HR wellbeing: looking after yourself and your HR teams

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you good afternoon everyone I'm going to get
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started because it's half past well happy Friday to everybody if you're watching live my name is Katie Jacobs I
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work with HR leaders at the CI PD and I've been hosting our coronavirus webinar series really looking forward to
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this one this afternoon we're going to be discussing a really really important topic how you as HR professionals can
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look after the well-being of yourselves and your teams joining me to discuss this and to offer some advice and
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guidance got a really great panel we'll have David de Souza membership director of the CI PD Gemma Dale well-being
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manager at the University of Manchester and a lecturer at the business school at Liverpool John Moores University and
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Emma cook director of purely balanced who specializes in the importance of
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sleep I'd like to thank them all for giving up their time to join us today before we get started on the content as
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ever some quick housekeeping the session is being recorded it will be available on demand by the webinar section of the
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CI BD website from this afternoon you can also access recording of our previous webinars there where we're
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looking at things like furlough well-being and leadership and communications and you can sign up for
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future sessions this coming Monday we're going to be looking at supporting people managers and then on Thursday we'll be
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exploring how clove in 19 is changing the reward and benefits landscape and I'll remind you about those at the end
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of the session as well secondly if you want to submit questions during the webinar please use the Q&A tab which you
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can find at the bottom of your screen please don't use chat box because we won't be monitoring that for questions attendees are muted so any questions
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will need to be submitted by typing and flag that we have had a few in advance so I'm going to answer those try and get
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those answered as well for legal advice COPD members can call our HR inform
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helpline that's available 24/7 and you'll get an individual response and a reminder that we are updating the FA
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cues and resources on our website all the time as new information becomes available you can head to the CIPD
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Coronas hub for more and finally I'd like to flag a really exciting new
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benefit our new well-being hub and helpline for members in the UK and Ireland together
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with award-winning well workplace well-being provider health assured we're now providing members with free help and
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support 24/7 and 365 days a year via telephone or online consultation with
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qualified therapists offering a structured way to work through physical or mental health issues and any
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financial difficulty you may be facing members can access the phone number and the online services via our membership
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benefits webpage you'll see more details about this at the end of the session and I'll give a reminder so onto the topic
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for this afternoon we know how hard you're all well working right now from
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navigating furlough to supporting the health and well-being of home workers people professionals have probably never
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worked harder than during the current coronavirus crisis according to a spot CIPD poll we did the other day
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two-thirds of people professionals are working longer hours at the moment I've been having lots of conversations with
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HR directors and once EPO recently told me he feels like his team has packed the year's worth of work into a few weeks
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another ones team is regularly pulling 16 on even 18-hour days sound familiar
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this afternoon we're going to offer some practical hints and tips to help you take care of yourselves and your teams
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to help you switch off create boundaries and get some much-needed rest I'll just
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take you quickly for our running order first up David will set a little bit of context and discuss the importance of
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prioritizing wellbeing for people professionals during times of crisis then Gemma is going to talk about how to
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approach self-care and share her insight into how to keep HR teams healthy and engaged and last but not least Emma will
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share some practical strategies to help you get a good night's sleep and then we'll open it up to questions so that's
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it from me for now and I'm going to hand over to David well sorry I just had to dust you off to
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let the cat out of the kitchen it was trapped and because we're working in a very different way just to clarify
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for everyone I'm not actually this is normally what the city office looks like and I'm not where I'm using as a
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background so you don't have to put up with my kitchen and but I do hope you'll stay with us for the next hour if only
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to hear Katy say award-winning workplace well-being provider one more time there's no pressure it's fun look when I
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started my career and many means again ago now I'm I remember getting taken to
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one side by my HR manager or they would have been a personnel manager if that age is it enough for some of the people
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kind of on today's webinar and they said look there's only ever three things going on in your life health wealth and
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your family and loved ones and as long as two of those three things were okay you can probably cope and what we're
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dealing with at the moment is something that it's attacking all three fronts almost at once giving people issues
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around the health of them in their their kind of runs and concerns around that
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genuinely giving people concerns around their financial security and also impacting family and the people that we
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care about it's almost impossible to be isolated from the impacts of what's happening at the moment you've met
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people are having to isolate from what kind of the virus itself so it's
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difficult to give a context to something like this without being an unduly downbeat and that's because it is
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something that can be completely over well and so what we're hoping to do today is give you some some tips and
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guidance to make sure that you are looking after yourself at an incredibly incredibly challenging time Katie
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mentioned that some of you will be working harder than you've ever been before but I'm also aware that some of
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you just won't be working at all you'll be furloughed you'll be waiting to find out what's happening with your
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organization's and the number of different sources of stress and tension in your lives and probably never been
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greater and that's why I'm really glad that we've got some practical advice and support for you today because the amount
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of different scenarios that we're facing into very rapidly inside of work and outside of work and I
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don't want to use the word unprecedented but we probably haven't seen this before in most of our lives so if you're
