Workplace Mental Health: Strategies For Stress And Anxiety Relief (Video) – Health & Safety

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From heavy workloads to news overloads and more, stressors
everywhere can negatively impact the workplace. Understanding your
legal obligations as an employer to accommodate
mental-health-support requests and implementing proactive
strategies are keys for healthy workplaces and mitigated litigation
risks.  

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Transcript

Michael Griffin

Principal, Seattle 

Hi everyone, I’m Mike Griffin. I am a principal in the
Seattle office of Jackson Lewis. I’m here today with my good
friend and colleague, Michael Thomas, in our Orange County office.
We’re going to talk with you briefly about stress and anxiety
in the workplace. Basically, why this is important to us and why
we’re passionate about it is because it’s something we all
deal with on a daily basis. We really want to try to help continue
the conversation and raise awareness, so that, maybe in a small
way, alleviate some of the stigma that might come along with
experiencing stress and anxiety in the workplace.  

Michael, what would you say about that?

Michael Thomas

Principal, Orange County

Thank you for listening. I always enjoy spending time with my
colleague, Mike Griffin. I’ll just highlight, really briefly,
why stress and anxiety are important to me. Part of it is just
wanting to show up authentically with myself in the workplace and
not feel anxious about whether I belong or whether I’m being
judged for any given reason. Part of that is just checking on my
own well-being, like how am I experiencing stress? How am I
experiencing anxiety? How am I showing up authentically? 

One of the things that we want to talk about to kick this
conversation off is why employers should really care about this
issue. Why is this a concern for employers? We’ll talk about
this topic in greater detail, but there’s increased demand in
the workplace. There’s a lot that’s going on outside of the
workplace and also inside the workplace that creates more stress
and anxiety for your employees. Employers are seeing a really sharp
increase in burnout and stress-related accommodation requests.
Also, many employers are having some challenges struggling with how
to actually navigate or respond to these types of different
requests. Understanding your legal obligations, implementing
proactive strategies, and even fostering a culture, which I’ll
talk about briefly, called psychological safety, are really key
components to creating a healthy workplace, mitigating litigation
risk, and mitigating some costly issues or risks that could come up
in the workplace. 

I’ll turn it back to you, Mike, just to really kick us off
by defining what stress and anxiety we’re talking about.

Griffin

Thanks, Michael. If you think about it in its most basic sense,
stress is what arises in us when something we care about is at
stake. Emotional, physical, and mental strain that, in this
context, can be associated with work expectations or experience. We
care about work and our reputation as an employee, as a manager,
whatever role we have, is at stake. Stress and anxiety can arise in
response to those workplace demands, especially when they feel
overwhelming. Short-term stress is normal and necessary. Everyday
stress we experience, like getting up on time, getting a project
done on time, making sure I get to work on time, things like that.
To accomplish goals, that’s normal, okay, and not necessarily
unhealthy.

When stress or anxiety becomes unhealthy, it is chronic. When
it’s something that doesn’t go away. We don’t get
relief from those feelings and the ways in which they can manifest
themselves. This is not news to anyone, I’m sure: increased
heart rate, physical clenching of the jaw, and tightening of the
shoulders. I don’t know about folks who are listening, but I
know that at times when I’m stressed out, I find myself really
tightening my shoulders or hunching them over. I catch myself and
try and relax a little bit. You can have an upset stomach, poor
sleep, be short-tempered, which of course can have some other
workplace implications – poor posture, and ultimately a
weakened immune system. There are a lot of ways in which this
stress and anxiety can manifest themselves in negative ways at
work. 

I’m wondering, Michael, if you can talk a little bit about
just how to identify the sources of our stress and anxiety.

Thomas

Thank you for highlighting all the different symptoms because we
all experience stress and anxiety at different points throughout
our day, but we don’t actually label it that way. When you say,
my breath becomes short, I get that, or my heart rate increases in
different moments, things like that, you can identify. 

Your sources of stress and anxiety are going to fall into two
different buckets. One is the stuff that does occur within the
workplace, and there’s other stuff that occurs outside of the
workplace that makes its way into the workplace. I’ll mention
what I mean by that in a second. 

The stuff that occurs in the workplace are things that Mike
mentioned, long hours, heavy workload, lack of job security, or
even changes within the organization or work duties can create a
certain amount of stress and anxiety. The economic insecurity that
many people might be feeling right now. Other things that we see in
our line of work that create stress and anxiety, like harassment
and discrimination in the workplace, or even just poor
management-employee relationships that often involve a union coming
in, and things like that. All those different things can create
stress and anxiety that occur within the workplace. 

