Managing Stress at Work Conference
This conference has taken place, however if you are interested in receiving information about future conferences please contact us.
Our next conference is:
'Workplace Resilience, Stress and Well-Being,'
at the CBI Conference Centre, London,
on Thursday 20th November 2008
Last conference was held on: Wednesday 28th November 2007
View photographs from our 2007 conference here.
Key areas covered:
- Case Studies from the Private and Public Sector
- Choice of 4 Workshops for Delegates to Attend
- Latest Findings re Management Behaviour and Stress
- HSE Initiatives on Stress - An Update
Venue: Business Learning and Conference Centre, Halbeath, Dunfermline, Fife KY11 8DY
Price: £149 + VAT per delegate (includes delegate pack and lunch).
Conference Details
The Conference is supported by:-
- OHSAS
Introduction
The 2007 In Equilibrium ‘Managing Stress at Work’conference is rich in the quality of its speakers and workshop facilitators. The conference objective is to enable delegates to learn from the experience of those who have tackled stress on an organisational level while also having the opportunity to learn more about managing their own and their colleagues’stress while at work.
The conference commences with an update from the HSE regarding the progress they are making in reducing work-related stress nationally, and how the Management Standards for Stress are being used by increasing numbers of organisations as a template for intervention. This is followed by some examples of how running a Stress Risk Assessment yields added benefits for management beyond the statutory 'Duty of Care' requirements. This looks at Stress Risk Assessment from the users perspective by reviewing the experiences of a cross-section of organisations.
Delegates then have the opportunity to attend 2 of the 4 workshops available. These look at the actions managers and individuals can take to reduce the risk of stress at work. The four choices include ‘the managers’role’, ‘developing resilience in managers’, ‘bullying and harassment awareness’and ‘individual stress management techniques’.
The conference continues with 3 case studies from national organisations from the private and the public sectors that have implemented stress management initiatives. Finally there is a fascinating insight into the findings of current research, funded by the HSE and the CIPD, into the link between manager behaviour and stress.
09.00 - 09.30 Registration
Session 1
09.30 - 09.45 Introduction by Conference Chair – Why manage stress at Work
Dr Alastair Leckie - Consultant in Occupational Medicine, and Director, OHSAS
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09.45 - 10. 10 HSE's current strategy regarding Managing Stress at Work
Professor Colin Mackay, Principal Psychologist, HSE
In this presentation Professor Mackay provides us with an update regarding UK workplace stress levels and the positive effect the HSE Management Standards for Stress are having. He will also review the various research and findings conducted by the HSE into causes of stress and will provide an overview of the HSE's targets for the future.
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10.10 - 10.35 Stress Risk Assessment - the hidden benefits experienced by real users
Bernard Lim, Director, Health-e-Solutions
Whilst compliance may be the reason why many organisations have started to formally undertake Stress Risk Assessments (SRA), essentially, understanding employee stress is a key part of good management practice. Having taken the first step to measure and in some cases, benchmark their organisation, what has been the experience of these real users? This session will present the experiences of a cross-section of these organisations,where the process of carrying out the SRA in a structured and planned manner has yielded benefits beyond the original objective. The presentation summarises the view from the users’ perspective.
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10.35 - 10.45 Q and A Session with previous speakers
10.45 – 11.00 Refreshments, Networking and Exhibition
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Session 2
Workshops
11.00 - 12.20
The same four workshops will be run concurrently before and after lunch. This allows delegates to choose to attend two of the workshops, one before lunch and one after lunch. Please specify when booking which workshops you would like to attend. Places will be limited and allocated on a first come first served basis.