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working HR it could be that you're having to make decisions that you've never made before it could be that you are facing situations that you've never
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made before but also be way that we then have a message those decisions and under
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pressure and under time pressure and it's something that most of us will have never had to face before and at the very
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best of times HR suffers from that kind of issue of cobblers children and not being looked
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after properly and we see that in the way that quite often we invest in our own professionalism all learning and
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development opportunities and certainly we're seeing it now as well in that people are expecting to have to step up
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they're expecting to be the source of everyone's concerns and their problems a font of all legal knowledge on some
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issues that we've never had to face before we're actually the guidelines has been and sketchy and hastily put
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together which is understandable but that's been challenging so it's a natural time I hope for people to pause
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and start thinking about themselves as well as the people that they serve and support and that's where today is really
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important but also because the challenge that we have coming ahead over the next few months will be probably equally as
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demanding and I think it's we've reached a normal sort of status in lock down
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very very rapidly from any organizations but you still have people operating on the front line and people supporting
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them but for many people the next challenge that we face is helping people to get back to the workplace or
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understanding that they wouldn't be able to in dealing with all of the challenges that come with that and actually all of
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that tension that you'll have between employers and employees quite possibly about what's an acceptable level of risk
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and how does that work in the working environment so things are probably going to get more complex before they get any
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simpler and that means that you need to look after yourselves better than you ever have done before and think about
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the mental impact of not just what's happening in work but everything that's happening outside of work as well because for every electron practitioner
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dealing with the challenges that they're having worked there'll be another one genuinely does face challenges with
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family or friends or the changing situation outside of it because it's very easy to forget that was for called
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human resources and we as a functional as a profession or almost exclusively
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human beings and that means that we had the same same choices the same difficulties in the same emotions and
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the same a finite amount of energy as anywhere else so Katie mentioned the world being helpline prior and that area that we've
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created for members and I'm gonna mention it again because actually we don't want you to have to use that we
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really don't think we don't want people to be in that situation but if you do need it we want you to know that the supports there as it is from the
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community that you have around you so I'm glad that we got Emma and Jen to take you through the rest of the session
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and I'll chip in again at the end but I suppose from us as your professional body you need to take care of yourselves
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and we understand the challenges that you're facing in a number of dimensions but take care of yourselves and each
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other and I hope you genuinely take some practical things away from today's weather
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thank you so much for that David I'm gonna pass over to Jemma Dale now who's
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gonna offer some kind of practical strategies and advice about working well in HR and how we can practice self-care
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in times of immense stress so over to you Thank You Katie and what I'd like to
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start by saying is when you talk about well-being for a living very often what you're actually doing is telling people
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things they already know I'm guessing the people on this call if I said to you now what are the amounts of fruit and
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veg you're supposed to eat today the steps you're supposed to do the water you're supposed to drink and however a
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bit in space there may be you'd know the answer to much of it and because when it
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comes to well-being often what we don't have is a knowledge gap we have a doing gap and within that not doing lots of
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things and often I think as human resources professionals as David's already alluded to we're often busy
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we're often putting other people first and possibly even more so in the current
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situation the slide that you can see in front of you now says what is well-being
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and it's a really difficult question to answer and be honest there is no one
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single answer to that is he's very unique and it is very personal there's been ideas about what is well-being as
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far back as I was doctor and we have academic definitions of it we have definitions that are in everyday
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language and I do want to come in a moment to a definition I particularly
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want to share with you but in terms of today one of the things some of the
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things I'm going to try and share some of the practical things I'm going to try and share will not necessarily be new to
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you some of them may not work because well-being is so unique so personal what
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is good for my well-being or what detracts or it will be different to you every single person on this call so what
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I would say is when we get into sharing those tips and we see some information from Emma later today it's really about
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looking at what might work for you try things and discarding what doesn't work
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so I said there's lots of definitions of well-being and and I'm not going to take you through lots of those but I do want
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to come to one particular definition if I can have the next slide please and
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because of this challenge with really defining what do we mean when we talk about well-being and so there are many
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many different definitions of CIP do you have one on workplace well-being but this is one that I've come back to Percy
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a number of times in the last few weeks and this is from a 2012 academic paper
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for some writers who tried to come up with the definition of well-being that would work both in a kind of academic
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Annaleigh person context and what they defined well-being asked was a balance
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point between somebody's individual resource-poor and the challenges that they're facing every day and we often
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see this idea of balance when we talk about well-being often we use the term work-life balance but I think this
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particular diagram is a really interesting one because when we look at resources and challenges now for many of
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us that balance has changed completely in the last few weeks and months and so
