WORKING ANXIOUSA young professional

copes on the job

CHANGIN’ TIMESTeach them while they’re

young

Let’s get PHYSICAL

All statistics from reports and studies by CAMH, CMHA, Mental Health Commission of Canada, Statistics Canada, Ontario Human Rights Commission. Graphic template from piktochart.

Civic Action

Dr. Carolyn Dewa

Editors’ note:

pg 1

“I began this research field 10 years ago and when I started people didn’t believe that depression was a problem in the workplace. Over the past 10 years we see that people really do recognize that this is something that needs to be addressed and now we’re at the point where ‘how do we do it? What’s an evidence based way of addressing this?’ Many employers are interested and it’s a growing tide realizing that it would be to everyone’s benefit to address this.”

“Mental health issues often involve “invisible” suffering, with Statistics Canada reporting that of adults with a mental health-related disability, nearly a third indicated that their employer was unaware of their condition. People with mental health issues may need special accommodation in their workplace, but less than half of those employed reported having all their needs met. Collectively, we need to encourage employers to play an active role in fostering workplaces that are supportive of mental health.”

Spotlight...

As we spoke about this magazine to our friends, families and sources, more and more they began sharing their personal stories of mental illness with us. We realized everyone is touched by mental illness and a lot of people care but don’t know how to be supportive or supported. As we were reporting we found that making mental health a priority in the workplace is only starting to be part of the zeitgeist. We hope that this magazine provides some constructive resources for employers to better address their employees’ well-being. And gives employees hope that they’re not alone.

Cover story –Set in the ultimate Toronto meeting place, the TTC, the piece shows that mental illness is all around us. The red figures indicate those who are dealing with a mental health issue and the blue show those who are not. But they all share the same space. Drawn by Liliana Vera M..

Jan Wong, Dr. Carolyn Dewa and all the people we spoke to at CAMH and CMHA, thank you for your time and generosity. We are grateful for the opportunity to collaborate with a few Centennial College fine arts students Liliana Vera, Caro-lyn de Lang, Chanda Ramnath and Brandon Bailey -- you brought our vision to life. The faculty at Centennial College, both outside and in the journalism program, have been such great resources -- especially Donna Lindell and David McClyment. Tim Doyle, whose open door policy we took full advantage of, thanks for your patience.

Acknowledgments:

co

nten

tsON THE COVERWORKING ANXIOUS3THE TIMES, THEY ARE A CHANGIN’10LET’S GET ACTIVE ABOUT IT22

8 RISE TO THE OCCASION

12 THE ENLIGHTENED EMPLOYER

14 THIS IS YOUR BRAIN

17 MENTAL HEALTH HOW-TO

18 HIGH-STRESS CAREERS

20 THE STANDARD AND THE CASE STUDY

26 affect’s tOP 6 MENTAL HEALTH APPS

24 A BALANCING ACT

WHAT’S INSIDE

Editor-in-chief: Tim Doyle

Editors-at-large and writers:

Shelby MortonBria JohnTara Fortune

Photo by Shelby Morton

Let’s paint a picture. You’ve just graduated from university. You’ve been applying for jobs for months and like every other new graduate-- you’re worried you won’t find one. Then a month after graduation, you’re hired for the job of your dreams. It pays well, it’s high profile, it looks great on a resume; it’s exactly where you’ve always wanted to be. But there’s one caveat-- you struggle with severe anxiety. Questions quickly arise. Is this too much pressure? Will my anxiety affect my job? Will I do a good job? This is exactly what recent graduate Jennifer Burns (who, due to the nature of her job, declined to give her real name) has strug-gled with as a new professional in a high-pressure industry. Jennifer graduated from university with a bachelor of social work in April, 2015. A month later, she got hired as a youth social worker at the hospital where she did her field placement. “I felt ready to have a full-time job, having spent years in both college and university,” she said. “But with that comes the anxiety

of knowing that I have to actually take on the responsibility of being a practising professional and no longer a student.” Jennifer has experienced generalized anxiety disorder for about two years. “A lot of my anxiety is socially driven. I have a lot of obsessive and racing thoughts, perseverating on an idea, doubting myself,” she said. “I get tense, shaky, with sweaty palms and nausea.” She said her anxiety became more pronounced when she transi-tioned into the workforce through field placements.

“Handling that type of responsibility while managing a mental health issue is a lot,” she said. “And as a student you’re always comparing yourself to more experienced people in your field.”

One particularly difficult challenge Jennifer said she has faced has been with public speaking.

“I have to lead ‘family sessions,’ where I have to facilitate a discussion with a group of people,” she said. “Which is basically public speaking.” -- Cont’d on next page

By Shelby Morton

WorkingAnxiousA young professional struggles to cope with mental illness

pg 3

Artwork by Chanda Ramnath @chandaramnath

“The first couple times were extremely anxiety provok-ing,” she said. “Because I’m mindful of the fact I want to serve the family that I’m working with and do a good job but also that another staff member is likely present and observing.”

Jennifer said another part of her anxiety stems from her fear of failure, of wanting to do a good job.

“Sometimes you have to fake being confident especially when you’re a new grad and have anxiety like I do,” she said. “It’s not very reassuring to clients if you’re noticeably anxious or nervous.”

Jennifer hasn’t disclosed her struggle with anxiety to her employers, but she said she would feel comfortable doing so if she felt significantly impacted.

“I’m lucky because I work in a mental health ward; I know the resources are there,” she said. “Through our em-ployee assistance provider (EAP) benefits, we have access to those resources.”

Karen Viveiros is communications manager of the EAP program, Lifeworks, at human resource provider Ceridian. She said a strong EAP program can help channel a person to the services that they need.

“We often undermine the employee’s life outside of work and how that can affect productivity,” she said. “And more often we don’t know how to address that effectively or where to go.”