Workshop A: Stress and Well-being: the manager's role
Dot Gourlay - Stress Management Consultant
This workshop reviews the Statutory and HSE requirements managers need to be aware of and how they can protect themselves and the organisation. This is followed with a summary of the actions managers can take to enhance well-being and prevent stress at work. There will also be some interactive exercises and general discussion regarding how the following affects the stress and well-being of employees:
- The behaviour of the manager
- The personality of the individual
- The level of pressure and demands
- Personal circumstances
Workshop B: Developing Resilience in Managers
Michaela Loughney - Consultant In Equilibrium
The need for resilience in managers has never been greater. In coping with the increased workload and pressure caused by organisational change and growth, all managers experience set-backs and disappointments. These are inevitable. However, it is the resourceful ways in which they respond to these adversities that separates resilient managers from the rest.
In this workshop Michaela Loughney looks at the evidence supporting the benefits of developing resilience in managers and provides some examples of how managers can develop resilience skills and attributes
Workshop C: Recognising Bullying & Harassment in the Workplace
Lynne Walton - Flagship Training
Too little is known about bullying in the workplace. Sadly it often takes the publicity of high profile bullying cases involving high levels of compensation to raise awareness of this all too common problem. More organisations are in denial about the existence of bullying and harassment than any other management or cultural problem. Part of the problem is that Bullying and Harassment are terms that can be widely misunderstood and at times overused. This workshop will discuss the importance of raising awareness and how managers and staff can recognise potential bullying and harassment situations.
Workshop D: Managing your stress - individual strategies to help you cope.
Dr Anita Levinson - Organisational Psychologist and Consultant
Managing your own stress is a very personal affair. The same situation or set of circumstances can cause excessive pressure and stress for one person but can also motivate and provide a buzz for someone else. Consequently, its ‘horses for courses’, to combat personal stress we need to work out what works for us as individuals. This workshop starts with a comprehensive review of stress awareness and how participants can recognise it in themselves and their colleagues. They will then be introduced to a variety of tools and techniques they can choose from that will reduce stress and boost well-being.
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12.20 - 1.20 Lunch, Networking and Exhibition
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Session 2 (continued)
Workshops
1.20 - 2.40
Delegates attend their 2nd choice workshop
Workshop A: Stress and Well-being: the manager's role.
Dot Gourlay - Stress Management Consultant
Workshop B: Developing Resilience in Managers
Michaela Loughney - Stress Management Consultant, In Equilibrium
Workshop C: Recognising Bullying & Harassment in the Workplace
Lynne Walton - Flagship Training
Workshop D: Managing your stress - individual strategies to help you cope.
Dr Anita Levinson - Organisational Psychologist and Consultant
Session 3
2.40-3.00 The vital role of managers in preventing and reducing stress at work
Emma Donaldson-Feilder, Chartered Occupational Psychologist, Affinity Health at Work
In order to reduce and manage workplace stress effectively, employers need to ensure that managers demonstrate the skills and behaviours that allow them to manage their staff in ways that minimise work-related stress. This session will explore why managers are so vital and which manager behaviours are most important for preventing and reducing stress in staff. It will reveal the findings of new research, funded by the HSE and the CIPD, which has developed a competency framework identifying the specific behaviours required by managers to implement the HSE Management Standards for stress.
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3.00 - 3.20 Refreshments, Networking and Exhibition
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3.20-3.40 Case Study: Workplace Stress – A Business Issue
Dr Catherine Kilfedder, Group Health Advisor, BT Group
The management of mental wellbeing, including stress, within BT is an integral part of the company’s People Strategy. A three tier approach addresses primary prevention/promotion, secondary intervention and tertiary restitution. Primary prevention/promotion focuses not only on the management of external risks to mental health but also on improving the resilience of BT people. This presentation will outline BT’s mental wellbeing activities, including the recent Positive Mentality health promotion programme, and address the business case for action.
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3.40-4.00 Case Study: RBS – Stress Tools
Dr Susan N Tannahill -Manager, Group Health and Safety, Royal Bank of Scotland Group
This presentation focuses on RBS stress management tools to support managers and employees to tackle stress proactively. The approach uses existing data to target resource where it would be most beneficial. This also provides an example of an organisation implementing an “equivalence” approach to the HSE management standards.
