It’s important for your employees to take the time off they’re entitled to, and after the challenging year we’ve all had, this can’t be stressed enough. Many workers have been dedicated to the care of service users, but at what cost? As an employer, you have a duty of care to your employees and as part of this, you need to ensure that their health and wellbeing isn’t suffering at work.
In a survey of 1218 health and social care workers, we discovered:
- 30% rate their stress levels at work as very high or high
- 19% took time off work in the last 12 months due to unmanageable stress or a mental health condition
- 56% have worked overtime, with just under a third of workers doing more than 5 hours of overtime every week
Whilst certain conditions and situations can’t be controlled within health and social care settings, one thing you can do is encourage your employees to take regular annual leave for their health and wellbeing. Taking annual leave has several benefits for both you and your employees.
Reduces stress.
Time away from work has been proven to reduce stress and burnout. Simply knowing that annual leave is booked can boost serotonin levels (the happiness hormone) and lower cortisol levels (the stress hormone) because of the excitement and relief associated with it.
Improves mood.
Everyone needs to relax, unwind and switch off from work now and again. Whether that’s with friends or family, picking up a new hobby or just lying on the sofa catching up on TV. Being able to focus on what they enjoy doing improves happiness and contentment.
Improves motivation and work performance.
Coming back to work feeling rested makes employees feel more motivated and work better. They’re also less likely to make small mistakes that may be linked to fatigue and the risk of mental health illnesses, physical health problems and absenteeism is greatly reduced.
You might be thinking... how can I encourage my employees to take annual leave when faced with the current situation?
That’s where we can step in and help you balance leave requirements. Along with traditional agency support, we can provide you with absence cover or contracted locums that will allow your health and social care teams to take rotational annual leave. This way, you can ensure that your service users always receive top quality care whilst your employees rest and re-energise during their time away. And when they come back, they’ll be refreshed and ready to go again.
In the event where short notice annual leave is required, we can quickly match compliant and skilled candidates to your available vacancies so that you’re never left without cover. Get in touch to find out more.