LifeWorks is a confidential 24 hour-a-day assistance program, where the employee can call toll-free, email, chat online or set up an in-person meeting with counsellors, or “triage consultants.”

“Whether it’s as simple as an answer to a question, or is-sues related to work, family or money, our consultants can assist them directly or provide support through recommen-dations to community agencies or referrals to counselling services,” Viveiros said.

She said that LifeWorks’ clinical statistics show that healthcare workers access its counselling services at about at 10 per cent higher rate than employees of other sectors.

She said it would be difficult for LifeWorks’ research team to pinpoint why.

“What we do know is that it’s a very stressful line of work. And we know that caring professionals experience burnout and compassion fatigue,” she said.

Viveiros said anyone with a mental health issue would benefit from EAP services.

“It also helps support the development of a healthy cul-ture, knowing that’s available to you and knowing that your employee cares enough to make that available to you,” she said.

Jennifer said, despite these resources, admitting to a mental health problem can sometimes be a struggle.

“A lot of my anxiety is socially driven. I have a lot of obsessive and racing thoughts, perseverating on an idea, doubting myself.”

Photo of Jennifer by Shelby Morton

pg 5

“A lot of times in healthcare professions, people want to seem like they have it all together,” she said, “I definitely feel that.”

Maggie Fung, manager of health human resources at the Ontario Hospital Association (OHA), said there are benefits to divulging a mental illness to an employer.

“One is the protection from discrimination under human rights legislation,” she said. “It’s then classified as a disabil-ity.”

Fung said the OHA is developing a web series about mental illness in the workplace.

“It’s in the very early stages but our plan is to provide various mental healthcare resources to our members in order for them to better help their own staff, therefore allowing that staff to feel more comfortable speaking out if they need to.”

Jennifer said she learned a lot about self-care while studying social work.

“You have to take care of yourself, especially in a help-ing profession where you’re often seeing a lot of difficult situations,” she said.

Leslie Carmichael, director of the people, engagement and culture program at the OHA, said mental well-being at all levels is the most important piece in a hospital setting.

“Healthcare workers are on the frontline,” she said. “It’s extremely important that they are mentally well. The care that the patient is getting is going to be subpar otherwise.”

Because of the demands of her job, Jennifer admitted she doesn’t always take care of herself.

“Proper self-care is so stressed in our field,” she said. “But it’s difficult to actually practise it. A lot of the time I’m working through my lunches and staying late.”

But she is seeing a personal therapist and is taking a new medication.

“Anxiety is definitely something that affects me on a daily basis,” she said. “But taking my medication, practicing mindfulness, eating and exercising regularly, and hanging out with friends is all a part of self-care, and I try to do that whenever I can.”

Jennifer said it’s also important to remind herself that a lot of her perceived missteps at work are a byproduct of anxiety.

“My anxiety tells me something that’s not always true. You really are your own worst critic,” she said.

But she said it helps to seek feedback from her peers.“I’ve only really received positive feedback from my

superiors thus far,” she said. “And honestly, hearing that reassurance really does help.

It lets me know ‘OK, I really am doing a good job here.’” q

“A lot of my anxiety is socially driven. I have a lot of obsessive and racing thoughts, perseverating on an idea, doubting myself.”

Small business program helps

youth to the occasion

By 6 p.m. students start trickling in and it’s just like any other classroom – they catch

up with each others’ days, they take out their homework and check their phones one last time.

The difference is that this is a youth entrepre-neur class for students with a history of mental illness.

The Youth Small Business program run by Rise Asset Development out of Rotman’s School of Management at the University of Toronto offers youth a chance to start anew. After the stu-dents complete the two and a half month-long intensive session, they can apply to the program for a loan and start their own business.

Jodi Butts, program coordinator, says that the program works because it’s not clinical.

“We’re giving people an opportunity to be in a safe space but not have to talk about it if they don’t want to. And we relate to them as entrepre-neurs,” she said. “We also give people permission to start a new chapter and that’s a very liberating thing.”

Typical onset for mental illness is between 16 and 24 so for those who have suffered a derail-ment early in their life, their dream job can seem far away.

“But you can pursue it in a business. So long as you do the work on a business plan and you have some knowledge to draw upon to be successful, we feel like entrepreneurship is a really great option,” Butts said.

At 6:30 p.m. Mary Ross starts the day’s class

By Bria John

RISE

All photos by Bria John

on how to use social media to promote busi-nesses. Ross has taught the class for almost three years.

“Although some of our students may be high school aged, it’s not a high school program. We teach entrepreneur skills at a sophisticated level and we don’t compromise on quality,” Ross said.

Admission to the program is based on the personal readiness of the student and in the business idea. By graduation, the students will not only have a viable business plan but also, through a Rise loan, a chance to launch a viable business as well.

At 8 p.m., Cassandra John (no relation to the writer) gets up to speak. The Toronto- native is an alumna of the program and has joined the social media teams for Manifesto, the Toronto-based music platform and Carib-bean Tales, the film festival. “I feel like I found out what I was good at while I was in the program. I found that I could persevere,” John said. “You’re in an environment where you don’t feel judged, everybody’s willing to work with each other, help each other and grow.”

Rise is inclusive and accessible to people from all educational backgrounds - a plus in John’s eyes. John was in fashion PR before getting into Rise. She heard about the pro-gram from a friend three years ago. “If people are willing to refer the program it makes us feel really good because it’s the best evidence that people had a positive experience,” Butts said.

Ross saw John at an event held by another graduate and asked her to speak to the class. Those kinds of connections are the hidden card of the program.

“The more students we can keep in touch with, the more connections we can make. That way alumni can become mentors,” Ross said.

One of the foundational elements of the program is transparency. Ross has been di-agnosed with depression and anxiety and she shares that with the class on the first day.