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4.00-4.20 Case Study: Stress Management at West Yorkshire
Probation – Ian Brandwood, Director of HR, West Yorkshire
Probation Board
Stress Management is not a separate discipline, it is really effective leadership and management. A holistic approach is required to tackle stress and it should be recognised that sustainable results
take time and effort. West Yorkshire Probation Board have found that the external environment also has a critical effect, so leadership is more important than ever._____________________________________________________________
4.20 - 4.30 Q and A Session with previous speakers
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4.35 Chair closing remarks and conference end.
Speakers Profiles
Dr Alastair Leckie
Dr Leckie is a Consultant in Occupational Medicine and Director of the Occupational Health and Safety Advisory Service (OHSAS). He is also an Honorary Fellow at the School of Clinical Sciences and Community Health at the University of Edinburgh.
Dr Leckie qualified from Edinburgh University in 1986. After 5 years of training he qualified as a General Practitioner in 1991, taking up a post as a Principal in General Practice in 1993. During his time in General Practice developed an interest in, and obtained a qualification in Occupational Medicine. He decided to retrain in Occupational Medicine, which he did at the Institute of Occupational Medicine based in Edinburgh. He took up his post as a Consultant in Occupational Medicine with OHSAS in 2002 and progressed through Lead Consultant to Director in 2004.
Dr Leckie teaches undergraduate medical students in both 1st and 3rd year at Edinburgh University. He also teaches postgraduates at the Department of the Environmental and Occupational Medicine at the University of Aberdeen.
Bernard Lim
Bernard Lim has been in strategic and operational management as a senior executive for over 25 years across a range of organisations ranging from start-ups to multinationals. With a particular focus on cutting edge life-sciences and biotechnology, where rapid growth and high uncertainty is the norm, he has had to manage organisations through prolonged periods of high stress, bringing the people together to achieve breakthroughs. As a result, he has a real passion and interest in leadership and the impact on organisational stress.
Bernard currently serves as a non-executive director for Health-e-Solutions with a particular interest in data analytics. He is also on the board of a venture capital backed In-Vitro Diagnostics company and undertakes strategic consulting assignments for clients in the US and UK. Previously, he was Senior Vice President for a NASDAQ biotech, Managing Director for a medical device company and Head of UK Manufacturing Operations for a US electronics company.
Professor Colin Mackay
Professor Mackay is a Principal Psychologist in the Better Health at Work Division of HSE's Policy Group with a particular responsibility for technical policy aspects of, and research into, work-related stress, work-related upper limb disorders, human factors and behavioural aspects of health and safety. His team in the Health Psychology Unit is currently working on the implementation of HSE's new Management Standards for work-related stress.
Dot Gourlay
Dot is qualified to Msc level in Health Promotion and has worked as a Senior Health Promotion Officer within both an NHS Trust Hospital and a large Local Authority. She is an experienced Corporate Trainer in many areas of Stress Management and Health Promotion including, needs assessment, programme development, teamworking and policy development. Stress Management for both managers and staff has been one of her key interests since writing her research dissertation on the perceptions of stress in relation to employee health in 1998.
Michaela Loughney
Michaela is a member of the Association of Business Psychologists and has a Postgraduate Diploma and Masters degree in Applied Psychology. She has worked for over fifteen years in the Human Resource field as an internal and external Consultant, Trainer and Lecturer. She is an Advisor at Liverpool John Moores University for a project working with SME’s in Merseyside. This role includes delivering corporate stress awareness seminars and carrying out Work-related Stress Health Checks within organisations. Michaela also works as an Associate Trainer and Consultant delivering corporate tailored programmes in many aspects of management development. Michaela is passionate about working with organisations, particularly SME’s for which she designs and applies management systems to assist business growth, and is currently leading a partnership project with ACAS.
