Psych Health and Safety in Canada Podcast

In this conversation, guest host Erin O'Byrne and leading positive psychology expert, Andrew Soren discuss the importance of meaningful work and its impact on psychological well-being. They explore the concept of eudaimonia and delve into the challenges and hazards of meaningful work, as well as the role of leaders in creating psychologically healthy workplaces. They highlight the importance of ancient wisdom and modern science in shaping workplace well-being. They stress the significance of starting conversations and embracing variability in work-life balance. Also included are recommended reading and further resources.

In this episode Ian speaks with Kevin Mooney, Vice President of Prevention and Employer Services with the Saskatchewan Workers’ Compensation Board. Kevin highlights different sources of motivation for companies to take serious action on safety. Serious incidents — fatalities, psychological injuries, and prolonged workplace absence — represent high costs for organizations and Kevin believes prevention efforts are on the right track with raising awareness and demonstrating low cost wins. The WorkSafe Saskatchewan Psychological Health and Safety Resource Centre (https://www.worksafesask.ca/resources/psych-health-safety-resource-centre/workplace-psychological-health-and-safety/) and 7 Step Psychological Health and Safety Road map (https://www.worksafesask.ca/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/Psychological-Health-Safety-PHS-Roadmap.pdf) are accessible methods to increase awareness and soon they hope to share the results of pilot projects in local small businesses that demonstrate a simple no cost/low cost approach to identifying and taking action on workplace psychosocial hazards and regular worker feedback. You can follow Kevin on LinkedIn (https://linkedin.com/in/kevinmooney76).

In this episode Ian speaks with Dr. Sandra Moll and they discuss why and how the peer support apps PeerOnCall (https://www.oncallapp.ca/) and Beyond Silence (https://www.beyondsilence.ca/) can provide game-changing early intervention for public safety personnel and healthcare workers. Early intervention can prevent a significant degree of harm and suffering. Sandra describes the design, implementation, and function of the apps. Currently the apps are in a research phase where they are researching "what works for whom in what context" to optimize efforts. In the podcast we review how peer support fits in the continuum of workplace mental health recommended by the WHO and why apps and the real people they connect can have a great impact. Peer support is one of many tools and having the right service at the right time can be critical to obtaining early support. PeerOnCall evaluation research was funded by Movember, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) and the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC). Beyond Silence research was funded by CIHR and PHAC. The views expressed herein do not necessarily represent the views of the Government of Canada.

In this episode guest host Ian Lewis speaks with Carlyn Neek in a "bottom up" perspective of workplace health by looking at what is happening at the individual level and how you can trace it back to problems in the person - environment - occupation fit. As an occupational therapist Carlyn has a front-row seat on workplace factors impacting individuals. However, when you look on a larger scale, workplaces have many levels that can be acted on. In this podcast they look at the various levels and their impact on the individual to help explain how macro level factors impact individuals at work.

THIS IS A REPLAY OF EPISODE #73 The Psych Health and Safety in Canada Podcast will be returning late January 2024! In this episode, host Kim MacDonald talks with guest Charmaine Hammond about her work with companies and organizations following traumatic events that change a community in unimaginable ways. When a natural disaster or disaster of human making happens, company leaders, employees, families, and friends find themselves under enormous emotional, psychological, physical, and financial stress. Finding a way back to normal and managing the impact of external factors on the workplace climate, working conditions, and mental health of employees, is a challenge many organizations are not ready to manage. Using the wildfires in Fort McMurray as a case study Charmaine will talk about the kinds of shifts that are needed in these circumstances, the psychological health and safety environment and risk factors that were impacted, and what organizations need to do to prepare when being trauma-informed becomes central to the daily operations. She will also share some of the best actions companies took and how they impacted mental health in the workplace and the company's role in managing during and in the years following the event. Here is a link to the incredible animated short that aims to raise awareness about mental health, through the eyes of woodland creatures coming back home after the Fort McMurray Wood Buffalo wildfires, released in July 2023: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJD64fAEQnU