Then, there’s everything that’s outside the workplace
that makes its way into the workplace. Things like a bombardment of
news can create stress and anxiety. This feeling that the workplace
in our nation is more polarized creates stress and anxiety. More
information about violence, either around the world or within
schools or the workplace, having more exposure to that kind of
stuff creates more stress and anxiety. Even just as an employer,
when your employees are showing up, they’re showing up with all
of that stuff. A simple example is that kids have recently returned
to school. A lot of parents have heard a lot about school violence,
and some have experienced it themselves, and they’re worried
about their kids. They are checking their phones throughout the
day. Again, these are things that are outside of the workplace that
actually make their way into the workplace, which involve stress
and anxiety. 

Michael, I’ll kick it back to you to talk about what some
legal obligations are that an employer should think about, and what
risks they should consider in terms of managing stress and
anxiety.

Griffin

There are quite a few. I’ll talk generally about them. Think
about it this way: increased stress and anxiety among workers in
the workplace can lead to increased requests for accommodation for
mental health support. I practice in this area quite a bit and
provide a lot of advice, counsel, and training. I’ve seen an
increase, probably every single year for the past decade, in the
number of requests employers are getting for accommodations based
on stress-related conditions. Now those conditions, of course, may
qualify as disabilities under both the federal law, the ADA, the
Americans with Disabilities Act, or the equivalent state law.
Obligations kick in right away to engage in a good-faith
interactive process. Typically, it’s when the employee requests
an accommodation of some sort or time off, but in some states, like
my state, Washington, the obligation for an employer to engage and
to initiate that process is a bit heightened. That’s probably
not news to folks. 

Failing to provide reasonable accommodations can lead to things
like internal or external complaints from employees who have made
such a request or a mishandled request. Legal action not only
includes charges but also lawsuits. Outside those legal risks, you
have some reputational risks. This can damage the brand. It’s
not surprising that folks feel more emboldened these days to talk
on social media and review websites about their experience at work.
Failing to identify and address these risks can increase those
concerns as well. A lot of concerns arise in this area, whether
employers are addressing stress and anxiety-related conditions
appropriately. 

Michael, can you talk about some best practices for dealing with
this?

Thomas

That’s a great question, Mike. Certainly, practically
addressing stress accommodations, as Mike pointed out, is not just
about compliance, although complying with the law is incredibly
important. It’s really about building a sustainable and
supportive workplace and workplace culture. There are five tips
that I’ll go through to I think to help you do that. 

The first is really recognizing that stress is a legitimate
workplace challenge. Understanding that chronic stress is a valid
reason for an accommodation request and should be taken seriously
whenever an employee actually makes it. It should be treated as a
disability accommodation that I think we’re all familiar
with. 

The second tip is that you really want to implement a clear and
compassionate process for mental health accommodations. Proactively
train your managers to be able to identify and handle
stress-related accommodation requests appropriately. As Mike
pointed out, sometimes it’s difficult for someone to actually
be able to identify that a stress-related accommodation might be
needed. As an employer, you have that obligation to engage in an
interactive process. Properly training your managers and being very
clear, concise, and compassionate about those processes and
policies for mental health and stress-related accommodations
becomes incredibly important. 

Number three, there are other reasonable combinations of stress
and burnout accommodations that you should consider. Some of those
examples could be flexible work schedules, like adjusted work
hours, possibly hybrid or remote options if that’s available
for the industry, or modified workloads, depending on, again, what
your industry is. Reducing non-essential tasks, things like that,
reassigning responsibilities, and mental health breaks. One way
that you can use PTO or have employee wellness days, like
that’s one way of kind of providing a reasonable accommodation.
Making sure that employees have awareness and access to your
employee assistant programs, or making sure that you actually have
employee assistant programs, becomes really important as well.
Realizing that there is a variety of different things that you can
do that actually is a reasonable combination for these requests for
stress and anxiety combinations. 

Number four is creating that culture of psychological safety. I
mentioned that a little bit earlier. That’s really creating an
environment that encourages conversations about stress and burnout
without someone feeling like they’re going to be retaliated
against for really asking for help. Creating that culture where you
reduce the stigma of having conversations about stress, anxiety,
burnout, or even mental health in some ways. 

Then, the last thing that I would point out is, be really
proactive if you’re working in a high-stress work environment.
For example, like a law firm, where we work long hours and we have
a lot of stress, implementing these tools and reducing that stigma
becomes really important to be proactive about it, versus waiting
for someone to ask for help. Sometimes, by the time someone asks
for help, some of that harm or that damage that Mike talked about,
like your increased blood pressure and all those different kinds of
things, have already occurred.

Those five tips in terms of how the employer as an organization
can respond to these increased requests for stress and anxiety,
accommodations, and so forth are good from an organizational
perspective. 