“It’s like that Hair Club for Men commer-cial, I’m also a member of the club,” Ross said.

John and Jasmine Swimmer, a student in the program, both struggle with depression and say having Ross teach the class is a comfort.

“It’s because somebody’s not looking at you from a place of judgment, it makes the con-

nection a lot more personal,” John said. “Just to see that she gets where we’re com-

ing from, and the struggles that we face, has really helped overall to get to the end goal,” Swimmer said.

Swimmer has big dreams for her high-end bowtie line called Blessed and Highly Fa-voured; she plans to hire employees once her business does well enough.

“I’m excited to start hiring employees – es-pecially those with mental illness and disabil-ities because I think they are very stigmatized and so don’t get hired,” Swimmer said.

Rise’s accommodation policy is also a bit freer. Because the classroom is diverse in terms of mental health diagnoses, they evalu-ate accommodations on an individual basis.

“Some schools have policies that are strict – if x, then y. We have the freedom to decide what students need on a case-by-case basis,” Ross said.

This year, for example, for the first time there are simultaneous sign language inter-preters in the classroom.

Mental health discussions, however, don’t often come up during class.

“We’re a business class first. Those kinds of discussions mostly come up one-to-one when the student and I are talking homework, for example,” Ross said.

Ross credits her learning disability, syn-aesthesia, for her ability to relate to people. Synaesthesia is when the stimulation of one sense involuntarily stimulates another, like perceiving numbers with associated colours. For Ross, numbers have associated personali-ties so math was like a “soap opera.”

“Having to create relationships between numbers to understand math points to a high-ly tuned empathy so creating a rapport with my students comes really naturally,” she said.

The students are also encouraged to net-work among themselves, and it comes easily because they’ve been in the trenches together. After a month together the students already have an easy manner with each other.

After class John sits with some stragglers who are picking her brain.

“If you told me even two weeks ago [that I’d be sitting with the students] I would have been like “uh no, that’s not going to happen.” It was accomplishment because I pushed myself out of my comfort zone so I’m really grateful to Mary for giving me that opportu-nity,” John said. q

Jasmine Swimmer, recent grad of RISE, sold her bowties at the Christmas Market in the Rotman’s building on December 2. From top to bottom: Jasmine fixes her display, poses with Mary Ross (RISE program lead), displays a tie from her collection, poses with Jodi Butts (RISE program coordinator) and helps a customer with his purchase.

pg 7

By Tara Fortune

The times they are a changin’ (and so are your children)

Artwork by Liliana Vera M. @thecatintherainvisual

In the age of technology that is always chang-ing, more children gravitate towards iPads than

playgrounds. A Scarborough psychotherapist thinks that advances in technology have caused more cases of mental illness in youth.

This year the Ontario government updated the health curriculum for grades 1 to 8. The curriculum had not been modified since 1998. A lot of news headlines have been about the controversial concepts of the sexual education portion of the curriculum. There has been little talk on the mental health les-sons the curriculum teaches.

The mental health section of the curriculum includes coping with stress, building healthy rela-tionships, communicating with others, recognizing mental illness and a lot of other concepts.

Maria Paonessa, an elementary school teacher at Woburn Junior Public School and a mother of two, one child in senior kindergarten and one in daycare, agrees with the new mental health aspects of the curriculum. She thinks the update is overdue and she has even had a student ask her what gender is. “I kept thinking to myself, this is actually a curricu-lum I think all human beings should be following,” Paonessa said. “The previous curriculum was before smartphones; it was before the Internet. This is defi-nitely overdue.”

Although she thinks it’s a step in the right direc-tion, Paonessa also thinks that it might be difficult for her to have some of these conversations with her students. She wants to address it in a way that will be respectful.

Ema Nardella, a Scarborough psychotherapist who deals with adults and children speaks highly of the new curriculum and thinks it’s a good step towards promoting mental health. Nardella thinks that there is one more key thing that needs to be taught and added. “I know this word is becoming more of a cliché, but it’s just so powerful, and that’s the word empathy,” Nardella said. “I think different people; educators and theorists, have touched upon this for a few decades now - but it just doesn’t seem to get enough active exposure.”

A Toronto mother of three, Wanda Lynch, has one daughter in middle school and agrees with the com-plex subjects being taught at a young age. “When you think about it there are a lot of children, for ex-ample, who have anxiety, concentration or behavioral problems which affects them greatly with their edu-cation,” Lynch said. “Children spend more than half of their day in school, so teachers should be trained to be aware of any mental health problems they see within any student. Having this knowledge, they can catch odd behavior earlier in children and use the proper classroom strategies to assist those children.”

Elementary and middle school can be a trauma-tizing time. As children mature they face challenges including peer pressure, body changes, sexual desires, bullying and family troubles.

“There’s a lot of pressure that children (and adults) face. If you don’t have coping mechanisms or nowhere to go, some people take the problem solving into their own hands – and it’s not always a positive outcome,” Paonessa said.

Paonessa thinks that her school needs to eliminate certain layers to create a safer space. She feels that the new curriculum could help this happen.

Nardella suggests that teachers and the curriculum only play one part of the development of a child’s health. Parents grow alongside them everyday. It is not always easy for parents to confront their children on sensitive subjects. Nardella thinks it’s always easier to start when they are little. She suggests to use it as a learning experience with your child. “This is the most valuable lesson you can teach your child,” Nar-della said. “To navigate their emotional world and to value it – that no feeling is bad or unimportant.” q

“The most valuable lesson you can teach your child [is] to

navigate their emotional world and value it - that no feeling is

bad or unimportant.”

pg 9

How some employers cultivate a mentally healthy workplace

THE ENLIGHTENED EMPLOYER

By Shelby Morton

Leslie Carmichael, director of people, engagement and culture at the Ontario

Hospital Association, recalls an employee who, due to stress and anxiety, took a seven-week leave of absence. When the employee returned, it was with a certain requirement.

