According to figures from the health and safety service Arboned, more and more people are reporting sick at work again. Corona is rising again, and around this time the flu is more common. But more people are also calling in sick because of mental health problems: 10 percent more than before Corona, in 2019. This is now an additional problem due to all the staff shortages that are creating a domino effect in the workplace.

The increase in mental health problems is not new. The number of dropouts has been increasing for years. The research agency TNO, together with Statistics Netherlands, conducts an annual survey on working conditions and has seen an increase since 2014.

However, there is a small break in this trend. In 2020, during the Corona crisis, absenteeism fell slightly. “But now the numbers have gone up again. Mental health issues have been a major cause of absenteeism for years,” says TNO researcher Wendela Hooftman. Arboned, one of the largest occupational health and safety services in the Netherlands, also says the increase is in line with the increase that occupational health and safety services were already seeing before Corona.

This increase has several causes. According to a study by TNO (.pdf), the increase can mainly be explained by dissatisfaction with salary, longer work behind a screen and lack of autonomy at work. But a bad work-life balance is also playing an increasingly important role.

“We just drive a bit too fast together,” summarizes behavioral psychologist Chantal van der Leest. “The feeling of having to conform to a certain image is increasing. 18 percent of young people say they suffer from it.”

Domino effect

And then another new problem arises after the Corona crisis: staff shortages that increase the workload. Arboned doesn’t have any hard numbers to show that mental health issues are related to understaffing in the workplace, but HSE sees it play a role in practice.

It has a knock-on effect, says Redmer van Wijngaarden, director of medical affairs at Arboned. “People get overwhelmed faster because they have more on their plate. You have to do the same work with fewer people.” If they are absent again, the workload for the other employees increases even more.

Dropping out of studies due to psychological problems is even more serious than dropping out of studies due to flu or corona, for example. According to Arboned, people with a burnout are out of traffic for an average of 279 days. This is especially a problem for small businesses. Van Wijngaarden: “If four people work in a bakery and one of them quits, you have a quarter of your company in absentia.”

delay

To prevent such situations, employers really need to look out for signs of stress, says Van Wijngaarden. Contact with your employees is the most important thing. “Also make sure that people enjoy the work that gives them energy.”

It is also important to reduce the pressure to perform, says behavioral psychologist Chantal van der Leest. “This pressure is in our entire society, but making mistakes is part of it. Create an atmosphere in which not only overtime or successes are highlighted, but in which mistakes can also be learned from.”

And if necessary, do not try to completely fill the gaps that arise due to staff shortages or absences, because this in turn can lead to more work pressure. “Move things if you really have to,” says Arboned’s Van Wijngaarden. “The work that matters most, first.”