2  The context of wellbeing support in legal workplaces

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It is important to contextualise your role by understanding how wellbeing support in legal workplaces has developed in recent years. This will help you understand where your workplace is situated in relation to such developments, how this might impact the goal you set, and the initiatives and outputs you choose to deliver.

Traditionally, wellbeing concerns and mental ill-health have been stigmatised within the legal profession. Some people associate admitting to poor wellbeing or mental health issues resulting from work as a sign of weakness and/or indicating unsuitability for the profession (Jones et al., 2021). Over the past few years, these attitudes have increasingly been challenged and there has been growing interest in supporting workplace wellbeing appropriately. However, the extent to which employers and organisations have engaged with this has depended on a range of factors, including the levels of financial (and other) resources available and the views of individuals within key positions. The following video discusses some of the common barriers to change.

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Transcript: Video 2  Common barriers to change

RAJ:
But there are barriers to developing psychologically healthy workplaces. I mean, one of them is that if it's not really felt at the top, the culture maybe goes down it goes down throughout the organisation.
MATHIJS:
And the barriers, I guess too, in terms of what might be seen as being financially really rewarding in terms of billing hours and being able to generate a profit, which is, of course, very important in business, but then in terms of that having possibly being in direct competition with the healthy workplace where people finish on time, they're not working excessive hours. They're getting to take their breaks, which can be really difficult to do if you are under pressure to generate good profits.
RAJ:
Yeah, and I think that there's this idea that working all the time will be cost effective, but actually taking a break and come back, you can come back with a fresh mindset, have a different take and make maybe a better decision. But in order to encourage people to see things that way, you really need to begin a culture change. Because at the moment, it's a profession in which there is huge time demands and a lot of overwork. So we'd have to change people's views about that.
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Video 2  Common barriers to change
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Common workplace interventions now typically include:

  • Offering an Employee Assistance Programme or other related benefits (for example, private health insurance).
  • Appointing a Wellbeing Lead and/or supporting the creation of a Wellbeing Committee and/or placing responsibility for wellbeing with the Human Resources function.
  • Developing a workplace Wellbeing Programme.
  • Encouraging individuals to upskill themselves around wellbeing and self-care.

 

Next, go to 2.1  Critique of common workplace wellbeing interventions.

2.1  Critique of common workplace wellbeing interventions