At times, it feels like we’re all drowning in some never-ending well – the next difficult client call, the next high-needs client, the next meeting or conversation about whatever emergency has erupted that day. But at least we have our newly announced Mindfulness Seminars to help staff deal with the stress of our job, right? Because it’s clearly not the fault of a system that does nothing but heap more work and responsibility on us while simultaneously slashing our pay, cutting positions and increasing stress. It must be that we’re all just too sensitive, that we all need to be more mindful and learn how to deal with our workload.

Every human service organisation trumpets the need to embrace trauma-informed practice (TIP), establishing the core components of safety, trustworthiness, choice, collaboration and power among the clients we serve. But nowhere does this rhetoric ever suggest that self-care includes ensuring the same kind of safety, trustworthiness and collaboration for the staff who provide care.

The organisations seem to be telling staff to deal with their stress via their obligatory seminar or training or retreat, with no acknowledgement that the source of workplace stress is seldom the individual employee. The focus remains on helping the individual be better at dealing with the work and their part in contributing to it; in other words, be more mindful, take more time and all will be okay – because trying to alter the tide of stress in the work environment is simply too much to tackle and fix. For Trauma informed practice training, visit tidaltraining.co.uk/mental-health-training-courses/trauma-informed-practice-training/

Let’s face it: bubble baths and meditation apps just aren’t going to get us over the hump when the true cause of our chronic pain and anxiety is organisational dysfunction. Organisational safety shouldn’t mean whether there are foosball tables and cereal bars in the break room; it should mean whether leaders are responsive, available and transparent to the organisational needs and whether the employees feel heard.

This isn’t about providing a warm and fuzzy workspace that feeds our need for playtime and free snacks but, rather, creating an open and honest communication system that sees us as whole people instead of as just a couple of able hands to do the dirty work we signed up for.

So it’s time for our leaders to swallow their own medicine and start making organisational changes that reflect the values that we work so hard to instill in ourselves and our clients. We can’t take one more ‘be more mindful’ seminar or one more recommendation to take a few more moments to breathe and centre ourselves while the root of the work environment dysfunction sits untended.