Your Work and Your Health

Work-related stress - an overview

• Stress is the largest cause of work-related illness people suffer in the workplace;
• Half a million people in the UK experience work-related stress, accounting for 12.8 million working days lost each year (estimated in 2003/4). This is an average of 29.2 lost working days for each case;
• This costs society about £3.7 billion every year;
• The most likely causes of workplace stress are poor organisation and management of people;
• Stress in the workplace can affect the employer and employee;
• It is up to the employers and employees to work together to avoid the development of stress rather than dealing with the problem once it has occurred.

The Health and Safety Executive is working with businesses to enable them to manage work related stress more effectively. HSE's key messages on stress are:

• work-related stress is a serious problem; tackling it effectively can result in significant benefits for organisations
  
  
• there are practical things organisations can do to prevent and control work-related stress


• stress is a management issue which you as a manager can help resolve.