How might occupational health professionals tackle stress in male-dominated sectors such as construction? Matt Wilson presents some potential solutions.
A previous CPD article considered the aspects of construction work that can impact mental wellbeing, while this article presents a way forward.
Construction safety has improved significantly, but work-related ill health remains higher than the UK employed norm (HSE 2020). Mental health is of particular concern, and the risk of suicide is high (HSE, 2022).
It is important to understand that, in a hyper-masculine environment, resistance to help is particularly common (Ness, 2012). Many refuse to be labelled with stress or a mental illness to avoid being seen as ‘victims’, which some may perceive as a loss of agency, social standing and competence (Lipsedge & Canlan, 2010). Therefore, any attempt to treat employees must first deal with the associated stigma, while training and advice needs to be credible, realistic, and relatable (Milner et al, 2018).
As a result of this stigma, occupational health professionals need to be vigilant for the signs of stress, such as sickness absence, as workers may less forthcoming (HSE 2019, Kotera et al 2020).
HSE’s stress management case studies reveal that:
- Managers, trade unions, HR, safety advisors and occupational health professionals should work together.
- Senior management commitment is essential.
- Approaches should be recorded and monitored for effectiveness, and reviewed and amended when necessary.
- The HSE stress management tool can be effective for addressing workplace stressors.
The priority is to avoid stress exposure in the first place but, considering the myriad of stressors in this industry, this can be difficult. Employers should follow HSE advice and recommendations from academic literature and mental health charities to reduce stress. The following factors should be considered:
- Job demands: including the working environment, workload, shift patterns the workers’ ability to take breaks. Exposure to workplace hazards including noise, vibration and challenging temperatures, plus the need to wear bulky or uncomfortable personal protective equipment, should also be considered.
- Job control: how much control the worker has over the work they do and how they undertake work tasks.
- Workplace support: from managers, supervisors and co-workers and provision of the appropriate resources to do their job.
- Relationships with co-workers: promoting a positive workplace culture, avoiding conflict, and discouraging and having policies that address inappropriate behaviours such as bullying and harassment.
- Job role: ensuring workers understand what is expected of them.
- Change: how organisational change, both small and large scale, is managed and communicated.
Social support and involvement
The HSE recommends stress management training for supervisors. This is vital for forming social support infrastructure, as well as support and referral to specialist services if needed (Kotera et al, 2020; Maqsoom et al, 2018). The HSE puts it succinctly: “train them not to become experts, but to know when to generate action” (HSE, 2019).
Mental health CPD
HSE recommends fostering good colleague relations through informal events and interaction. The construction industry is rife with division, either through an office/site employee divide or culture and language, which if left unchecked will only hamper activity to tackle stress.
Informal support infrastructure is also vital, whether social via colleague support, family, or employee assistance programmes (Maqsoom et al, 2018).
Flexibility and involvement
Flexible working practices can help employees maintain a good work life balance, which can help alleviate work-related stress and stress from employees’ personal lives (Kotera et al, 2020; Flux et al, 2019).
Worker involvement in decisions can help manage stress related to lack of control (Burki, 2018; HSE, 2019). Interventions can include scheduling appraisals and one-to-ones with managers to facilitate feedback on work performance, and the opportunity for employees to raise issues and have regular input in work processes.
Stress and mental health could be discussed at staff meetings to allow for open discourse, and having an open-door policy or other agreed route for employees to raise concerns where uncertainty or conflict arises can help them regain control (HSE, 2019).
The construction industry is rife with division, either through an office/site employee divide or culture and language, which if left unchecked will only hamper activity to tackle stress.”
Policies and procedures
Drug screening should be implemented in an industry where heavy plant and machinery is regularly used (CIPD, 2007). Randomised screening may alter behaviour and, where issues are identified, employees should be referred to specialist services. If an employee indicates that their drug or alcohol misuse is stress related, employers should seek to understand the the origins of this stress.
Research by Broadbent & Papadopoulos (2014) lends support to the argument that construction work has considerable negative impacts on its workers’ health beyond the more obvious hazards on sites. For example, construction workers are almost twice as likely as the general working population to smoke or drink excessively (Sherratt, 2018) and over three-times more likely to die by suicide (Burki, 2018).
Policies should also address discrimination at work. Failure to address discrimination will adversely affect relationships with workers and ultimately, their mental health (Maqsoom et al, 2018).
Job change and development
Job change or redesign may be useful as a strategy to reduce the symptoms of anxiety, depression, and job strain (Broadbent, 1985; Kotera et al, 2020).
