
Employee assistance programme
Helping your employees through life’s twists and turns.
Wallboard Employers are, thankfully, becoming better attuned to the benefits of managing employee wellbeing, with many introducing policies and procedures to safeguard employee health and boost engagement and morale. By offering the likes of flexible working, access to personal counselling and healthcare cover, employers can go a long way to convincing their employees just how much they value their hard work and commitment.
HR professionals know too how employee wellbeing affects their behaviour, performance and productivity. Maintaining it is challenging at the best of times and can be tested further by the impact of stressful events such as moving house, the break-up of a relationship, being victim of a crime or the death of a loved one.
But, while HR teams are generally well prepared for dealing with the commoner life events that affect us all, they may not be so ready to deal with the impact traumatic events can have on their workforce when they occur on a larger scale.
Life-changing events can and do come from as a bolt from the blue – and leave lasting effects on those whom they touch. While making plans to support employees affected may be an unwelcome task, it is nevertheless important for HR professionals to prepare for the unexpected and accept the uncomfortable truth that their people can be caught up in traumatic events at any time and any place.
When a traumatic event occurs – be it a fatal accident involving a single employee through to a large scale occurrence lots of people – HR may be called upon to support them and possibly also their loved ones. HR will also have a critical role to play in helping to manage the flow of information about the incident to the wider company. So, for those who haven’t done so lately, now’s a good time to review their company’s policies and procedures to ensure that, should the worst happen, their organisation will be ready to respond.