KEVIN HUME Consultancy

There are common pressure points in the workplace which are identified by employees as being particularly significant. In the NSW legal profession for example, one recent survey (the 1998/99 Practising Certificate Survey) reported 75% of respondents saying they experienced at least one of eight forms of stress - not enjoyable work challenges but STRESS. The most common form of stress reported was

• Too much work (57% of respondents)
• Not enough time for family, friends and social life (46%)
• Excessively long hours (39%)
• Insufficient resources (27%)
• 15% the type of work they were doing
• 14% not having ENOUGH work
• 12% conflict with colleagues
• 11% conflict with management

Complaint handling is traditionally a high-stress area with employee 'burn-out' and consequent high staff turnover an also increasingly evident problem. The highest-risk industries for stress were health and community services (19%), education (14%) and personal and other services (10%). Professionals (17%) and clerks (11%) were more likely to be stressed than laborers (1%) according to the Australian Centre for Industrial Relations Research and Training. The International Labor Organisation puts miners, police and prison officers at the top of their international most highly and dangerously stressed rankings alongside airline pilots, journalists, advertising executives, dentists, actors and broadcasters. Certainly my own experience as a journalist and high profile broadcaster fronting ABC Radio and Television as well as Channel 7 top-rating news and current affairs programs in Perth, and Sydney says the ILO has got it right.

'Very thorough and interesting course. Informative, calming and relaxing. I've learnt ways of dealing with stress and well being at work generally I didn't know were available.' Danielle Martino, Executive Assistant to CEO, Melbourne.