Job redesign would require reviewing responsibilities and understanding an individual’s limitations and ambitions, and can be facilitated by offering career development and job rotation. This has proven to be a preventative strategy in younger workers (Maqsoom et al, 2018).
However, any job redesign needs to meet the needs of the business, and it is important to understand that younger and older workers may require a different approach due to their differing experience and perception.
Manage the obvious risks
By addressing the stressors on site, the requirement for unhealthy and destructive strategies such as alcohol or drug abuse may lesson. However, while we can mediate stressors to a certain extent at work, it is important to understand that there are wider health inequalities at play.”
Though usually considered as part of the Construction Design and Management Regulations 2015 and Regulation 4 of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999, employers should control risks such as noise, vibration, safety concerns and musculoskeletal disorders, all of which can affect stress-levels.
Consultation is key when there is any kind of change, whether this be the introduction of new technology, the movement of key employees off site, or the closure of the business. Examples of good communication methods include emailed notices, online forums, meetings, and notices on site or in the office. Multilingual notices should also be considered, especially as construction is a vastly multicultural industry.
By addressing the stressors on site, the requirement for unhealthy and destructive strategies such as alcohol or drug abuse may lesson. However, while we can mediate stressors to a certain extent at work, it is important to understand that there are wider health inequalities at play. Living standards, education, life events and social status outside of work all contribute to psychosocial health (Flux et al, 2019; Abbe et al, 2011).
Sources of stress outside of work and those borne of societal and cultural issues are not areas in which individual employers or OH professionals can be expected to address. It is only by a combination of industry bodies working in collaboration with mental health charities, the HSE, and other government bodies to increase mental health awareness and literacy, can we hope to see a vast improvement in the mental health of this industry.
References:
Abbe, O. O., Harvey, C. M., Ikuma, L. H. and Aghazadeh, F. (2011) ‘Modelling the relationship between occupational stressors, psychosocial/physical symptoms and injuries in the construction industry’, International journal of industrial ergonomics, 41(2), pp. 106-117.
Broadbent, D. E. (1985) ‘The clinical impact of job design’, The British journal of clinical psychology., pp. 33.
Broadbent, R. and Papadopoulos, T. (2014) ‘Improving mental health and wellbeing for young men in the building and construction industry’, Journal of Child & Adolescent Mental Health, 26(3), pp. 217-227.
Burki, T. (2018) ‘Mental health in the construction industry’, The Lancet. Psychiatry, 5(4), pp. 303-303.
CIPD (2007) Managing drug and alcohol misuse at work – A guide for people management professionals, published 07/07 by The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, 151 The Broadway, London, SW19 1JQ
Flux, L, Hassett, A and Callanan, M (2019) ‘How do employers respond to employees who return to the workplace after experiencing the death of a loved one? – A review of the literature’. Policy and Practice in Health and Safety, Vol.17, no.2 pp98-111
HSE (2019) Tackling Work-Related Stress Using the Management Standards Approach, HSE publication WBK01 published 03/19
HSE (2020) Construction statistics in Great Britain, v.1 Published 11/20
HSE (2022) HSE Workplace Health Expert Committee Work Related Suicide. WHEC-18 2022. Bootle:HSE
Kotera, Y., Green, P. and Sheffield, D. (2020) ‘Work-life balance of UK construction workers: relationship with mental health’, Construction management and economics, 38(3), pp. 291-303.
Lipsedge.M and Canlan. (2010) Work, Stress and Sickness Absence: a Psychosocial Perspective, Hunter’s Diseases of Occupations, Tenth Edition, Part 6 – Work and Mental Health, pp.804-819
Milner, A., Law, P. C. F., Mann, C., Cooper, T., Witt, K. and Lamontagne, A. D. (2018) ‘A smart-phone intervention to address mental health stigma in the construction industry: A two-arm randomised controlled trial’, SSM – population health, 4, pp. 164-168.
Maqsoom, A, Mughees, A, Safdar, U, Afsar, B and Ali Zeeshan, B (2018) ‘Intrinsic psychosocial stressors and construction worker productivity: impact of employee age and industry experience’ Economic Research 31:1 pp1880-1902
Ness, K. (2012) ‘Constructing Masculinity in the Building Trades: ‘Most Jobs in the Construction Industry Can Be Done by Women’’, Gender, work, and organization, 19(6), pp. 654-676.
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Sherratt, F. (2018) ‘Shaping the discourse of worker health in the UK construction industry’, Construction management and economics, 36(3), pp. 141-152.