“She needed to carry a pillow with her around the office and to meetings for a sense of comfort,” Carmichael said.

Carmichael said she didn’t think twice about allowing this.

“Nobody frowned upon that,” she said. “It worked for her while she was away, so it was included in her return to work plan.”

Carmichael said her job is to foster internal engagement within the OHA and maintaining her staff’s mental health is a huge part of that.

“Dealing with mental health is a delicate line to walk and I don’t take it lightly,” she said. “I can’t visualize what [the employ-ee] is going through but I’ll do my best to sympathize.”

In the last two years, OHA staff, includ-ing Carmichael, has been trained and certified in mental health first aid.

“Is a pain in the chest a heart attack, or is it anxiety?” she said. “Ok, we’re dealing with

depression or suicidal thoughts. We don’t want to put our supervisors in a position where they don’t know how to deal with such things.”

Mary Ann Baynton, a workplace relations spe-cialist and founder of workplace mental health

social enterprise Mindful Employer Canada, said it’s important that employers have practical strategies for the workplace.

“I’ve watched managers burn out by trying to help an employee with a mental

health issue,” she said. “If [an organization like Mindful Employer] can make it easier on them, and teach them how to do the work that I myself can do, then it’s much more cost effective.”

Lauren Hill, senior manager of the IT department at Scotiabank, said mental well-be-

ing should be a priority to all employers. “It’s important to know that you

can come to work and be appre-ciated for your effort and abilities

regardless of what’s going on in your personal life,” she said.

Scotiabank is a sponsor of Not Myself Today, a workplace mental health initiative launched by Partners for Mental Health. It provides toolkits that include activities, online resources, and ma-

pg 11

terials to help employers properly address mental health.

Jeff Moat, president of Partners for Mental Health, said the campaign’s goal is to eliminate the stigma surrounding mental illness.

“Not feeling like yourself today? Well, that’s OK,” he said. “It’s about recognizing that we all go through a gamut of emotions and it’s com-pletely normal to feel these feelings.”

Hill said Scotiabank, with Not Myself Today, provides managers with support when dealing with employee mental health, including promoting inclusive language, providing re-sources for counseling and simply asking how an employee is doing.

“I’ll even tell them something personal about myself, that way they feel comfortable talking to me about whatever they need to,” she said.

Carmichael’s department utilizes Not Myself Today’s toolkit, including distributing mood buttons to employees.

“It’s all about being open. If the button you’ve got isn’t fitting your mood, ask a co-work-er to swap,” she said. “Feeling happy today? Well, grab a happy button.”

Moat said mood buttons build empathy, and connect employees to each other and their emotions.

“We’re mindful of this ‘ignore it and it’ll go away’ mentality sur-rounding mental illness,” he said. “If you feel off, you should pay attention to it—it’s your mental health calling.”

Carmichael also takes part in is the Mood Disorders Society of Canada’s Elephant in the Room anti-stigma campaign. The campaign offers employers and employees a small blue ele-

phant to place in their work area to demonstrate that the workplace is a safe place to talk about mental illness without fear of judgment.

“As cute as it is, it wasn’t given because it’s a cute blue elephant, it’s there to start a conversa-

tion,” she said. “If you want to talk, put it on your desk.”

Debbie Turner, program manager at Mood Disorders Society of Canada, said the campaign also offers customizable posters with phone numbers and informa-

tion about mental health. “Too often employees think they’ll be thought

less of because of a mental illness,” she said. “By showcasing the elephant and the posters, it’s the employer’s way of saying that this is an issue they care about.”

Carmichael said cultivating a team envi-ronment is key to a healthy workplace. She provides weekly mental health-related emails, fitness incentives, team-building exercises (including a recent dragon boat race), as well as anti-stigma “lunch and

learns.” “When my employees are well, I know they’re

operating at their best and engaged in their work,” she said.

Baynton said it’s important to show that a person can manage a health condition while contributing to the workplace.

“Stigma exists when we think that a person with a mental illness cannot function or be productive,” she said. “It doesn’t have to be a liability.”

Carmichael said she is proud of the OHA’s progress.

“The more we talk about it, the more we can significantly reduce the stigma,” she said. “It’s ul-timately about understanding that mental illness does not define a person.”

Photos courtesy of: Mood Disorders Society of Canada and Partners for Mental HealthLinks: www.mooddisorderscanada.ca/pages/elephant-in-the-room-campaign

www.partnersformh.ca; www.notmyselftoday.ca

this is your brain

and we like it

Right Brain by Allan Ajifo. Flickr Creative Commons.

modup.net

By Bria John

Imagine that there is a perfect job out there for you and the employer wants

you now, just as you are. The team behind Pymetrics, a New York-based company and an online recruitment tool, believed precisely that and created a system to help you find each other.

“What Pymetrics does is look at the cog-nitive and emotional traits that spell success within certain industries and then match can-didates with those industries based on their traits,” said Alena Chiang, head of marketing at Pymetrics.

When Frida Polli, co-founder and CEO of Pymetrics, graduated from Harvard Business School in 2012 and was looking for work she realized that the factors used in the recruiting process - resumes, GPAs, and the prestige of schools - were not good indicators of job success. When she told her friend Julie Yoo about her experience they decided to create the game-based recruitment tool.

The games, 20 in total and played on their website, isolate particular traits and habits of the players. For example a game called ‘Balloons’ measures risk learning in high-risk situations by having players pump up differ-ent coloured balloons. The balloons pop at different intervals (some colours pop sooner than others) but the more a balloon is inflated without popping, the more money the player wins. The data derived from this game is collected with the data from other games to create a candidate profile. This game for ex-ample extracts data related to how the player reacts to risk, a trait that is valued differently depending on the industry ie. venture capital-ist versus social worker.