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what does this tell us it tells us in this theory that when we have well-being
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we have personal well-being when our resources and our challenges are aligned
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and actually for many of us at the moment our challenges are significant and our resources are depleted many of
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you will be balancing care for others child home schooling all sorts of practical things even in recent weeks
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things like you know can we get that the basic provisions that we really need so
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my reason really for sharing this slide with you today was to encourage you to
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think about where is your current level of balance and where is your current
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well-being because self-care starts with self awareness so what I'm going to do
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in a moment is try and show some practical tips with you things that you can try to help you just
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boost and enable your well-being at the current time but first and if I can have the next slide I wanted to just reflect
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on well why is our job so challenging well when I thought HR professionals in
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more normal times if I can use that phrase this is the stuff that we often get involved in and this is the stuff
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that can come with a real high emotional load we support individuals and we support managers many people on this
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call will we're familiar with all of these kinds of things and these can be challenging at the best of times but if
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we move on we know that we've got a whole range of other particular challenges at this moment and and Davian
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KT voyage alluded to some of these if we can move to the next slide many of you will also be dealing with these things
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so furloughing and that was as anybody that's close to that will know is
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extremely complicated and we've heard legal update up to legal update helping people to work remotely practically
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adapting all our policies adapting our strategies and some of us will without doubt be thinking about what does this
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mean in the longer term the practical return to work but also the potential that we may need to cut costs and what
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does all of that mean as well and I know some people are already thinking about the big implications in the longer term
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but we are already seeing from early research some of the challenges that are
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on your screen now there's been some early research from academics at the University of Manchester from the
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Institute of Employment studies and I will tweet some of these out after the session so that people can see them if
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they're interested but we know these are some of the things that are coming through already so these will be coming
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through for our people and there may be things as HR professionals you are also experiencing so we're going to talk
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about sleep in a moment or two but things like anxiety being distracted
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early indications that people are taking less exercise or their diet has reduce or even their drinking more
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musculoskeletal issues because lots of us are working and sort of in kitchens and dining rooms and in a kind of
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slightly suboptimal sort of way that people feeling anxious and overwhelmed
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there is a real challenge coming towards us as HR professionals the potential
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mental health impacts of what we are experiencing are going to potentially be severe and long-term what I am going to
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say is that the suggestions I'm going to come on to in a little while will be about boosting and enabling your
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well-being they're not about supporting people who are experiencing a mental health crisis and I do want to say if
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you are struggling if you are experiencing some of these issues and you need more help please retail the
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CIPD of audio released some amazing resources the NHS is still open your organization's may also be AP's or
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cancelling services so please do seek support for your mental health if you need it so if I can come on now to a few
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of my tips for just supporting and enabling your well-being sleep we're
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going to talk about that in a lot more depth but sleep is absolutely critical to good health and well-being I'm also
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going to come on to now those things that I said to you that fall into the category of stuff that you know but
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sometimes we need a reminder of it and sometimes what we also do is we know
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these things are important but we do prioritize it so what I would like to do as I said before is just invite you to
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perhaps reprioritize some of those things for yourself that
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we know are good for us so food making healthy food choices simple NT jokes on
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social media about people spending lots of their time in lockdown peering into
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the kitchen cupboards or peering into the fridge I have personally spent far too much time in the biscuit tin in recent weeks
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but making good food choices and making good food choices and good exercise choices are really important we're all
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allowed out for our daily exercise whether you run away you cycle or
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whether you're just doing something in your own home it's really important to try and keep up that physical activity if you can and your situations allow it
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get outside for that just being in nature for small periods of timing just like walking through a park makes and
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really be different and I also want to talk about rest and brakes there's loads of good advice
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around about how to work successfully from home unfortunately lots of it were written for a pre pandemic world and
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lots of it was written assuming that you're not necessarily looking after children at the same time but what I you
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know that idea around tried have start and end times try and take a break in a break try to have a different place for
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your work and your home life might be possible for some people not possible for everybody but where you can building
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in that rest and trying to keep some real boundaries between work and home I
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mentioned before that some people are feeling very overwhelmed by the current situation lots of people when I talk
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about well-being one of their reasons for not focusing on well-being is they don't have time and sometimes certainly
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when I'm doing personal training work that really means I don't actually want to or I'm not prepared to prioritize
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this some people right now will have more time perhaps they're on furlough leave or perhaps the amount of work that
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they've got has been impacted others will be experiencing a whole range of
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different reasons why they are more busy than they ever have been what I would
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say is there's always room for five deep breaths
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the other thing that I would encourage you to do is something like a guided meditation it's another great way if