Lynne Walton
Lynne has been writing, developing learning materials and training on the subject of Bullying and Harassment for over 10 years. Additionally she managed the National Programme for serious crime training including domestic violence and racist crime. Lynne is a highly experienced corporate trainer who has developed and delivered training to a diverse range of learners from a variety of backgrounds and cultures. Lynne has a professional background with Learning and Development and Criminal Justice.
Dr Anita Levinson
Dr. Anita Levinson is a Chartered Occupational Psychologist, her doctorate was on the industrial relations aspects of health and safety, and she is a member of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development.
Anita has been writing and delivering training courses on various aspects of managing stress in organisations, in both the public and the private sectors, for over twenty years.
She has also been involved in carrying out stress audits and facilitating focus groups to identify the main stress-related issues in organisations and to encourage employee participation in generating solutions.
Emma Donaldson Feilder
Emma Donaldson-Feilder is a Chartered Occupational Psychologist who specialises in helping organisations achieve sustainable business performance through improvements in the well-being, morale, productivity and engagement of staff. She combines research and practitioner roles with writing, presenting and lecturing on workplace well-being. She is co-director of a research programme funded by the HSE and CIPD, which is investigating the link between leadership/management and employee stress/well-being. She has particular expertise in assessing and managing work-related stress risks and has worked with a wide range of clients in the public and private sectors. She is also Consultant Editor for a forthcoming CIPD subscription publication on performance and well-being
Dr Catherine Kilfedder
Catherine Kilfedder, a Chartered Clinical Psychologist, joined BT’s health and safety team as group health adviser in December 2006. Her remit is to drive the company's health and well-being agenda, with a particular focus on mental health and well-being.
Her appointment to BT comes after five years with a multidisciplinary occupational health and safety service in Scotland (Occupational Health and Safety Advisory Services (OHSAS)) where Catherine was a member of the management team as well as head of the counselling and psychology service.
Catherine also has a number of research interests, particularly in the field of work-related stress. She completed her PhD in this area in 2003 and has managed grant funded projects in aspects of intervention and risk assessment for work-related stress in the NHS. Catherine was also involved in the development and delivery of an early intervention, case managed, rehabilitation pilot for NHS staff.
Dr Susan N Tannahill
Susan is the Manager, Group Health and Safety for the Royal Bank of Scotland Group based at their world headquarters in Edinburgh.
RBS group is one of the world’s top 10 banking groups, providing banking and insurance services to retail and corporate customers in the UK, rest of Europe, the US and the Asia Pacific Region. Over 140,000 people are employed by the Group across 30+ countries.
Prior to joining the Group in 2004, Susan was Head of Group Health & Safety with Standard Life. She has also worked with BP International, and the Institute of Occupational Medicine, and her career has spanned across the various disciplines of health and safety. She has particular interest in the prevention of work related ill health. Susan has also gained expertise in different roles as in-house specialist, consultancy, research and academia. An active member of the British Occupational Hygiene Society, and previous Board Member, Susan has published and presented numerous papers in the field of work related health. In 2007, Susan was elected as Vice Chair of the Inter Bank Health and Safety Group.
Ian Brandwood
Ian Brandwood worked in a variety of jobs for Sheffield City Council, initially training as a building surveyor. He spent 5 years as a manager within the council’s Works Department and it was here that his interest in industrial relations was developed. After working as a Chief Officer at both Cleethorpes and Cherwell District Councils, Ian moved to Nottingham City Council to become Assistant Director responsible for Finance and Business Support, initially within the Building Works department and latterly within the City Treasury. In all his local authority roles, he was primarily responsible for preparing the organisations to successfully respond to the challenges posed by compulsory competitive tendering.
In November 2002 he moved to his present post as Director of Human Resources for the West Yorkshire Probation Board. He is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development and sits on the National HR Strategic Board for the National Probation Service.
Documentation
All delegates will receive full conference documentation, complete with copies of presentations and a delegate list.
