I write this with a heartbeat over 100. Cortisol levels are heading north of 30 micrograms per deciliter. My breathing is fitful and my left foot has started to itch. I’m not dying; I’m just on a deadline.
Third one today so no big shakes. I’m in the zone. And I’ve been doing it for 35 years; hunter-gathering not with spears and stones but words and pictures, always one espresso ahead of the dread. My prey? Ideas. Innovation strategies for brands. Think pieces. Headlines. Body copy. The odd poem.
Will I crash and burn? One day, yes, but let’s try and get through World Mental Health Day first. I’ve just learned that Forbes magazine is talking about a ‘workers’ revolution’ called ‘The Great Resignation’ in the United States. An astonishing 40 percent of the millions quitting their jobs claim it’s due to ‘burnout’.
Add to this the revelation in the 2021 Cigna 360 Wellbeing Survey that 88 percent of employees in the UAE claim to feel stressed at work – and over 50 percent are looking to quit – it looks like another dark legacy of the pandemic. Or does it reach even deeper?
Just as Covid -19 advanced digital literacy six years in the first six months of the pandemic, it has also raised the flag on self-care. Think of it as an armistice from 21st Century hyper-competition, one that grants us space to talk about mental health, already the big issue for those working in 24/7 digital work streams. ‘Presenteeism’ is not just about being in the office whenever the boss walks round the corner. You must now be there for them at home too.
What happened to the toxic workplace? It just got better distributed. Home is no longer a refuge from stress. Indeed, squeeze in the kids and extended family, it’s a boot camp with very limited holiday options.
Here, I make a special case for those at work in the creative industries where recent studies by the University of Ulster for the UK Arts Council indicate you are 36 percent more likely to be suffering from anxiety. That’s before the pandemic. I’ve seen over a dozen close colleagues simply quit the business since 2020 because their wellbeing mattered more than the next Cannes Lion.
Businesses need to address wellbeing and the productivity crisis head on.
And it’s often the “strong” ones who suffer most; those extroverts who can work a room with a smile and little need for 90 slides of claptrap on Powerpoint. Press them and they’ll tell you the downside of working from home. Whether it’s Zoom or Teams or any other remote ‘peopleware’, your emotional intelligence is on a dimmer switch. Your audience is a row of boxes. All too easily, the tone of the meeting becomes transactional, rather than exploratory. It’s about buying an idea rather than expanding it.
At least introverts get an even break for the first time in business history. Working from home, they can focus on the task in hand without the hot breath of a project manager on their necks. As John Cleese puts it in his book Creativity: A Short and Cheerful Guide: “The greatest killer of creativity is interruption. It pulls your mind away from what you want to be thinking about. Research has shown that, after an interruption, it can take eight minutes for you to return to your previous state of consciousness, and up to 20 minutes to get back into a state of deep focus.”
The greatest killer of creativity is interruption, John Cleese explained in his book Creativity: A Short and Cheerful Guide.
Where does this leave the control freak boss who, with scant evidence, sees a direct correlation of hours in the office and efficiency?
Everybody is talking about the nature of work post-Covid and what ‘hybrid’ will look like back in the office. Nobody more convincingly than Peter Cheese, former Accenture global guru on HR and current chief executive of the Chartered Institute of Personnel Development. His latest book The New World of Work writes a blueprint for businesses that need to address wellbeing and the productivity crisis head on.
In the footsteps of enlightened industrialist William Morris, he presents us with the concept of ‘Good Work’ that makes a business “responsible, trustworthy and transparent”. Such a company, he argues, people will be proud to work for. These are the employees who will be there for you at three in the morning with the perfect presentation – wearing pyjamas, balancing a toddler on their knee.
Whether they happen to be in their own living room – or your new company creche – you’d better get used to it.
Mark Fiddes, Consulting Creative director.
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