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Mental health, bullying and the construction Industry
The aim of this blog post is to start discussion about what others have experienced on their projects
“we don’t want them if they are too weak”
“he’s too weak to deal with the stress”
“would have probably been a sh*t Forman if he can’t handle the pressure”
“we don’t have room to carry weak people”
“He’s [the PM] not that bad, sure he’ll rip your head off and shout at you but he will forget the next day”
These are all phrases I have overheard and challenged in the last two weeks.
To set the context for this post there is a staffing shortage on my section of the project. This is true of both the engineering staff and foremen, with the project struggling to recruit and retain both.
Just over two weeks ago one of the sub-agents left work and has not returned since, I have been told unofficially that he has had a mental breakdown due to work related stress. Last week the stand in section foreman gave his morning brief to the other site foreman and then immediately drove home calling the team Agent to say he felt sick with stress. Yesterday morning the new foreman for my site quit having only started the day before, telling HR that having thought about it overnight he did not want to work in this environment as he had concerns for his mental health.
As I met and showed the new foreman around the site and the various elements of works ongoing he had expressed how surprised he was that the main contractor had not employed a foreman for the works associated with my bridge previously – he then witnessed the PM scream and shout at a section engineer for laying down steel in the wrong place, an honest mistake that took less than half an hour to rectify.
This got me thinking about my own experiences and what I am witnessing. Whilst I am used to operating in high stress environments (as we all are) when deployed on operations and on exercise on the face of it the construction industry (and my project) should not be inducing this level of stress in the team. No one is making life or death decisions and putting soldiers in harm’s way, there is no enemy, no one is throwing bricks or petrol bombs at us, you will not get blown up driving to site – so what’s going wrong?
Whilst researching this I have been shocked to learn that the reason the UK construction industry is ‘the UKs deadliest profession’ is not due to on site accidents but in fact due to the prevalence of suicide amongst construction workers “more than one construction worker every day [being lost] to suicide”, with 450 suicides amongst construction workers in 2016 alone (The Guardian, 2019) and 26% of the workforce considering suicide in 2019 (CIOB, 2020).
I have gone on to read that contributing factors include being away from home (weekly commuting), the physically demanding nature of being on site, financial pressures and job security. Many of these pressures exist in the military so what’s different?
I think there are two key factors. Firstly, and most obviously all service personnel are salaried and so job security is not a concern. Whilst there is a definite and enforced Chain of Command this enables unacceptable behaviour by superiors to be challenged without risk of losing your job. There is also a strictly enforced discipline process to correct behaviours and a complaints process open to all. I have read that 21% of construction workers experienced bulling in 2021 (HSM, 2021). In my opinion the PM for my section is a bully. He will forcefully bully those he is able to into agreeing with him, and is very derogatory towards those he does not agree with or respect. Most worryingly he received a company award at last month’s summer function for “the person who always delivers results”. Whilst he certainly delivers I wonder at what cost in the long term?
Secondly, there is a welfare support network available to every soldier. Firstly, through the chain of command, with Army wide policies on mental health and welfare as well as unit policies for management and implementation. Service personnel also have access to support independently through the welfare department within each unit in addition to a plethora of service charities. This is not the case for most construction workers with the CIOB finding that “56% of construction professionals work for organisations with no policies on mental health in the workplace” CIOB, 2020). I have not been able to find any policy produced by the contractor I’m attached to (and am yet to find anyone in the company who’s ever seen one for a contractor they have worked for in the past).
Feeling insecure or unable to raise concerns, and having nowhere to turn to when struggling to cope is seemingly proving to be a fatal combination for construction workers.
Is what I’m witnessing an exception or a sad industry norm? I am curious to know what other people are experiencing on site? Do your companies have policies on mental health? Are people you work with confident / feel secure enough to call out unacceptable behaviours?
References:
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/aug/13/why-do-so-many-construction-workers-kill-themselves
https://www.hsmsearch.com/Survey-reveals-impact-bullying-construction
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