“I see it as a much more fair and objective way to do candidate sourcing. Regardless

of what else shapes the way that your brain thinks about things, all we’re here to do is assess the way it is now and be able to rec-ommend to you that based on the way you approach this, these are the industries that you’d be a good fit for,” Chiang said.

This includes whether the candidate has a history of mental illness because the games level the playing field.

“Our perspective is that it’s not really a mental illness, it’s really just the way that your brain thinks might be super different than the majority of the population and that got labelled as mental illness,” Chiang said.

Youth Employment Services (YES) in To-ronto started the Lighthouse Project in March this year to help youth with a history of mental illness find work after noticing a lack of resources in the city.

“[Pymetrics] sounds like a really great tool and it could be a great starting point for finding what kind of job someone would suit. But for some people there are just some other factors that would need to be incorporated, like exploring the accommodations,” said Cynthia Ainslie, a career counsellor with the Lighthouse Project.

Timothy Lang, CEO of YES said that some youth in the Lighthouse project face the same issues as all unemployed youth - they need help writing resumes, learning how to inter-view or knowing how to dress appropriately.

“So many times it’s the same struggles. But the additional support that we give helps [youth in the Lighthouse Project] deal with specifically the mental illness or challenges they may have,” Lang said.

Ainslie says that her client’s mental health issues sometimes shape the job search.

pg 13

-- Cont’d on next page

“Everyone who comes in here is a person first, everyone has a different personality. Some clients who have social anxieties, for example, can’t do a lot of heavy customer interaction, they wouldn’t suit working as a cashier where they’re talking to people all day,” she said.

YES works with employer partners who don’t always know if a job seeker has a history of mental illness or not. When told, says Ains-lie, the reaction varies.

“Some employers have been really accom-modating and understanding and we’ve seen a lot of that. We’ve also seen other times where employers might get scared off and we don’t hear from them again,” she said.

The Ontario Human Rights Commission reported that in 2011 the unemployment rate among people with mental health or addic-tions disabilities was at 22.6 per cent - almost three times higher than for people without disabilities.

Ainslie believes that part of it could be due

to a lack of knowledge on the employer side. The other part is cultural.

“I think people encounter a lot of pessi-mism from their community like their families and doctors. People are often told not to work and are discouraged when they could be working and they’d benefit from working and this gets internalized,” Ainslie said.

Yoo and her team also work with partner companies to get people who are successful in their industries to play the games. They then use that data to build industry profiles. Chi-ang says this can give users a more compelling story and can bolster confidence.

“Imagine if you went into a new job knowing that the way that your brain works naturally fits to the job. That gives you a lot more confidence to fit in for what you feel like is a good fit for you,” Chiang said.

Ainslie uses tools like Personality Dimen-sions and Career Cruising in her counselling sessions now but she’s open to using Pymetrics in the future. q

The ballon game on the Pymetrics website measures how the player reacts to risk. Different coloured ballons pop at different rates but none is predictable. The more a balloon is inflated, however, the more ‘money’ the player stands to collect. This is one game of 20 that together act as an online recruitment tool.

Clockwise from top left: Cynthia Ainslie sits at her desk in the YES Lighthouse Project office at 555 Richmond St. W in Toronto. The youth clientele use the com-puter bank to search for jobs and prepare documents. The YES signboard greets clients as they arrive. Ainslie stands with her team - Robert Wharram, job developer, and Mustafa Essa, program coordinator, who together run the project.

All photos by Bria John

Screenshots from the Pymetrics website.

Mental Health, the workplace and YOU

An inside look at careers

Artwork by Carolyn de Lang

When two of his co-workers fell from a burning building into

the flames, the whole team had only minutes to search the inferno to find them.

Mike Wood, a Toronto fire captain with 20 years of experience, knows first-hand that being a firefighter is not an easy job and comes with a lot of stress.

Job strain and job related stress are two categories of stress according to Dr. Ash Bender, a Toronto psychiatrist that specializes in workplace mental health at CAMH and The Scarborough Hospital. Not every job will have the same level of stress. Everyone is different and every-one handles situations differently.

“People are more likely to report poor mental health if experiencing high stress. They’re actually twice as likely to develop clinical disorders like a major depressive disorder,” Bender said.

Scientists at Southern Medical Uni-versity in Guangzhou, China conducted a study that said the most stressful job is waitressing. Waitressing is linked to high stress and low wages that can cause heart disease and strokes. The study claims that feeling in control and respected is a big factor in workplace stress.

“There’s the demand-control-support theory that looks at someone in a high demand position with low control and low support. They’re going to report the experience of high stress,” Bender said.

Jen Farr, a waitress at Beer Bistro on King St. East in Toronto, shares why she believes serving is stressful.

“Your number one priority is making sure the customers are satisfied and happy, which means pleasing everybody. You unfortunately come last.”

Hearing stories from Wood about jumping into fires may lead one to think, why was a server rated one of the highest stress jobs? Different studies

online have different rankings of the most stressful jobs. On the website, Ca-reerCast.com, firefighter is given a stress rating of 71 per cent. Wood shares why his job can be stressful.

“The responsibility that we hold for the safety and protection of our crew, not only from a moral standpoint but from a legal standpoint, does create some stress,” Wood said.

Wood also mentioned that because firefighting is shift work it makes it more stressful. He said that many firefighters are expected to work Christmas and New Years and even though it sounds “minute in some point, they do create some stress because you do miss a lot of really great moments.”

Both Wood and Farr said they have experienced a situation in their work-place where a co-worker was not able to handle the pressure.

When asked if work caused any social or mental barriers for them, Wood and Farr were surprised to discover that their workplaces did, in fact, create certain barriers, some that aren’t always visible. Farr said after long shifts of dealing with customers she craves some alone time.