THIS IS A REPLAY OF EPISODE #66 The Psych Health and Safety in Canada Podcast will be returning late January 2024! Did you know that chronic pain is increasing in working adults in Canada? Do you know if your employees or your peers experience chronic pain? Or how their condition impacts their lived experience at work? Although chronic pain is a commonly studied topic in many fields, very little is known about the work experiences of employees experiencing chronic pain beyond return-to-work studies. In this episode, Podcast Host Kim MacDonald talks with Dr. Duygu Biricik Gulseren, an organizational psychologist and assistant professor in the school of human resource management at York University, about the new understanding of chronic pain and her research focus on employees who live with chronic illness, chronic pain and pain disability. Dr. Gulseren shares some of the findings from her two most recent published two studies on working with pain and leadership behaviour that supports psychological safety and positive employee psychological experiences at work. Dr. Gulseren also shares her work with York students mentoring them to develop a special platform aimed at providing practical, evidence-based resources for those working or interested in occupational health and safety and psychological health and safety, its progress and change. The student-led project is called theohsproject.ca.

THIS IS A REPLAY OF EPISODE #63 The Psych Health and Safety in Canada Podcast will be returning late January 2024! This episode explores the need for leaders and managers to broaden their understanding of inclusion, equity and diversity and question assumptions and conclusions when it comes to employees at work. Diversity does not always have a recognizable visible indicator. Host Kim MacDonald speaks to Wilma Li, founder of Business Knowledge Integration Inc. about her personal journey into EDI and her focus on advocating for interpersonal understanding and intercultural intelligence. EDI is evolving and better metrics of diversity and inclusion are required to reduce harms and business risks and create greater psychologically healthy and safe workplaces.

THIS IS A REPLAY OF EPISODE #62 The Psych Health and Safety in Canada Podcast will be returning late January 2024! Dr. Manju Varma is a nationally recognized expert in anti-discrimination. Before her current position at the Nova Scotia Community College, Dr. Varma was the Anti-Racism Commissioner of New Brunswick. Dr. Varma also serves on the Board of the Canada Race Relations Foundation. Psych Health & Safety Podcast Canada host, Kim MacDonald and Dr. Varma talk about her path from school teacher to anti-racism, human rights work and equity, inclusion and diversity specialist. She shares the challenges and opportunities in the work and offers advice on how to create workplace and classroom psychological health and safety, protection from harms to mental health, and the important role education and communications play in managing issues of equity, inclusion, fairness and safety.

Host Kim MacDonald's special guest in this episode is Mike Russo, a health and safety specialist, occupational hygienist and ISO health and safety auditor. Using a well known work health issue as the basis for the conversation, Kim and Mike demonstrate how you effectively apply the workplace Health & Safety RACE model, traditionally used in physical health and safety risk, impact and practice, to risks, hazards and harms from the two perspectives of physical and psychological and physical health and safety lens. They demonstrate and share practical considerations and the questions to ask at each stage of the model (recognition, assessment, controls, evaluation). They discuss potential risk factors, indicators and influences, the crossover of physical and psychological impact, and discuss some of the obstacles that can get in the way of introducing change.

In this episode host Kim MacDonald speaks with special guest Dr. Stefanie Ruel a professor at Cape Breton University in human resources and organizational behaviour. Dr. Ruel is a former space life sciences Mission Manager who historical and contemporary justice, equity, diversity, inclusion, and Indigeneity (JEDII) challenges and opportunities in STEM and entrepreneurship. Dr. Ruel's latest research explores new understandings of grief, grieving, and work and their importance for health-oriented, workplace leaders, managers and supervisors who are interested in continuous improvement and applying newer research and understandings. Using the example of grief and grieving, Dr. Ruel also helps us understand how important it is to regularly review HR practices, policies, and benefits to ensure they are not creating invisible barriers to thriving and flourishing at work. Dr. Ruel shares how outdated, disproved research and models have and continue today to shape workplace beliefs and guide employee benefits and policies. The DSM-5 now recognizes complicated grieving as a mental illness. Dr. Ruel shares her thoughts on the role of workplace culture (one of the 13 psychological health and safety risk factors), the need for attention in supporting the area of grieving as a mental health concern and what all workplaces can learn from indigenous culture and practices.