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you're feeling anxious or stressed or overwhelmed to just bring that down slightly I'd also encourage you if you
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can to try and find some me-time now I know that is a really really big ask at the moment but you know what
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we're spending lots of time right now with our partners and with our children and we might love them but we're not
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used to spending 24 hours a day seven days a week with them so this might
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involve some negotiation or it might involve some real strong prioritization but if you can find a little time for
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you don't have a bath go and read a book in your room in a different room for 20 minutes do your exercise alone
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rather than taking the kids if that's an option for you if you can share that with a partner just try a couple of
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times we can carve out a little bit of time for you the coffee on the screen
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you can see now a represents connection lots of us are used to that face-to-face it's not available to us in the same
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quantities at the moment but it's also connection with phonons family colleagues is really important for
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well-being lots of us are replicating that at the moment with family zooms
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family quizzes all these kind of things they're great they can be really beneficial but I'd also caution you
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because they can contribute to overwhelm so if you need to say no to one additional connection because there's a
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cognitive load as well with lots and lots of face-to-face meetings inviting somebody into your own home so we need
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connection but we need connection with balance and the final picture on there is around gratitude and positive
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psychology I'll tweet really great lecture example on that after the session from a good friend of mine supe
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Bo but actually placing deliberate emphasis on what is still good what is
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still positive and all the things that you've got to look forward to these are
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real positive thing to do right now and will boost our well-being and mental health I'm doing a really nice activity
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with my family at the moment we're all keeping a little jar of all the things that we love and we want to do again and
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every time we say I can't wait to do this when lockdown ends and we return to
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a more typical situation we're just putting on a post-it note and putting it in that jar that's going to be our post
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pandemic bucket list so just doing those little things and placing that positive emphasis it's what I would encourage
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everybody to try and do a simple exercise like what are the three good things I'm grateful for today can make a
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real difference and then finally if I can have my next slide a couple of final
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messages if I can as a good friend of mine often says go gently with yourself
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be kind to yourself cut yourself some slack this might actually not be the
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moment to take up a new hobby new language or do all of those things that you've been thinking about doing
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for the last five years or so literally go gently in the world and in your life
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prioritize your self-care it's absolutely important I know it's become a bit of a cliche to say but you can't
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be there to support other people if you're struggling so prioritizing yourself creating those little spaces
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for you a critical and please don't feel for a please feel free to say no when
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you need to if something is not going to serve you well in the current time as I
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often say to my Cochise no is a complete sentence and if I could just have my
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final slide right now what we're experiencing feels huge it feels
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overwhelming and the uncertainty not knowing where it's going to end is a real challenge for some people and we
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know that in the early research is telling us that but I would simply ask everybody at this time to remember that
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this will pass this will end there are better times to come we will be reunited
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with our friends and our family so thank you for listening to me today wherever you are stay safe and say well thank you
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thank you so much for that Jim that was brilliant I think that teed up our next speaker really nicely as well was he
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touched on the importance of getting a good night's sleep so without further ado I will pass over to Emma who's gonna
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talk through that in some detail and then hey everyone first well done I
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couldn't help but agree with all them things there so just everyone on the line here okay so I'm a cook the
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director and founder of clearly balanced and I've got a company that believes in
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self care prevent in health care quite literally if you just stop and take five
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minutes to yourself as gem said listen it the world of difference now the
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background that we've got to what I'm about to go through is I've got over a decade worth of research behind me on
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how we do what we do why we do what we do and how we are involved in in a
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technologically advancing world but we still have our human needs underneath and Anstead especially for you guys for
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CRPD and we called it put in the human in human resources and I think at this
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point in time that's super important because the end of the day you guys have had a whirlwind of stuff that has landed
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on your shoulders and on your desk be that whether you are still oh okay and as we said whether you are furloughed
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now the reason why we put the emphasis on getting a good night's sleep is because sleep is the foundation to
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health and well-being if you start to fix your sleeping pattern your body will naturally start to reset itself they are
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proven time and time again that sleep also helps boost your immune system it's not only at this current point in this
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pandemic is it vital that you start to pay attention to the way that you sleep them it also helps balance your hormones and
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it helps balance the hormone cortisol cortisol is what's known as our wear cap
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on line on a morning what an unbalanced amount of cortisol in the body is what we know is our stress harm line so one
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of the things that have been causing quite a lot within this session that I've been doing is they're simply
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teaching people the importance of sleep simply because if your car is all levels in your hormones become imbalanced what
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ends up happening is you end up running in a state of fight flight or freeze through in the day which then makes any
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small issue or complaint that comes along it can sometimes be a little bit heavy and a little bit bigger than what
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it should be so I'm going to take you over some where you can help improve your sleep and at the end as well we've
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got a link which is to Norma what we've developed as a company is it the five
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points which off routine well it just as it actually helps you get to a deep sleep state it's on the screen now I'll
