Location: Booterstown, Co Dublin changed location to Maynooth during project. Also Belfast, Cork and Dublin 1.
Funding: €5,000
Description:
Explore the stress experienced by staff
members and how this affects them and their families through discussion with
staff and their partners. In particular the organisation explored the increase
in stress due to the relocation of the main office. Comparison was facilitated
by research that had been undertaken into stress in the organisation in 2000.
Number of employees:
| Total | Male | Female | |
| Employed | 102 | 29 | 73 |
| Took part in research | 18 | 30% | 70% |
Achievements:
A Family Friendly Working Group made up
of staff, union and Human Resource representatives was set up to oversee the
research and the subsequent implementation of findings. In the short term the
initiative allowed Trcaire to identify not only the level of stress within the
organisation but critically, it also enabled it to identify the causes and to
seek ways of overcoming these.
Obstacles:
Time constraints
Lessons:
The challenge for the future is to build on the
work done to date by ensuring that the recommendations from the 2002 report are
fully implemented and evaluated. These included:
- Continue to run more time management courses moving forward.
- Delegation of work needs to be looked at.
- Make use of administrative assistants more to tackle Programme Officers inboxes while they are away.
- Launching a dignity at work policy.
- Briefing and debriefing upon return from overseas trips.
- Quiet room set up.
- Continued use of Tai Chi and yoga.
This will ensure that the Trcaire staff remain committed to the organisation and that they enjoy a safe and relatively stress free work environment.
Learning for other organisations:
In light of this
project it was recognised that organisations whose workforces may be or have
been subject to stress should take a proactive stance to prevent workplace
stress and negative impacts on work / life balance