Farr said that managers can have an impact on encouraging a positive workspace. She believes a lot has to do with the manager looking at every level of the industry as an equal.

“It doesn’t matter what your title is or what your position is, everybody should work as a team and look at the

picture as a whole,” Farr said. “I feel like positive feedback and encouragement during and after a shift can make a big difference in stress levels.”

Bender used the effort-reward model as an example of how bosses can improve mental health. The model was developed by Johannes Siegrist, a medi-cal sociologist and professor.

“The effort-reward model which is high effort and low reward, will experi-ence strain. If you’re asking a lot from employees, you have to pay them prop-erly but you also have to show recogni-tion, appreciation, support, and all those kinds of things,” Bender said.

Wood said that Toronto Fire Services has made progress in the way it helps its employees. He said there has been a lot of education on mental health and implies that the stigma is being lifted.

“If someone at work is feeling that they need to share or talk about some-thing, we are all encouraged as crew members to listen. But, ultimately, if we need to use a phone number we can call and we are given immediate access to services,” Wood said.

“Increasingly the expectation for employees is that the employer should be providing resources. Being aware of job strain and stress exposure that are deleterious to our health, they should have resources available because they ought to know better,” Bender said. q

By Tara Fortune

“It doesn’t matter what your title is, or what your position is, everybody

should work as a team and look at the picture as a whole.”

pg 17

After talking the talk, Bell decided to walk the walk.

Bell launched the Let’s Talk campaign in 2010 in an effort to get the public talking about mental health.

Three years later, to get its employees talking, the company adopted the National Standard for Psychological Health and Safety in the Workplace.

The Standard is a federally funded, voluntary set of tools, resources and guide-lines for encouraging a psychologically safe and healthy workplace for employees.

Marie Josée Boivin, VP of human re-sources at Bell, said the Standard inspired Bell to improve its wellness practices, em-ployee assistance programs and accommo-dation services.

“We created a more in-depth manager training program to address common language, practical strategies and preven-tion,” she said.

Developed by the Canadian Standards Association and the Bureau de normalisa-tion du Quebec and championed by the Mental Health Commission of Canada, the Standard is the first of its kind in the world.

Sapna Mahajan, director of prevention and promotion initiatives at the Mental Health Commission of Canada, said after the launch of the Standard, many ques-tions arose.

“Who’s doing this? What’s the impact? What are some of the challenges?” she said. “We immediately knew if we were going to release such a pivotal document, that we’d have to do some research factor-ing in all the organizations with varying environments.”

To address this, the Mental Health Commission of Canada introduced a three-year research case study.

The goal of the case study is to track implementation of the Standard, as well as to answer the who, what, where and why with qualitative and quantitative research.

Merv Gilbert, one of six researchers on the case study and adjunct professor at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, BC, said they use what is called a “formative evaluation.”

“It’s the process of putting something in place, and asking questions like what helped it be successful, what does success look like, what kind of things get in the way of success,” he said. “As opposed to an outcome evaluation, which is essential-ly: did it work?”

The case study utilizes four assessment tools, the first being the organizational re-view. This is an organizational self-assess-ment, which basically tracks the organiza-tion’s procedures and policies in creating a mentally healthy workplace, establishing a “baseline.”

Mahajan said one of the biggest surpris-es was learning how much the organiza-tions were already implementing.

“Every single organization had quite a bit in place,” she said. “It was just how they communicated and positioned it with-in the organization.”

The next two tools include the imple-mentation questionnaire and implemen-tation interview. The tools explore the perceptions of and overall compliance to implementing the Standard, respectively.

The fourth assessment tool is called the psychological health and safety awareness survey for employees (PHASE) and it tracks the requisite knowledge and percep-tions employees have about psychological health and safety in the workplace.

This tool is encouraged but not manda-tory, because the commission has recog-

nized that many organizations already have their own employee or engagement surveys in place.

Mahajan said the case study tracks 13 workplace factors that affect psychological health and safety as outlined in the Stan-dard, which include civility and respect, recognition and reward, or the psychologi-cal demands of the job.

“It helps the organization specifically recognize where there needs to be im-provement,” she said. “OK, we’re weak here, let’s improve A, B, and C.”

Gilbert said all the data recorded was gathered into a feedback report, which was given to each organization at baseline and interim.

“One of the quantitative assessments was a self-assessment of the 13 factors, which was given to the organization in graph form to show how they are doing and how they are doing in comparison to the other organizations,” he said.

Mahajan said she initially only expected about 10 organizations to volunteer. But they ended up with 41.

“These are organizations demonstrat-ing leadership and commitment to a very important issue,” she said. “These are forward-thinking trailblazers.”

One such trailblazer is Bell. Boivin said utilizing the Standard and

participating in the case study has helped Bell be more accountable to its actions.

“When you’re so vocal about something externally, you’ve got to walk the walk internally,” she said. “It’s important to have a framework to map all your activities back to.”

Mahajan said she was surprised to learn that most organizations weren’t volunteer-ing to lower costs or liability, but to protect their employees’ psychological health.

The Standard and the case study

By Shelby Morton

“We’re really relying on people’s brains, minds and intellect. Employers are realizing that’s the asset, that’s the future and how they stay in competition.”

Infographics courtesy of the Mental Health Commission of Canada’s Early Findings

Interim Report. All information was compiled based off of 41 participating organizations.

Additional infographics can be found at affectmag.wix.com/

affectmag.

“Compared to 50 years ago, we’re really relying more on people’s brains, minds and intellect,” she said. “Employers are realizing that’s the asset, that’s the future and how they stay in competition.”

The Commission recently released an early findings interim report on the data collected and spotlighted some of the more successful organizations in the case study, one of which is Toronto East General Hospital (TEGH).

