Imagine dedicating your life to helping others, only to find yourself struggling with similar issues you aim to resolve. This is the reality for many public service workers today.
Workplace wellbeing is essential for maintaining worker mental health, job satisfaction, and overall productivity for both the worker and the organization. In high-stress professions, where employees often face emotionally demanding situations, ensuring a psychologically safe work environment is critical. Organizations that prioritize workplace wellbeing not only enhance the worker experience but also improve the quality of services delivered. Identifying and addressing job-related psychosocial risks can help create workplace strategies for mental health, leading to a more supportive and sustainable work environment. The thing that sets Radius apart from other risk assessment tools is that it is solution-focused. Each job factor has a menu of best practice solutions, as well as the opportunity to develop custom solutions.
Let’s explore how these factors could impact a worker in a real-world setting, using Radius – a job-specific psychosocial risk assessment tool.
The Cost of Caring: Understanding Psychosocial Factors in Social Work
The local community mental health clinic has a team of passionate social workers who serve adults with complex mental health concerns. They provide counselling, crisis intervention, and service navigation for individuals facing significant personal and systemic challenges. They find their work to be meaningful but also face considerable job-related stressors that impact their psychological health, safety, and wellbeing. The employer shared that there had been an increase in sick time and higher rates of attrition in the past year, and they were starting to see an increase in short-term disability claims for mental health-related concerns. Radius was used to evaluate the psychosocial factors for the social worker role to explore realistic, actionable solutions.
Assessment Findings
Psychosocial Factor #1: Workload and Working Time
The clinic operates with limited resources, and the social workers often manage a high caseload with complex client needs. The emotional intensity of their work, combined with tight deadlines and administrative burdens, has led to burnout symptoms such as fatigue, trouble concentrating, and disrupted sleep. Despite the dedication of the team, they feel stretched thin and worry about the quality of care they can provide. This factor has a rating of high.
Solutions:
The team of social workers and leaders identified the following solutions:
- Empower leaders to model healthy behaviours related to working time.
- Ensure structures are in place to allow workers to take regularly scheduled breaks.
- Review work processes and tasks. Reduce redundancies where appropriate.
- Provide efficient and effective technology for staff.
Psychosocial Factor #2: Exposure to Traumatic Events
Many clients seen by the social work team have experienced significant trauma, including experiences of domestic violence, being unhoused, and challenges with substance use. Repeatedly hearing these traumatic stories, coupled with the responsibility to provide emotional support, has led to secondary traumatic stress. Over time, workers have reported feeling emotional exhaustion and have difficulty disengaging from work after hours.
Solutions:
The clinic has a mental health awareness program and a comprehensive benefits package to support their employees. The team selected the following solutions for the exposures they experience:
- Enhance early intervention programming. Structure a formal program that provides opportunities for workers to receive assistance and support after a critical event or upon early detection of psychological harm.
- Develop a formal process for operational pauses to process traumatic events and/or occurrences.
Psychosocial Factor #3: Co-worker Support
Despite the reported challenges, the social work team reports having a strong support network among colleagues. The team regularly debriefs difficult cases together, offering emotional support and practical strategies to manage stress. This camaraderie helps to mitigate the psychological toll of their work and fosters a sense of belonging.
Solutions:
There is a strong level of support and care for each other amongst the team. Preferred solutions included:
- Provide and/or promote a Peer Support program (formal or informal)
- Provide training opportunities and education for co-worker support/peer support.
What happens when the helpers need help? Exploring the unseen pressures faced by Ontario workers and practicing strategies to prevent risk for psychological injuries is critical. This story highlights the importance of addressing high-risk job factors while strengthening protective elements in the workplace. By implementing a structured, methodical job risk assessment and implementing targeted solutions—such as enhanced workplace safety measures, structured trauma support, and workload management—the clinic can further support its employees' wellbeing. Tools, like Radius from the Public Services Health and Safety Association, can help organizations assess psychosocial risks and implement tailored solutions to foster a healthier, more resilient work environment.
To learn more and see the full list of 18 Factors, log in to Radius at pshsa.ca/radius.