Host Kim MacDonald's guest in this episode is Dr. Liane Davey, author of The Good Fight and specialist in workplace team leadership, behavioural dynamics, and team functioning. Liane works with global companies to not only change business success, but change mindsets, and build new skills that result in sustainable workplace change. They discuss the impacts of leader action and attention, communications and expectations, work design, workload and a new risk area called "thought-load". Each of these are essential considerations in executing either the Canadian National Standard for Workplace Psychological Health & safety or the ISO45003 standard. Liane shares how a leader's understanding of their own behaviour, including what they are rewarding, either intentionally or unintentionally, has a significant impact on psychological health and safety, the culture and outcomes. Liane shares a set of practical evidence-based actions that will make the biggest positive difference in team functioning, employee anxiety, and overall mental health, and your own productivity, along with the 1 thing she wants team leaders to do differently.

Host Kim MacDonald speaks with workplace recognition and reward author and specialist Nelson Scott about his niche, one of the 13 psychosocial risk factors in the Canadian National Workplace Standard for Psychological Health & Safety. They talk about perceptions and interpretations of a work topic that can be understood as simple common courtesy, or can be deeply linked to our experiences and perceptions of respect and organizational fairness, two additional workplace hazards embedded in both the National Standard and the global ISO 45003 standard. Nelson emphasizes shared responsibility and some of the known and unknown benefits when R&R is authentically delivered and becomes a part of workplace culture. He says that what can seem like a no-brainer in benefits to employees and the workplace, doesn't always get the attention it deserves. Operational demands, no expectations for the behaviour, and daily events can take a toll on our best intentions. Nelson's book, Thanks Again! offers even more simple and effective ideas to reset recognition habits, for both up-and-coming and seasoned managers: https://books.friesenpress.com/store/title/119734000020745519/Nelson-Scott-Thanks%2C-Again%21

Substance abuse in Canada is not often talked about at work. But it is a major crisis in human suffering, harm and risk to safety, health and death by suicide. It touches virtually every workplace, every family and every friend group. And the cold, hard costs to the workplace of that suffering, harm and risk? A 2020 study by the Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction (CCSA) and the University of Victoria's Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research (CISUR) reported the cost to people in Canada at $49 billion, with the largest portion in lost workplace productivity at $22.4 billion. Nearly 74,000 substance use-attributable deaths occurred in Canada in 2020, more than 200 deaths a day. In this episode host Kim MacDonald explores this workplace issue with special guest Candace Plattor who will help us break down the myths, stereotypes, and misunderstandings that many of us have built about what enabling, protection and caring looks like in today's workplace environment. The type of substance use can vary from an employee drinking alcohol during a workplace or business lunch to an employee affected by an addiction to opioids. Employers and employees can feel the impact through lowered morale, through the climate it can create or when the workplace has a culture of acceptance and not participating results in exclusion. If reducing harm and risk at work is our collective objective, Candace believes we first have to unlearn a lot of what we believe are the most helpful actions. She believes that the crisis requires a new level of workplace education to more accurately reduce risk and protect mental health and psychological health and safety. Candace discusses how to eliminate unintentional enabling, and support it all by specific actions and policies, including around some of the new drugs that workplaces now have on-site to save lives when someone has overdosed. Organizations have a non-negotiable responsibility for health and safety at work, and Candace has surprising advice for human-centred, caring leaders. Check out Candace's TedX Talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VadN5wpk_-0 Love With Boundaries: https://lovewithboundaries.com/wp2022/

Kim speaks with guest Lisa Lounsbury about her work with companies in the mining industry.

