about sleep, managing anxiety, strategies for managing childcare and home schooling, and the menopause
- Resilience and mindfulness training sessions
- Half-day mental health first aid training
Alongside all this, our HR department has given our benefits and rewards scheme a complete makeover and launched a comprehensive financial wellbeing hub. This offers advice and guidance around all money-related matters. There is as well a new “Myoffers” platform that offers employees discounts on a range of products – including discounts on the weekly supermarket shop.
To sum up, navigating a pandemic is not easy for any organisation, both operationally and in terms of supporting employee health and wellbeing during what has been unprecedented times.
At Yorkshire Water, we’ve taken a biopsychosocial approach to supporting our employees. In doing so, we’ve put in place extensive support, as I hope this article shows.
However, even with the rollout of vaccines, we know that Covid-19 continues to pose a significant threat, especially as mutations and new variants emerge. As such, the whole organisation – including the occupational health team – will need to remain vigilant in our approach to supporting the health and wellbeing of our employees as we move forward.
References
“Covid-19: Practical workforce strategies that put your people first”, Deloitte 2020, https://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/Deloitte/global/Documents/About-Deloitte/gx-workforce-strategies-that-put-your-people-first.pdf
“The Heart of Resilient Leadership: Responding to Covid-19”, Deloitte, March 2020, https://www2.deloitte.com/us/en/insights/economy/covid-19/heart-of-resilient-leadership-responding-to-covid-19.html
Sign up to our weekly round-up of HR news and guidance
Receive the Personnel Today Direct e-newsletter every Wednesday
“Covid-19: Practical workforce strategies that put your people first”, Deloitte,2020,https://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/Deloitte/global/Documents/About-Deloitte/gx-workforce-strategies-that-put-your-people-first.pdf
“COVID-19 rapid guideline: managing the long-term effects of COVID-19”, NICE, December 2020, https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng188
