How are you all doing?

It's definitely been quite a difficult couple of years. In the first lockdown, my mum was diagnosed with ovarian cancer. We knew it was ultimately going to be terminal from an early stage, and I made the 'interesting' decision to change jobs earlier this year, knowing that time was running out. I took a month off to spend with her between jobs and (obviously) had Covid for two weeks of that precious time. She went into a hospice just before I started in my new role, and died a week later.

The new job has significant legacy issues to resolve, no history of HR whatsoever, and a team that have been really personally affected by the issues of the last 2 years. Equally, the challenge is good, the perspective that my own bereavement has given me is probably quite healthy, and I'm making progress. Importantly, the people I'm working with are caring and supportive, and that makes the world of difference. And on the mental health side, I'm training for the London marathon in October, in support of the hospice who cared for my mum. I'm not one of those people who gets massive endorphins from running, but the time and space it gives me is healthy, I think.

And this community is something I always come back to - it's such a help to share and discuss the issues that affect us all. Thanks to everyone who does so: I really appreciate it.

I think exhausted about sums it up. Same as everyone else. It's relentless and I don't feel like I've stopped despite having jut come back after a week off. COVID was challenging, but this is something else entirely now. I've had to fight my organisation to allow me to bring a HR Assistant on board and I'm now having to fight to get that role made permanent despite all the evidence showing that the department works much better already with two of us than just me on my own. I actively told our new MD yesterday that I wouldn't be cancelling my week off at the end of month as I'm close to burning out and need the break.

Good for you taking that well-earned time off Gemma.

Thank you for being such a valuable community member, Nina.

Thanks Johanna, I realised I had to as I could feel my patience making a speedy get away when I had to explain 3 times to an employee why I couldn't send their colleague home just because they had a sore throat and force them to spend their own money on a COVID test. I'm sure my facial expressions are mirroring my mood and lack of patience at the moment.

I think there are lots of us feeling a similar way- and I can fully empathise with Emma, having been given (constructive) feedback about my "readable" face! (There go my plans for an alternative career as a crack poker player.....)
Like everyone else I am tired! Like many others I have worked longer hours whilst WFH and carried forward 15 days holiday for the past 2 years. For whatever reason (Covid, lockdown, cost of living, heat) people in general are getting more needy and generally anxious and I guess many of us feel guilty at not being able to make life better for them. I enjoy my job - I like the different component parts and the challenges and the people I work with - but more and more I wonder if this level of work is really sustainable or what I want to do. I have a good supportive manager but he can't always shield his team from the increasing demands made on us, both by external forces and constant internal changes. I think "flat" describes it well - not depressed or miserable or even unhappy - just "getting on with it"

This thread has really impacted me. Thanks to everyone who has shared their thoughts so far.

So pleased we have this space where people feel they can open up to their peers. We've been talking about this within CIPD, too. We're listening and very mindful of the 'pulse' of the profession.

Colleagues here tell me that this broad sentiment on the wellbeing of the profession is reflected elsewhere.

I think the last few years have been a steep learning curve - literally, given I used the month I was on furlough leave to complete 70% of my Level 5 assignments! There was a lot of pressure throughout the pandemic to give the right answers, immediately, but with no more information than our employees had.

My company has been extremely supportive of me, and therefore I have been able to be supportive of our employees. We’re a small family-run company, and despite our largest ever turnover of staff (generally overwhelmingly positive reasons for leaving), we’ve maintained our caring culture and have employed some fabulous new people despite the pressures of the recruitment market at the moment.

I would agree that it seems some of our people feel more fragile, nervous, anxious and in need of support - which is tiring for all concerned. I do feel like we reach a point where we have been as supportive as is possible, but the infrastructure around mental health in the community is fairly broken, and therefore further external support is difficult for our employees to access.

One of our current issues is the wider societal conversation about WFH. Reading the millions of articles on it makes it feel that working from home is now a basic human right, no matter your role - but half of our employees are customer-facing and therefore don’t have the option of working from home. So that is a point of tension, which can sometimes make for difficult conversations.

Thanks for the thread Steve - it’s always nice to be asked “how’s things?”! Perhaps some of us feel like we’ve stopped asking our colleagues the same question, for fear of the answer…?

Tired