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cover it in just a second and it helps you get to a deep sleep tip from a couple of things what you could do to
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actually help you at this point in time occurs as Jemma pointed out and quite rightly we're in a state of uncertainty
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and unusual and one of the questions that I've been asked over and over is
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how come it's my sleep that's been affected whether that means you're under sleeping or all the sleeping and there
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is one word that could be put to blame for that and it just quite simply uncertainty it's
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uncertain times it's unser and issues it's uncertain future its uncertainty so whether you're
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under sleeping are all the sleep in it's because we are in a state of this not
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annoying now the best way that you can possibly address this is by focusing on what you do as a person in your day to
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day routine sleep is one of the main things you can do as well because if you do start to fix your sleeping pattern
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and this doesn't necessarily mean that you have to sleep longer it just means sleeping smarter if you get some deeper
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sleep levels and you hit them deeper sleep states you will wake up feeling a lot more refreshed in the morning what
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will then happen in turn is you will start to feel better as your day comes along you'll start to think more
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positive you'll think clearer and all of a sudden all these little areas will start to fit into being and better
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really so a couple of things that you could be doing okay so I'll just take you over our five points which are
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protein first this is just for when you're going to bed okay so open posture
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is because we have a mind-body correlation and if our body's sat quite closed off
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I will mind off that to all the think reasons why that would be so if you got
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a bed on the night just make sure that you're not taking the stress of the day to bed with you because if you are
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you'll be laid in quite a closed off position a nice all composure when you sleep will allow your subconscious to
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switch off parallel positions on there is simply put pillows underneath the
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knees if you lie on your back pillows between the knees if you lie on your side this is a nervous system edge it
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helps in the nervous system slip draft breathing techniques as Jemma said if
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you just take five deep breaths this is exactly it okay so the breathing techniques that we recommend is called
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diaphragmatic breathing it's basically where you take a nice deep breath in and
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take it all the way down to your lower stomach this directly starts to relax the body because it starts to alter some
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of them anxious feelings and negative feelings that we've got in our system I masks you
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for an evening especially within the current climate because if you put an eye mask on and use it as part of your
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sleep routine what the MS does is it enhances your melatonin levels melatonin
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is the hormone that helps you switch off the reason why I masks enhance that level is because it gives you a
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prolonged period of darkness of both eyes what this will also do given the
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current climate its signals to your subconscious that that is your time to go to sleep because at the moment now we
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are working from home and in home there isn't really a work/life balance and I
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mean previous to the corvid 19 dynamic we were already having a bit of a
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difficulty making work and home life a difference in two different areas now
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only are even worse with that okay so an eye mask is something that becomes quite vital because it really does signal to
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that mind it's time to switch our and our counting backwards technique is because if you count backwards it
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activates a super consciousness it helps relax you into a deeper sleep state now this is just five points in the
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five-point signature super of the team that we've got what we have got on what's available for you is the whole
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session on how this sleep and routine works that's available online and I've given you guys it the links available
31:01
for a couple of weeks you can sit and watch through that and we'll come about at the end I believe one of the things
31:07
that you could be doing okay that could actually help the way that you sleep on a night now the light light is really
31:15
vital okay so we've got something called a circadian clock within our body it's what works is in front of morning and
31:21
it's what puts us to sleep on a night our circadian clock is altered by daylight and natural light and unnatural
31:27
light now I understand that some of us are living in flats some of us are living in houses get out I'll get
31:34
somewhere near lights at least once a day so we've obviously got our daily exercise I highly recommend that on a
31:42
morning first thing on a morning if you can on middle of the afternoon if you can even if it's to take a lunch break
31:48
to differentiate you dare down the reason being is because of the UVA and UVB rays that are actually present in
31:56
the light in the natural light even if it's cloudy there help reset our circadian clock and our circadian clock again if
32:03
them levels of cortisol and melatonin so I'd recommend getting out at least once
32:09
a day and what you can also do to help improve that is sit near open windows
32:14
and doors so if you are restricted and don't have a garden open a window and
32:19
sit near some natural light some fresh air again it's just because our usuals
32:24
now become unusual and we're kind of getting stifled in our houses our flats and not realizing that that's even
32:31
having an effect on us some of the things that you could do is digital detox is if we could just go back to the
32:37
weather side just so it's got the information on please you could just do some digital detoxes you could do things
32:44
like turning off your devices at certain times this is really good especially if
32:50
you are working from home and you do have a lot going on if you make hands and brought is to be online and offline
32:57
that works really well I understand that some of those are quite attached to our
33:02
devices so that is something that you could do which actually helps you which is turn the blue light off now this is
33:09
on all devices you can google it on how to do yours but basically the blue light
33:15
emitted by devices actually registers in our brains and it tells our brains that
33:21
if their lights now again previous to the mccorvey pandemic we would actually have natural
33:27
light integrated into some of our days as well be walking to cars be out on lunches even just on an evening coming
33:34
home now that we're actually in these four walls and I would dare like times are quite restricted with getting out
33:40
and getting out in fresh air what's ended up happening is these device lights that we are on as
33:46
suggested earlier some of you guys are working 16 18 hours a day now some of
33:51
these devices are actually effecting an altering our circadian clock you can
33:56
change that device light to change to an orange light I highly recommend it from 6:00 p.m. till 6:00 a.m. this is quite
34:04
simply it set it and forget it thing you can google how to do yours it doesn't change that
34:10
the speed just changes the look in the back and it makes it an orange color the
34:15
orange color doesn't actually change our circadian clocks if you've got children as well it's really good for them to
34:21
help their sleep you could also get into a routine okay so because we are really
34:28
out of our normal at the moment something that you could do that would really make a difference is set in a
34:33
routine something that would best mimic your actual routine because although you
34:39
may be out of routine now you will be going back into routine and the same goes for those if you've even been
34:46
furloughed because as much as we are having this timer the time will go
