Reducing excessive workloads is one of Cardiff UCU’s priorities. The Workload Working Group meets regularly and is led by Martin Weinel. Email rcampbell@ucu.org.uk to find out more about how you can get involved.
Work-related stress and workload
We know that work-related stress is one of the biggest issues faced by workers at the moment, and that mental ill-health is disproportionately suffered by workers in the education sector. In Higher Education, staff are working an average of two unpaid days per week. This represents a significant health and safety hazard in the workplace, as stress can have major impacts on physical and mental health. Read our leaflet with more info: click here to download in English; click here to download in Welsh.
Watch a seminar about institutional ‘time theft’ here.
Health and Safety inspections for work-related stress
In Feb-March 2024, UCU Workload Reps carried out a H&S inspection focused on work-related stress in the School of Law and Politics. This is intended to be the first of our department H&S inspections on this issue, and if you can help us do an inspection in your school or department, please get in touch: rcampbell@ucu.org.uk.
Results
Staff reported a worrying array of negative impacts on their health (mental and physical); work life and personal life such as depression, panic attacks, exhaustion, insomnia; severe physical health responses; reduced productivity, motivation and enthusiasm; irritability at home and lack of time to take care of own wellbeing.
The results from the HSE Stress Indicator questions are reproduced below, and show that “urgent action is needed” across 6 of the 7 Management Standard areas.
| HSE stress management standard | HSE indicator response |
| Demands | Urgent action needed |
| Control | Urgent action needed |
| Managers’ Support | Urgent action needed |
| Peer Support | Urgent action needed |
| Relationships | Good, but need for improvement |
| Role | Urgent action needed |
| Change | Urgent action needed |
The quantitative results from the survey were reinforced by recurring themes in staff interviews, discussed in more detail in the report. Other issues that came up were potential EDI concerns around work-related stress and workload, and a feeling from many staff that they could not take time off or raise their issues more formally due to perceived negative consequences for themselves and their colleagues.
University response
Disappointingly, the university’s response to the report has been to minimise the findings rather than understand them and work to address them, despite a report from LAWPL itself that describes staff as ‘at breaking point’. Their legal responsibilities as an employer involve preventing stressors, whereas their response is framed around management of stress once it has already occurred.
We are very concerned that if the university does not act, we will see further deteriorations in staff wellbeing. The university has already experienced the worst possible outcome of work-related stress, and it should be doing everything in its power to tackle the key drivers of stress such as unmanageable workloads.
Summary of the data:
We held in-depth interviews with 11 members of staff (both academic and professional services) on their experiences of work-related stress, and we received 33 responses to the HSE Stress Indicator survey. Combined, this gave us a suitable depth and breadth of evidence on which to base our findings.
We also analysed other sources of data and information, such as the local WAM data, Staff Survey 2023 responses and sickness absence and occupational health referral data, and conducted a ‘Red-Amber-Green’ analysis of the university-level policies and procedures that are supposed to form the employer’s preventative measures for work-related Health, Safety and Wellbeing risks and hazards.