In this episode, host Kim MacDonald talks with guest Charmaine Hammond about her work with companies and organizations following traumatic events that change a community in unimaginable ways. When a natural disaster or disaster of human making happens, company leaders, employees, families, and friends find themselves under enormous emotional, psychological, physical, and financial stress. Finding a way back to normal and managing the impact of external factors on the workplace climate, working conditions, and mental health of employees, is a challenge many organizations are not ready to manage. Using the wildfires in Fort McMurray as a case study Charmaine will talk about the kinds of shifts that are needed in these circumstances, the psychological health and safety environment and risk factors that were impacted, and what organizations need to do to prepare when being trauma-informed becomes central to the daily operations. She will also share some of the best actions companies took and how they impacted mental health in the workplace and the company's role in managing during and in the years following the event. Here is a link to the incredible animated short that aims to raise awareness about mental health, through the eyes of woodland creatures coming back home after the Fort McMurray Wood Buffalo wildfires, released in July 2023: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJD64fAEQnU

In this episode, host Kim MacDonald talks with guest Linda Crockett about her work with organizations and employees navigating the negative impacts of workplace bullying, and harassment and how illness, and injury can be the result. Over the past 12 years, Linda has supported both employees and employers in navigating the impacts of complex and problematic workplace behaviour. Linda shares her thoughts on what organizations and employees can do to improve work conditions and move through this very human experience. Here is Linda's recommended reading list from the website she created to support public access to resources on workplace bullying; https://instituteofworkplacebullyingresources.ca/recommended-reading/

Mindfulness practice and leader coaching have had a significant boost in popularity and use over the last few years. If you have been working in or studying workplace psychological health and safety you may have even experienced your own workplace adding initiatives that are focused on self-care and resilience. They are sometimes offered in efforts to improve work-related stress. These initiatives are unlikely to affect the workplace conditions of psychological health and safety directly. They are not hazard controls to mitigate harm presented by a psych health and safety risk factor. But don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. In this episode, host Kim MacDonald speaks with practitioner and entrepreneur coach, Corilee Fox, about its role in strengthening emotional literacy, personal stress management and understanding yourself as a workplace leader. Corilee shares the mindfulness principles and how leaders can observe their behaviours to support positive shifts in workplace culture.

LISTEN TO PART ONE OVER AT THE PSYCH HEALTH AND SAFETY USA PODCAST! 😁 In this episode, host Kim MacDonald talks with special guest Dr. I. David Daniels, about his experience over the last year as the host of the Psych Health & Safety USA podcast. Dr. Daniels will share some of his pivotal moments as host. He shares the life and work experiences that shaped his interest in occupational health and safety and in the specialty area of psychological health and safety. Listeners will get a chance to hear about the workplace experiences that are the subject of his Ph.D. dissertation and how that research informs the work he does as an agent of positive change. Dr. Daniels will also share his thoughts on how the United States supports psychological health and safety, what is changing, what needs to change, and the near-term opportunities that help him stay hopeful and optimistic.

Early adopters in any emerging frontier can offer great practical learning and help pave the way for those who come after. Although many leading academics and behavioural scientists have been studying the connections among psychosocial stress and stressors, work conditions, leader influence, and mental health and wellbeing, we are still very much in the early stages of applying psychological health and safety management, strategies, and interventions into Canadian organizations. In this episode, host Kim MacDonald talks with special guest Adam Chomos about his experience developing and facilitating a workplace psychological health and safety education and training intervention with an early adopter. Listeners get a front-row seat to a thoughtful and open debrief on the project, including purpose, process, experience, challenging parts, the things that occur that you weren't expecting, and lessons learned.

In this episode, host Kim MacDonald talks with Dr. Alycia Damp, a behavioural scientist applying science with technology to change the way we work. Dr. Damp is currently working in a Canadian company, applying selection science to the important process and practice of workplace hiring. The company, HireGuide, is developing evidence-based and behavioural science-backed systems that help organizations mitigate the negative impacts of risk factors like human bias and unstructured interviewing, and improve hiring accuracy and job fit and achieve organizational transparency, equity, fairness, and inclusion goals. Dr. Damp offers her advice for the best place to invest your time in the hiring process to support your long-term psychological health and safety efforts. Read Dr. Damps's article to explore new considerations for hiring planning around job and culture fit: https://www.hireguide.com/blog-posts/hire-for-culture-fit