34:51
quicker than what we're thinking it just feels long because we're in it now you should be looking at a set of routine
34:56
which is getting off at a similar time to your work schedules are you normal work schedules you know having your
35:03
breakfast dinner tea at certain times and still going to bed at certain times as well why not to use this as a I will
35:11
I can have an extra half an hour sleep in still try and set as best a boundary as you can with routine and waters what
35:18
this will directly to do as well is help balance that security and clock because if you are getting off and going to bed
35:24
at certain times than the same times each day your security and clock will start to balance meaning by the time we
35:30
look to come out of the pandemic there won't be another jolt to the system which is something that we really don't
35:36
want to happen okay you could also try asking yourself what
35:42
is wrong but for those of you who aren't sleep in okay for those of you who are
35:48
resting and I'll use the word rest in loosely because what I mean by resting is sleeping and still awake you're not
35:55
feeling tired this is for you guys okay and the ones that aren't sleep in now one of the things that's happening
36:01
at the moment is our subconscious is in all the drive as to what's actually going to happen or going to come out the
36:07
other end of this now what we're not realizing is because we are cast into these walls where we are going a million
36:14
miles an hour on learning developing as Gemma said you know people are now learning new skills
36:19
and all these different things you guys on the of this this webinar you guys are sat
36:24
there listening to this thinking yeah you know I've got all of this new information that's downloaded as we said
36:30
earlier I think it was David with the new laws and legislations and all of
36:36
this stuff well it's in sleep that your brain categorizes that so how you learn is on
36:43
a night when you fall asleep the brain categorizes and cleans itself from the night before that is how we learn as
36:49
humans that's what sleeps role and function is its to categorize your deer back into your subconscious now if you
36:56
guys have downloaded knowledge new information as well as a whole lot of uncertainty as to what's actually going
37:02
to go on and what it looks like not to mention the amount of people that are now looking to you for guidance advice
37:08
you may be given positive messages negative ones whatever that's coming about in your role specifically the
37:15
direct implication of all them things is your sleep will be out of whack because
37:21
your mind isn't switching off and even though you think it may be on a night again we now work in the same four walls
37:27
that we live in so taking care of how you sleep and how you rest becomes absolutely paramount because if you
37:34
start to get a good night sleep and hit your deep asleep state you will naturally wake up feeling more refreshed
37:39
meaning that you'll feel just a whole more different okay now I do believe
37:46
that we're about out of time is that right kitty remain for questions so
37:51
listening very intently enjoy the
37:56
questions is like I said okay and the other people involved I've got a link
38:01
that you can come up to us with kitties you give that I do I and we're gonna the slides will be available for download
38:08
from this afternoon so I think Emma you're yes are around us tis going to be
38:15
available for free for a couple of weeks for people but yes if you if you'd be interested in actually watching the sea
38:20
bass session and getting it just put me an email along on the purely balanced record at UK and I'll send you a link
38:25
that's available it's gonna be a bill for four weeks - you guys just as a as a helping hand from me and it takes you
38:32
for 45 minutes there's a whole sea protein some of the things that was being getting back our people say they've never slept this
38:37
good in 11 years just a whole lot of testimonials as well they're all available but just from me to you okay
38:44
I'll punch you back thank you so much Emma can I ask German David to unmute
38:49
themselves so we haven't got the kind of mute unmute and we'll move on to questions um got em had quite a few come
38:57
in but do you keep them coming uh first what I'm gonna take from a soul HR generalist so she says I'm feeling
39:05
more overwhelmed from a tsunami of information there seems to be more reading resources and webinars and it's
39:10
making me doubt my knowledge but also feel that I need to read everything and engage with all of the content what is
39:16
the best way to keep informed particularly with all the changes and also ensuring that we develop professionally um David quite like that
39:22
to you first yeah I mean first of all like I can play empathize no understand
39:28
it and I think it's one of those times where everyone is feeling out of their depth so the first thing to acknowledge is probably not this gene almost anyone
39:36
thinks they're in control of what's happening now they just haven't understood what's happening yet our
39:41
resources that are probably the simplest way of keeping in touch so we are they are coronavirus hope on a regular basis
39:49
any of the major changes will be represented there so keep it keep in touch with our updates you don't have to
39:55
absorb every webinar or every podcast everything out there pick the ones that you think might be useful to you and
40:01
listen to them at the time there isn't going to be overwhelming for you understand actually having some gaps and
40:07
some space will help you to kind of assimilate that knowledge and make sense of it rather needing to constantly
40:12
feedback and know I don't know the key things doing the other thing I'll put on is just make use of the communities that
40:19
we have more so now than ever so if you are unsure about something the easiest way of being calm about that
40:25
there is someone that you can call so the communities to help lines the other sources should stop you questioning
40:32
yourself the entire time because you know that there's always another source that you can go to so I'm not sure about
40:37
that I'm just going to check with someone so I think there's some really practical stuff but just be patient with
40:42
yourself and kind to yourself at the same time because there's none of us that can keep up with it and not only
40:48
can I empathize I'm feeling that way myself so I am on trial and things like this today where I
40:54
can't say the wrong thing I've got a team with over 100 people I'm gonna run and we're trying to do everything that we need to for our members at the same
41:00
time and it's never been like this before so you we will feel at different
41:06
times at more depth or overwhelmed that's okay it's what you do about it that probably counts
41:11
um can I put that to you as well Gemma and I'm just gonna add on to it another question I think is connected about
41:18
overwhelm can be seen as a weakness so how can we help colleagues to be open and honest about it and normalize it
41:26
first of all everything that David said about about being deliberate about where
41:31
you put your attention you can't catch everything and I think there's a particularly challenging things about social media that you just use don't put
41:37
your phone down I know my screen time is up it's only pretty high anyway so I think it's been about Judi but with your
41:43
sources and that may be things like turning notifications off and it may be things like and only following official
41:51
news sources for a while and techniques like that to the point around it sometimes been seen as a weakness
41:58
I completely agree we know that despite all the great work done in recent years and we things like time to talk day and
42:05
all the mental health awareness that a lot of people still feel the talking about mental health and is a potential
42:11
weakness saying you're overwhelmed is lots of people saying that they wouldn't tell their manager if they were struggling and those are in kind of
42:18
normal times and I think as HR professionals we can to some extent lead
42:24
and by example and I for example have been doing almost daily training courses
42:31
and webinars for my organization and I'm trying to personally make a point when I bring that slide up that I showed you my
42:38
presentation earlier around the potential early impacts and the early research I've been trying to say you
42:44
know these the ones that I'm also experiencing to try and just make it feel that that conversation is an okay
42:51
want to have some of this stuff there is organizational specific because some cultures they really and you know that
42:58
that is much more prevalent I think than than in other places so there is a simple answer to changing
43:05
an organizational culture but I think the only thing we can do is just try and be good role models and if we're feeling overwhelmed say so connect
43:13
I am the background I've got is I've worked with in all different industries oil and gas I've worked in manufacturing
43:19
and retail all of them and one of the the main things that's coming through for me personally is everyone is under
43:27
the same pressure I'm getting people I've worked for a message in the England you know and I just said look sometimes
43:32
admitting defeat is the easiest way because what you may fall down is someone else maybe excelling in so you
43:38
know maybes networking with each other and saying okay look this is anyone can help with this because you might then
43:44
have someone else go I understand that completely well do you know anything about this and you know you've bounced a
43:50