Christine Devine, wellness specialist at TEGH, said utilizing the Standard has given the hospital an opportunity to improve its own wellness program, which they launched in 2004.

“Back then, our trust scores were really low,” she said. “But slowly, with the framework of the Standard, our employee en-gagement scores have been on the ascent,” she said. “We are one of the top performing hospitals in terms of staff engagement.”

The case study was recommended to TEGH by Excellence Canada, from whom it (and Bell) received a mental health at work award for implementation of the Standard.

Devine, who is TEGH’s representative for the case study, said collaborating with the Mental Health Commission has been amenable.

“It’s an opportunity for the ultimate professionals to weigh in and guide us,” she said. “They understand that everyone has a starting point, and that it starts with the little things you can do to consider psychological health and safety.”

Boivin said being involved in the case study has been helpful with engaging, improving and promoting some of their initiatives.

“It creates a community of interest where we can push ideas and have an exchange and get different perspectives,” she said. “We’ve had other organizations approach us to better understand our practices—specifically our manager training program.”

“And it improves recruitment,” she said. “I’ve interviewed young people who’ve said they would be proud to work in an organization so involved with this issue.”

Mahajan said once a month every representative, or “cham-pion,” from an organization has access to an expert panel, including the commission and other organizations, to ask them anything.

Devine said collaborating with another representative Sandy Coughlin, director of occupational health and safety at Provi-dence Health Care in Vancouver, BC, was particularly inspiring.

“[Providence] has an excellent employee resource website, and we wanted to learn how to emulate that,” she said.

Boivin said she’s received letters from the Commission on the positive contribution her staff have made to the case study.

“It’s exciting to contribute to the documentation of something you believe in so deeply,” she said. “[The case study] provides the proper context and practical strategies most organizations don’t have access to.”

She said the Standard and the case study have inspired Bell to push itself further when it comes to promoting psychological health and safety.

“We’ve had a clear improvement in usage of EAP and double digit improvement in terms of short term disability cases related to mental health,” she said.

Mahajan said it’s not only important to track success, but to track barriers as well.

“We understand that different organizations have different realities and it’s not always going to be a seamless transition,” she said. “But we want to record all the barriers to ensure no other organizations face those same barriers.”

She said she hopes the case study will bring awareness to the Standard and its benefits.

“It’s going to drive uptake, staff engagement, retention, recruit-ment. It’s going to help organizations reach their bottom line, whether financial or other,” she said.

“But more importantly—it’s going to bring attention to an area that is highly stigmatized.” q

pg 19

The National Standard for Psychological Health and Safety in the Workplace and the Early Findings Interim Report can be

found atmentalhealthcommission.ca.

By Bria John

If you go to the Toyota manufacturing plant in Cambridge, Ont. at 8:15 in the morning you’ll be greeted to a cheery sight - employees on the manufacturing floor and in the office

stretch together to start the day.One leader stands in front with a headset and leads workers in simple stretches and activity.“The culture of work warm-up is aligned with our production environment. For the people

who are building cars all day they do focused exercises that help them limber up for the day. There’s a big focus on wellness at the organization,” Suzanne Baal, manager of communica-tions at Toyota said.

Now the organization includes the office workers in the morning routine. Research has shown that physical activity can positively affect mental well-being.The benefits are three-fold – biological, social and psychological.

- active -about it

let’s get

Fitness in the workplace improves physical and mental health

Photo credit: Bria John

“The releasing of endorphins is a biologi-cal mechanism. The social aspect is distrac-tion, so a lunchtime yoga session can distract from something that’s causing distress in the workplace. The increase in people’s self-con-fidence because of engaging in physical activity and feeling capable is the psycholog-ical aspect,” Dr. Kelly Arbour-Nicitopou-los, assistant professor at the University of Toronto said.

Toyota’s not the only company making fit-ness a priority; McMaster University started the MACtive program with their employees in 2007.

“We originally put the program in place to reduce chronic diseases related to physi-cal health. Mental health is in the forefront now,” said Deb Garland program manager of engagement and wellness at the Hamil-ton-based university.

For six weeks in the spring McMaster employees are encouraged to put on the pedometer and participate in all kinds of physical activity during their lunch break, like zumba classes, rock climbing and pulling a bus. And, the university offers walking clubs year-round.

“It’s a tool for teams to get together and make sure to have fun,” Garland said.

While McMaster has noticed a boost in morale, it hasn’t been able to gather the stats on employees’ mental health yet.

“As a non-profit, getting those numbers can be expensive but we are hoping to get some next year,” she said.

Toyota also doesn’t keep track of the num-bers but it addresses employee well-being through the lens of creating a good work-place community.

“What I do know is that [the warm-ups] can lead to a positive work environment. It’s something that people enjoy. When we stand up and do the warm-up together we also chat. There’s a social well-being element that happens naturally by standing up and rolling your wrists and looking out the window to-gether which contributes to team building,” Baal said.

The Cambridge plant includes an on-site gym and recreation rooms for house leagues that is staffed with trainers, physiotherapists and nurses and accessible to employees throughout the day.

“There’s a big focus on prevention rather than treatment with the hope that we can catch things early and help people learn ways to avoid strain or stress on their bod-ies,” Baal said.

Two of the major concerns with imple-menting physical activity in the workplace

are the loss in productivity and the cost to the employer.

“The dedicated time we spend doing the warm-up is five minutes, it’s not a huge in-vestment of time. I use five minutes of desk work but I may be more productive when I sit down,” Baal said.

‘There doesn’t necessarily have to be a huge cost. We know that physical activity is associated with less absenteeism because people have better health. So the money they’re going to invest is likely going to have a longer term effect on the staff,” said Ar-bour-Nicotopoulos.

According to Garland, 30 per cent of leaves at McMaster are mental health relat-ed.

