Compassion Pays - At Last!

I read the following comments by Susan Heron of AIM in the Weekend Australian of 22/23 August(Weekend Professional section)

• Companies need to regard non-salary benefits such as good workplace culture, flexible work arrangements and health/wellbeing programs as competitive weapons in the battle to attract and retain the people their business needs to prosper
• The downturn is having an effect on salaries…non-salary benefits have become the key battleground for employee recruitment and retention…
• The non-salary component of a person’s package or employment conditions becomes critical in the bid to attract and retain the best employees.

My comments:

• We are finally getting closer to the day when employers see employees as more than ‘workplace resources’.
• Money always has been only one (albeit important) part of the employee’s quality of life deal.
• Ever since the industrial age, business has employed the whole person, not simply their role as ‘a workplace resource’.
• Work is only one part of our 24/7 day and of our stress.
• Personal life and personal goals have everything to do with job choices, work productivity and commitment to corporate goals.
  
• We carry all of our emotional baggage 24/7 affecting everything we do at work, home and even at play.
• Just like any other purchase, people ‘buy’ jobs to meet their own needs, and only secondarily to meet the corporate aims of the employer. The sales package has to serve a person’s 24/7 needs and lifetime goals.

I would suggest it’s time to change the expression ‘human resource management’ to one of ‘people investment management’.

How to Keep a Healthy Bottom Line

I wrote another article the other day, "How to Keep a Healthy Bottom Line" and had it published on the Best Management Articles website. Overnight (literally) it got on to the Most Read Articles for the month of August. Last time I looked the number of readers was continuing to steadily grow. Go to http://www.bestmanagementarticles.com/MostRead.aspx to find it on the list. Check the "month of August" option.

To date, my various articles on that site have attracted well over 10 000 readers, not to mention a few thousand more on other Article Directory sites. Another article of mine, "How to Enjoy Work Life Harmony Rather than Work Life Balance" is now close to getting on the "All Time most read articles" listing on that site.

I get a tremendous feeling of personal satisfaction from knowing that my contribution to world thinking is getting to so many people across all countries of the world. There are times like this when you feel you know what you were put on this earth to do :) .

Liberated!

Today I had a therapeutic massage. It did more than make me feel relaxed. The word that came into my mind was "liberated". To me that means much more than just feeling free, lucky though I am to enjoy feeling free. It brings in elements of allowing my creative self to fly, opening doors to greater self belief, self confidence and self-assurance. I am proud to be the person I am and I believe in my power to help others. Not a sense of arrogance or self importance but a sense of peace that I am doing what I was put on this earth to do.

Try a massage sometime. It offers a wonderful opportunity to meditate.

Leisure actively benefits work productivity

My efforts to promote the benefits of leisure to sustained high quality work productivity, including stress management, have to be fought against the generations-old work ethic. I don't have any problem with the importance of work - it takes up a fair bit of my own life too.

Where I do have a problem is the age-old belief that leisure is a waste of time - particularly 'good working time'. Ok that's starting to break down in various ways. The latest interesting stats are that Australian workers voted work life balance ahead of salary increases. What they are really saying is they want to enjoy life.

But when it comes to discussing hard dollars, ensuring a healthy profit, shareholders pressures, etc, the term leisure is still a non-word. It's not until I have a client well and truly interested in using me that I even introduce the word leisure (other than in my business name).

They do start listening however when I start talking about job satisfaction, reducing unauthorised use of sick leave, reducing the number of hours spent by staff and management alike in unproductive effort (staff conflicts etc). The facts are that absorbing, interesting, passionate interests pursued away from work and unconnected with work interests have a massive impact on work productivity, staff communication, commitment, workforce stability...the list goes on.

Yep, there is indeed a big link between work and leisure...its just that it's going to take a long time before the work ethic image of leisure is erased and replaced by what I call a Life Ethic.

Workplace Stress Statistics

This a "blow my own trumpet" blog, borne out of my frustration about the inability of organisations to even accept they have a responsibility for minimizing the risk of staff stress claims, let alone take any stress risk management action.

Graham Yemm, a UK consultant, has come up with some alarming stats which are in line with other stats I have seen over the last couple of years regarding stress in the workplace. His information is that :

• 65% of workers believe their stress is due to work-related issues
• only 29% of people believe their bosses are doing anything about stress...49% believed their stress levels were worse because they had lack of confidence in management
• 45% of managers do not believe there is any issue or problem with staff mental health, but
  
• 97% of them recognize there is a link between people's health and productivity and
  
• 86% say they want their workforce to be more productive
  
• 62% of employers feel that investing in people's health is a luxury they cannot afford
• it's estimated fewer than 10% of organisations have a mental health policy and only 14% of them believe it is any good.

Other stats I have found elsewhere say that stress related OHS claims are on the rise - something over 8% of all claims and stress claims take much longer to resolve and are more costly. Talk about 'head buried in the sand' stuff.

I see my energy management program (go to www.workleisure.com) as not only having real stress management benefits, but also they offer value for risk management programs designed to show workcover bodies that the organisation is actively doing something to minimize the risk of stress claims.

I could go on for pages on this but it won't mean much until managers start to believe:

• there is a stress management problem in their organisation specifically
• they have an OHS responsibility to actively do something to minimise the risk of stress claims
• there are good options around - like the energy management program that I offer - that can demonstrate to workcover bodies they are actively doing something to minimize stress, enough to help keep OHS levy contributions down.

There...got that off my chest!! :)

The People Gardener

Because I have 30 years planning experience in the field of parks and recreation, I have come to see the links between the growth of nature and the growth of people. Why not! After all we are part of nature (not separate to or above nature). We start from a seed that contains everything the mature plant requires, provided it is planted in fertile soil and nurtured with water and nutritious food. And my business is one of cultivating strong new growth.

People are starting to liken me to a People Gardener. And I thought to myself - that's not a bad image to have. The typical gardener is a gentle soul who is warm, caring, nurturing and sincere and they say that just about sums me up as a personal growth mentor.

A gardener doesn't tell nature how to grow, he/she simply helps it by ensuring it has the nourishment it needs to naturally blossom to its full maturity (or potential). That fits very well with my approach to helping people blossom to their full potential. Talking nicely to a plant also helps it grow!

Yeah I like the image of a People Gardener. I hope you do too.

Easing My Own Pressure

We are told that most pressure is self-imposed. I have moved from Adelaide (less than 1 m) to Sydney (more than 5m) and saw this as the opportunity to expand my business. What I forgot was that I am still only a one person business and that Sydney was going to require a whole new marketing exercise. I increased the pressure on myself. My natural passion palled. I got down on myself. In short, I went against all my own principles of enjoying being me.

Soon after I arrived in Sydney, I was told 'the bigger the market, the tighter your focus needs to be'. The wider I spread myself, the greater the competition I face for work. Sure I help with work life harmony and retirement planning and stress in the workplace...but what in all of these my core skill is in helping people (re)identify their passions, what they really enjoy doing, what brings the best out of them. They not only grow, they achieve greater work life harmony, and do a better job of planning their future.

So I made a big decision: to focus on what I loved doing - helping people use the power of enjoyable interests as the means to increased personal growth and development. I took the pressure off myself. And you know what? its getting amazing results. My passion is back, my energy restored and my focus significantly tightened.

I am now officially a Personal Growth and Development Mentor who helps people re-discover the interests that increase their self esteem, self confidence, self belief and sense of self worth. I am the best there is at it and I am enjoying being me.

Roll on Sydney! and watch this space :)