feature there's knowledge especially just at this point in time to understand everybody is feeling the same I think
43:57
should take a massive pressure off everyone else thank you yeah I'm what a
44:02
question I know we've all been talking a lot about people who've been working incredibly hard and intensely but we've
44:08
also touched on HR professionals it might have been furloughed and this is from an HR professional who's currently on furlough and they say well I
44:15
understand the reason for it I feel as though I'm not contributing when many HR professionals are working so hard at the
44:20
moment I feel as though I'm being left behind in the profession do you have any tips on how to overcome this feeling um
44:26
David nice thoughts yeah first of all outs of young pathologies with you and I
44:32
know quite a few people get placed on fellow or indeed have lost their jobs at very short notice so it becomes a question of what's the
44:39
best thing that you can do with your time at the moment and actually you have the ability to invest in your CPD to
44:47
think about actually what you can learn at the moment and make really good use of that time very different way so we
44:52
we've got a three day festival of work coming up which is brief remembers there's eight days more CPD that's
44:58
available on the website as well as a host of other kind of things that you can do and make good use of your time
45:03
so rather than feeling that your skills are dwindling or you're not keeping up you've got an absolute opportunity to
45:08
stretch your thinking and your learning into different areas that you might not have had the time available to be before
45:16
so I think it's using it and thinking about it it's not that unity well making else in terms of the skills that your
45:21
colleagues are picking up during furlough and I'm hoping we don't have to go through this again actually you know
45:37
there are other lessons that you can be picking up that will genuinely give you an advantage when you go back because
45:43
previous I'm guessing that you had a challenge but not finding enough time to learn and keep the skills or knowledge
45:48
up-to-date now you haven't got that excuse that time they're very constructive things where you know I
45:59
said started off by saying in my session that and there are lots of different different definitions of well-being some
46:06
of them are really closely aligned who is sort of a chief man's purpose meaning
46:11
and having a real meaning in our lives and I think when our work is reduced when we things like furloughed there's a
46:18
knock on well-being impact there because that meaning and that purpose is shifted or reduced and people fundamentally
46:25
start to question their own value I think what I would say is women that you
46:30
know being furloughed it's not necessarily about you it's about also things organizations looking to save my
46:35
name and and all sorts of things it's not about you but I recognize that real
46:41
challenge that lots of purpose and a meaning can bring for my well-being perspective so I think daily makes some
46:48
great points which is about take this opportunity to learn you have got perhaps the moment that other people
46:54
haven't but there may also be lots of organizations out there at the moment maybe things like charities who would a
47:00
lot of it HR support some learning and development it could be run online so if
47:06
it's wipe your personal circumstances have a look at what something like volunteering and using your skills in a
47:12
different way can give you because that may help you retain some of that some of that purpose and meaning specific
47:21
question about sleep for you and a journey in life the people who are finding themselves sleeping too much at
47:26
the moment yes people sleeping too much okay I'm glad this Kimmo this one I keep getting written in
47:31
about and I've just put this to you guys those who are sleeping too much it's because the seed that you get in is a
47:38
quality which is why when you waking up you are still feeling tired so if otherwise pre-pandemic who
47:45
experienced sleep in a whole lot of hours and wake you're not still feeling tired it's because you aren't hitting
47:51
your deep sleep states that NFI your sleep isn't productive you can back it at the 5-point routine and whoever wrote
47:57
that question in please email me I can send you the link the five-point routine that we've got actually puts you into a
48:03
deeper sleep stare earlier meaning you get a more productive sleep meaning by the time you wake up you feel better if
48:09
you are finding that you're sleeping it's also a little bit of what Jemma said there it's also back into that
48:16
uncertainty and not knowing your role and whether you've got a role that you're specifically you know whether
48:21
it's because of Thoreau whatever it is that's sleeping is kind of your body's where we set in itself and shutting
48:27
everything out so what I would recommend is paying more attention to the way that you are sleeping so again email me and
48:34
I'll give you the link so you can actually get your sleep and back on point and get into the routine set your
48:40
alarm and wake back up even if one night you want to go to bed and you are not tired then still go to bed and still
48:46
wake up in the morning even though you haven't actually got work to go to don't let that be a fact they still get up
48:53
because what will happen is that I'll have a knock-on effect for the following day as well and it's understanding why are you doing it again if you are off or
49:00
sleeping because the quality of sleeping you get in isn't very good so poppy self along I'll give you that to get you into
49:06
them deep sleep stairs and a bit of my management as well I've got a mine management the canteen mind thing we can
49:12
get you on there as well is a good ends of a lot thanks ever got a question from
49:18
somebody he says I encourage our managers and staff teams not to respond to emails after hours to ensure they get
49:23
some downtime but the CEO continues to email me after hours and expects in the medium do any of you have any advice on
49:30
how to explain to him that HR can't be a 24 hour service when it's just me and I'm already working longer days and
49:36
David you take that but we should caveat away obviously I don't expect you to answer your own experience because I'm
49:41
sure our CEO doesn't do that to you learner if you of them I think it's I
49:48
mean if the question is how do you explain something to a CEO to start my company is always remembering that there
49:54
are actually human being so I think people seem to think that the CEO is some kind of weird office where actually
50:00
you can't have a conversation with them I think having if you can I mean amazing daunting but explaining to them that is
50:08
the first step to because they've got no chance of filling in that gap if they're not aware of it currently I think the
50:14
other thing right not reply and but that can actually create a different kind of
50:20
expectation or a different dynamic I think the only thing we can do and these are really unique circumstances it's give them a chance to be better and
50:26
because it made me that actually they're sending that email but they're not expecting an immediate response to it
50:31
might just be the arty that's how they're working days shifted all that so they've always worked but if you want
50:37
someone to understand something from your point of view you have to be bold enough and brave enough to explain it
50:43
from your point of view otherwise you're asking them to do all of the work and fill in the gaps and I'm writing your CEO it's got a host of
50:49
other challenges and things bobbing about at the moment which is why they're probably firing different things off at
50:55
different times because it's whatever comes to mind for them at that point in time and if they're demanding an instant
51:01
response from you that's a different challenge and that's again a conversation about actually the fact that if they want you to be providing a
51:08
good service then actually they need to appreciate the circumstances that you're in thank you different question I was
51:18
gonna say something very similar from the experience I've got the people messaging in which was everything from here to our two CEOs because I think of
51:25
the current climate where people not really getting it someone's actually setting a boundary between you and them and just saying look this is where I
51:32
obviously need some downtown to what what best where would you like it would you like me to answer straight away or the next morning you know being that
51:39
kind of gore between because they're new as well there might not realize they're putting on you and that's what I've had
51:45
a lot of people message and said you know I didn't even realize I was doing this to my staff and I'm like look you know it's just it just goes both ways I
51:52
totally agree with there but just have quite a conversation of how would you like me to respond for future
51:57
clearly and somebody's got some food and
52:04
I have colleagues and team members who live by themselves give me advice for people who are alone right now they
52:12
might be following a lot of well-being tips but loneliness is really starting to get to them and they're currently on furlough yeah so this is this is a
52:19
challenge and again I'm gonna refer if I may to some of the research that came
52:24
from University of Manchester which I'll I'll tweet light if anybody that wants it um and you know the truth is
52:30
everybody's experiencing this in a different way so we're all living through the same situation but
52:36
experiencing it and living it very very differently so there may be some people whom are living on their own and are