“Personally, I enjoy working for a company that values wellness and invests in it. I really enjoy work warm-up in the morning. It’s also good business to invest in helping people stay healthy rather than treating people after they get sick,” Baal said.

Incorporating physical activity into the workplace doesn’t have to be an onerous thing. It’s a matter of changing the culture.

“Part of our wellness programming in-cludes healthy meetings; so taking meetings outside or having walking meetings instead of in the boardroom,” Garland said.

It can be as simple as getting up to talk to a colleague instead of sending an email or standing every once in a while.

Arbour-Nicitopoulos and University of Toronto colleague Dr. Guy Faulkner addressed workplace physical activity by creating an online platform that sends alerts through Outlook. Over 11 weeks participants wearing pedometers are given strategies on how they can increase their steps. They found that the number of steps increased by the end of the program.

“Increasing the amount of physical activity or reducing the amount of time sitting are both associated with positive mental health,” she said.

“Education and commitment on the employer’s part is big. An employee can be committed but if they feel like they’re not being encouraged by their employers, it’s kind of hard for them to deliver on that,” she said.

For example if an employee feels like they’re being watched and judged for walking to a colleague instead of sending an email, next time they might just send the email instead.

“But it’s a whole culture change and changing a culture can take a long time,” she said.q

pg 21

Lunch Break by Wesbs. Flickr Creative Commons

By Tara Fortune

Careers, deadlines, social-life; all of these need to be taken into consideration when you are studying at

a post-secondary institution. Managing time can be hard and stressful when there are so many things to fit into your schedule.

1 in 4 people attending post-secondary school have a mental illness according to the Yellow Umbrella Project, a campaign that brings awareness to post-secondary institu-tions. Svetlana Lilova, a counsellor at the Centennial Col-lege’s Story Arts Centre, said that mental illness can create problems for students.

“In addition to dealing with everyday life activities and functioning and school demands, the person will have an added issue to deal with. Whatever it is it, takes energy and time, so it’s like an added course, depending on the issue and depending on the person,” Lilova said.

Eleanor Page, a 20 year-old student studying psychology at Ryerson University, has had a mental illness since the age of 13 when she was diagnosed with a panic disorder. As she entered university she was diagnosed with depression. She said that so far depression has been her biggest obstacle in university.

“Depression has definitely affected my performance in school, and it has done so in many ways. For one thing, when I was at my worst, I was miserable, I had no energy, no motivation, no joy or interest in anything, not even in hobbies or socializing, let alone what I was studying in school. It was incredibly hard to get out of bed in the morn-ing; I had no desire to even be alive. I dealt with how bad I was feeling by drinking quite heavily and picking up other self-destructive behaviours. At the time relieved some of the pain, but never actually helped me get better. If anything, slowed my progress, and prevented me even further to focus on what I had to do for school. Depression often affects the ability to concentrate, and that definitely happened with me. I could not focus on anything even if I at the time had the motivation to get something done. Overall, what I was going through completely overwhelmed me as it does for many people who suffer from depression, which ultimately led me to put my studies on the back burner,” Page said.

Page handles stress by compartmentalizing tasks and organizing her time.

“It took me a long time to figure this out, that’s for sure. At first I drank and tried to avoid whatever stressors I

Artwork by Carolyn de Lang

could – that didn’t work well of course. For one thing, once I started taking care of myself and making sure I ate well, did not engage in as much self-destruction, and became just more compassionate towards myself, I noticed my stress levels related to school actually dropped. In order to have a healthy mind you must also listen to your body and give it what it needs,” Page said.

According to Lilova, Centennial College has various programs to help stress management such as: meditation drop-ins, yoga, faculty outreach, mental health week (in De-cember) and emotional intelligence workshops. Lilova said that if a student is struggling with mental illness then it is a good idea to disclose to their professor. They do not need to specify the disability, just the accommodations they need.

“We provide training for faculty on how to respond to students in distress, and how to refer them. There is suicide prevention, safe talk, responding to problematic behaviour in the classroom, and just various other trainings,” Lilova said.

Samantha Martino, a 20-year-old student studying creative industries at Ryerson University, was diagnosed with depression two years ago. She said that mental illness

impacts her studies greatly because it is hard for her to get motivated. When talking about graduation and transition-ing into the workplace, Martino said she is stressed about it.

“I’m stressed out a little about graduating from school for sure. But I try not to compare my situation to that of my peers. It’ll work out for me too but my process is just a little different due to my illness, and that’s okay,” Martino said.

Martino handles her stress through spending time with her dog. Dogs can be very useful to eliminate stress and relax.

Lilova said that it’s important for students to be mindful of their stress levels. Talking about it can be very helpful as can deep breathing.

“Eating well and sleeping are really important. We don’t sleep enough during these stressful periods of the semester,” Lilova said.

Martino said that there is one really important thing for all students to remember.

“Don’t get into a mindset of putting your academics ahead of your mental health. You really don’t have time for a huge breakdown in the middle of the semester, so stay on top of stress management and the rest will follow.” q

A balancing actthe student life

“In order to have a healthy mind you must also listen to your body

and give it what it needs”

Eleanor Page, 20, Ryerson student

pg 23

Affect’s Top 6 free mental health apps

online

Check out the page on our website and join the discussion. We’d love to hear your thoughts on mental health and what ‘s happening in your workplace to promote well-being.

Dudley Patrick is a Toronto-based R&B artist. He also has a history of mental illness. He shares his story of struggle and triumph as he sets up his

own record label. Dr. Becky Inkster and Dr. Akeem Sule are two

psychiatrists at Cambridge University in England. They founded Hip Hop Psych to combine their two

passions.What happens when psychology meets hip hop?

Watch our mini documentary online.

www.affectmag.wix.com/affectmag

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