Newsletter #17 – November 2023

Are you a manager in a UK organisation (business, public, voluntary sector all welcome)? We are looking to recruit around 25 managers to speak with us for 45 mins to 1hr in Nov / Dec / Jan about their decision-making around workplace wellbeing. In honour of each participating manager’s time contribution we will give £20 in shopping vouchers to The Feed – an organisation working to abolish food poverty in local communities.

This research is phase 2 of a project we publicised late 2022. Please consider being involved – people usually enjoy the reflection involved in research interviews and each contribution helps us keep improving the insight we send out on this Evolve newsletter and in our workshops.

Email back to workplace.wellbeing@uea.ac.uk if you are interested in being involved, or read more here:

https://evolveworkplacewellbeing.org/how-far-do-you-want-to-go-with-workplace-wellbeing-call-for-interviewees-2/

Dr Mark Bryan from the University of Sheffield joins us to explain what UBI is, who is thinking about it and the potential implications for organisations, managers and HR leads. Looking to the future is a key part of keeping on top of wellbeing trends, so check it out!

Available on all good podcast directories, and also via direct link:

https://evolveworkplacewellbeing.buzzsprout.com/2109567/13749534-universal-basic-income-what-implications-for-the-future-of-work

Team members Profs Olga Tregaskis and Alita Nandi have a new open access paper out on job-related training. Their findings indicate that job-related training (including health and safety training) offers a significant pathway to improved life satisfaction for groups that are already disadvantaged, namely those living in deprived areas of England, those with low qualification levels and the unemployed. However, men and white majority continue to gain most from job-related training, suggesting there are continuing barriers for women and people from ethnic minority groups. Read more here:

Training and life satisfaction: a disrupted pathway to better work – Olga Tregaskis, Alita Nandi, 2023 (sagepub.com)

Profs Sara Connolly and Kevin Daniels from the UEA team and Chris van Stolk from RAND Europe (plus several of our colleagues from the ProPEL Hub) are part of a network led by Prof Adam Whitworth (Strathclyde) entitled ‘WHERC: Building towards a vision of Work-Health Expert Research Collaboration’ that has received funding from National Institute of Health Research. Look out for more on where this research takes us, in future newsletters.

View our short videos on:

1) What the Evolve Workplace Wellbeing toolkit is and

2) What is in the toolkit

3) How to use the toolkit in practice.

https://evolveworkplacewellbeing.org/toolkit/

Join our free Evolve Workplace Wellbeing Online Network for:

·       Quarterly online research insight and discussion sessions

·       Monthly office hours on any workplace wellbeing

https://evolveworkplacewellbeing.org/the-evolve-workplace-wellbeing-network/

·         14^th November 2023, 2pm – Online – Evolve Workplace Wellbeing Network Insight and discussion session. New research: Is there a motherhood gap in Job Quality in the UK. Open to Network members only. Sign up to the network here.

·         22^nd November 2023 – Online – Skilled Managers – Conflict, Challenge and Opportunity Tickets, Wed 22 Nov 2023 at 12:00 | Eventbrite

·         23^rd November 2023 – University of Strathclyde, Glasgow. Workplace Equality, Diversity & Inclusion and The Role of Flexible Working Tickets, Thu 23 Nov 2023 at 10:30 | Eventbrite

·         13^th December 2023 – Norwich – In collaboration with Voluntary Norfolk, open to VCS organisations: Evolve Workplace Wellbeing Network – Session 2 Tickets, Wed 13 Dec 2023 at 15:00 | Eventbrite

In this section we compile other evidence-informed links to pieces on workplace wellbeing that we have found interesting. The following are not produced by the Evolve Workplace Wellbeing team.

·         Stress at work – Stress Talking Toolkits (hse.gov.uk)

·         What happens at work does not always stay at work: Daily job crafting and detachment among colleagues – Sanz‐Vergel – Applied Psychology – Wiley Online Library