52:43
just fine and no issues with that whatsoever we know other people and not
52:48
just those living alone and still we found this you know they're going to crave that contact and there was a bit
52:55
of a concern for some of that research that people might actually rush back and break lock down because they are so
53:01
desperate for that contact and that's to challenge the you know organizations I
53:06
mean the policymakers will need to address so everybody will be experiencing these things differently I
53:12
think the only thing that if you are living on your own and you are
53:19
experiencing the challenges the thing to do is simply reach out for that connection and and if you know of
53:28
somebody and that he's alone and we can't assume they're struggling we can't assume that they're not okay but we can
53:35
ask that question and I think one of the most important things we can do right now is check in with people and check in
53:42
with each other so how are you today what's going on for you right now is there anything I can help you with
53:48
and just simple little ways that we can be there for other people there's no one
53:54
answer to that because well-being is so individual and personal so for some the answer might be what David's already
54:00
said fill your time with some great learning and Bill so all the connections for others it might be beyond your
54:06
family and create layers of you know opportunities to have coffee with people
54:11
online but for the people that's the wrong things so I don't think there's a single answer to that thank you
54:16
um got a question on how to achieve work/life balance when for many of us
54:22
those two things are completely conflated probably because we're doing them all in the same kind of four walls and the con difference between working
54:29
at home versus working from home is what we're experiencing now more akin to work-life integration and do we need to
54:36
recognize it as such and kind of reach a point of acceptance or how do we set boundaries between those is it even a
54:43
concept now work-life balance donar he wants to take that first but I think to John's point it depends
54:50
entirely on the individual it depends on the secretary the circumstances there's a whole raft of things there's no you
54:56
know for many people the working lives and their home lives have been run together it's been instantly in a way
55:02
they wouldn't have anticipated whether that's you know in particular schools being show up as well that's had a massive impact on people I I think it's
55:10
very dangerous to start prognosticating about the long-term impact this will have on the workplace beyond the fact
55:17
that it's inevitably going to be different so I think there's so many different use cases and so many
55:22
different ways actually even the next few months can play out that I think it's to say that this is you know we're
55:29
now in for where life integration that may not even be a healthy way to be what may happen is that we need to find we
55:35
might need to find different ways of teasing apart in the future and do that with possibly less flexibility over
55:40
locations and but it's never just been about the home environment and the work environment it's not been about that and
55:46
it shouldn't be the case that people are now just having to accept that they have to work into the evenings or pretty much
55:52
indefinite hours because actually there's an important striving work boundary so it's a really good
55:58
observation or just would be very careful of anyone giving you a definite answer I think we need to remember you
56:05
know people keep talking to me about as David said what was featured at like well we all just work flexibly well we all just become remote at home workers
56:11
and what I keep saying is you know we do with our work-life balance is change there is a big difference between those
56:18
kinds of work-life balance in in a traditional normal situation and work-life balance
56:23
in a crisis you know when you when you think about for example things like
56:28
working from home normally you plan and structure that you don't go to work one day and go oh we're not we're not coming
56:33
in tomorrow so take your laptop and anything else you can carry which is a lot of people's practical experience so
56:39
I think we need to be really careful to separate that now and and the past and
56:44
more any possible future might look like what I would say is for anybody who is thinking about work-life balance now or
56:51
indeed things in the future that they need to think differently and future and I've got a great free work-life balance
56:57
make available moment so and Emma Jimmy
57:05
thoughts on kind of how you can differentiate your working base from your differential thing okay so just a
57:11
little bit of psychology here this is gonna sound trained what it really works different cloths different rooms so for
57:18
example if you're gonna go to work as now I have my work so fun right now because I am at work and come four
57:25
o'clock I'll be taking it off and putting my confi zine sounds a little bit daft but while working out for while
57:32
the sandwich children as well as I said at the beginning of the session if you can mimic the life that you were in to
57:38
was great a degree usually possibly can obviously you can't change where you're working and how you're working you could
57:44
change the room on the Arias you could make a specific place for work or it
57:49
could simply come down at items of clothing so I've been recommending to people that have been messaging me pressing the children instant then bass
57:57
girl doesn't have to be the school uniform specifically maybe as a colour or you could have maybes a certain topic
58:02
you wear for work even if it's comfy and casual and not your normal attire something that can tell the mind okay
58:09
this is time for work and this is now time to not be at work again giving you that actual ability to think I'm gonna
58:15
reply to them in the morning because right now I'm not at work and as weird as that sounds the feedback I've been
58:21
getting for that is phenomenal so just give that it's a tiny tip was really really useful our specific work areas in
58:28
the house just don't as best you can don't integrate everything together but coding is the main thing
58:35
thank you I'm just asked I know I'm in charge I'm just gonna one more one more
58:41
question and it's I want really quick answers and I think it's a really nice one can i panelists tell us one thing
58:46
that they've personally done differently to prioritize their own well-being in the last month and David you can also
58:52
make your other point of your quick thanks my other point is that we should you know it's never been about where you
58:58
work it's been about flexible working and currently the police can stop you if you're attempting to at your office and you shouldn't be so that's an entirely
59:04
different thing to flexible working and will you talk her into that concept in terms of things I've changed in the last
59:10
month I I'm out all of my team so Katie you'll notice very early on to say that
59:15
actually I was everyone was getting tired out by zoom and proteins and different cause of that nature so far
59:22
more of them are now just making calls to each other rather than having as much screen time as seem to be enforced by
59:27
taking what we used to do in the office and just doing it online okay um okay so
59:33
and exercise we really part my life is how I maintain my mental health and I
59:38
will share with people on this call I cried when the gym shot I was more upset about that than the schools closing and
59:45
so for me I decided to replace that with exercising and there was every day so I made myself a promise that I would run
59:51
or cycle every day that isn't for everybody it's a really personal thing and that for me having that little
59:57
challenge and a little promise to myself was what I've been doing my loving and mine is super simple
1:00:03
I take a timeout and that sounds random but I do either 15 30 or 45 minutes
1:00:08
timeout not for no screen know anything whether it's a bath a walk sitting in
1:00:13
our weather I just lay down I took a turn at some point in the day usually about five o'clock and I just
1:00:19
don't I just it's just me I just sit with my thoughts so I'm afraid that's
1:00:27
all we've got time for this afternoon I'd like to thank the panels being so great we've got some really lovely comments in the chats and you so much
1:00:33
for giving up your time and thanks all for your questions from the audience as well a reminder is going to be available
1:00:39
on demand from this afternoon and so feel free to share it far and wide with peers and colleagues watch it again if
1:00:45
you want and reminder our webinar next week are on people management and reward and that you can
1:00:51
sign up for those now by the CID website and the final final reminder about our new well-being support for members in
1:00:57
the UK and Ireland with a free 24/7 telephone helpline staffed by qualified therapists and provided by award-winning
1:01:04
workplace well-being provider health should and these sides are going to be available to download from this afternoon so you can find out more about
1:01:10
everything there and I know a lot of you been asking about Emma's five-point plan so you can find that again as well yeah
1:01:16
I see you mail email me in and I'll send you up thank you so much Emma so just don't say take care of yourselves
1:01:22
because as everybody said you can't really care for others if you're not in good form yourself and we'll leave it
1:01:28
there for this afternoon so thank you so much for watching and good bye