March saw the LTOA run their first Mental Health in the work place workshop. The workshop was facilitated by Nicola Hainey, Professional Performance Coach and attended by 20 participants.
For such a serious topic the workshop was fun, laid back covered things such as stress management, time management, work/life balance, effective communication (particularly with challenging residents). It never felt intimidating or uncomfortable It certainly did not start with a round the room with a my names “Richard I suffer from stress” or saying what is the cause of stress in your life.
Whilst a 3 hour workshop will not cure stress overnight it certainly gave people tools to take a way and it made you think.
For me the take home point was eating the frog, (I’m sure there is a vegan equivalent). Mark Twain said “Eat a live frog first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.” So I now try and do the job that I really don’t want to do first so I can stop worrying about it for the rest of the day.
I also now view e mails as just another task and not something that I constantly need to be monitoring. I’m sure others who attended took home their own messages.
I do hope the LTOA run another workshop because I’m sure it would be of benefit.
Richard Edwards, Croydon