Mike, I want to turn it back to you because we’re not just
talking about the organization and how they respond to stress and
anxiety. How do individuals, as they show up to the organization,
manage their own personal stress, anxiety, and sense of
wellness?

Griffin

It’s such an important question, Michael, and what I’m
going to talk about are some techniques for managing coping with
stress and anxiety that are not going to be groundbreaking or
shocking to anyone, I don’t think. It’s helpful to just be
reminded of some effective coping mechanisms, because there are
plenty of coping mechanisms that are unhealthy and ineffective.

Before I talk about these, I just want to briefly jump back to
what I was talking about earlier in the legal risks. I don’t
want to give the impression that employees have a legal right to a
stress-free workplace. That issue has been litigated and has come
up quite a bit. No one’s really entitled to that under the law.
What’s more common and what I see are stress-related conditions
like generalized anxiety disorder or depression, things like that,
that clearly do qualify as disabilities.

In terms of techniques for coping and managing stress, one key
to keep in mind is that avoidance doesn’t work. Avoid avoidance
basically. How do we avoid stress and anxiety, and how do people
avoid them? They mask it. They cover it with, oftentimes, substance
or other addictive behaviors that don’t really help; generally
speaking, the research shows that they exacerbate the issues.
Quality sleep is, I can’t overstate how important that is,
based on just my limited amount of research on this and very
personal. It’s incredibly important; more research shows that
sleep is probably the single most important healthy activity we can
engage in. 

Of course, regular aerobic exercise is a tremendous benefit. It
seems like every other week, there’s a new study reminding us
of why it is. Also, in that vein, relaxation techniques like yoga,
meditation, and breath work. There is an enormous amount of
resources online for free that can teach you very basic meditation
and breath work techniques that are very helpful. I used them this
week, as a matter of fact, when I had a difficult day. 

Limiting our exposure to social media and news, probably also
not very shocking to everyone. That can tend to cause us stress and
anxiety. Really important to take breaks during the day. One thing
that has worked for me on a personal level is if I’ve had a
stressful situation, just walking out of my office, going outside,
walking around the block and coming back up. Simply getting your
body moving in some positive way can really help cope. Obviously,
eating healthy and limiting substances that affect our sleep and
our well-being generally. Limiting alcohol and other
substances. 

The last thing I want to mention is something I learned from a
book I’m going to recommend after I finish this little
discussion here, which is focusing on your resources. Your family,
your friends, and your work resources, rather than the challenge
that you’re facing right now. Whatever that stimulus is,
that’s causing you stress, you’re going to necessarily
devote some mental energy to that. If you can, in the same
experience, focus on how I am going to resolve this and what
resources I have to resolve it. Studies have shown that that really
does help alleviate the anxiety. The last point I’ll make on
this coping technique topic is that you are not alone. You have
resources, family, friends, and colleagues who care about you.
Tapping into those resources can be a tremendously helpful
benefit. 

Before I turn it over to Michael to take us home, I just want to
make a couple of quick recommendations, reading suggestions or
listening suggestions if you do e-books. The Upside of
Stress by Kelly McGonigal is a fascinating book.
Research, she highlights, essentially explaining, generally
speaking, how we think about stress can determine whether or not we
develop chronic anxiety and stress or whether we use it in a more
positive way. Really interesting book. Two others I would
recommend, a book called Breath  by James Nestor
and a book called Why We Sleep by Matthew
Walker, a researcher at Berkeley. Changed my whole perspective on
sleep and just how important it is, and it caused me to regret some
earlier years of my life when I thought sleep wasn’t that
important. 

Thanks for listening. Michael, I’ll turn it over to you to
take us home. 

Thomas

Mike, it’s always a pleasure spending time with you. A lot
of what we’re talking about is part of the employer’s basic
obligations to create a safe work environment for their employees.
In our modern culture, we hear more about stress and anxiety. We
experience more stress and anxiety, which is likely to continue
into the future. Really supporting your employees who are either
facing burnout, stress, or increased anxiety, in some ways, is no
longer really optional. It really is an essential part of creating
both an inclusive and legally compliant work environment. Employers
really should commit themselves to proactively addressing these
types of accommodation requests and implementing practices that
really create a sustainable workplace and foster a culture where
all your employees really feel like they belong and can
thrive. 

That’s all that we have for this podcast. Mike, always a
pleasure, and it was great having a conversation with you. I got
some reading homework from you, so I partially appreciate that.
Maybe that makes me a little bit more stressed.

We also want to thank you all for taking time out of your busy
day and your busy lives and sharing a little bit of your time with
us. Thank you, and stay tuned for more information from our
firm.

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