Head of HR, Tracey Winson, has worked for Agrovista for more than 10 years. As the country recognises Mental Health Awareness Week (May 18-24), Tracey explains why there couldn’t be a better time to launch new internal initiative, Wellbeing at Agrovista.
19/05/2020
Tracey Winson, Head of HR
“When you think about the term ‘wellbeing’, it can mean so many different things to different people. Perhaps it’s physical fitness and wellness, or maybe it’s safeguarding and protecting each other from harm. However you view it, ensuring the wellbeing of both ourselves and others should be of paramount importance.
Not so long ago, the concept of mental health and its wellness was almost a taboo subject. It wasn’t recognised. Whether that’s because as a nation we’ve historically had a stiff upper lip, or whether it’s simply because we didn’t recognise that it was a ‘thing’. And that couldn’t have been more the case in our industry – farming.
Fast forward to today and we’re thankfully in a different place, albeit, still with a long way to go. The barriers to talking and sharing our experiences no longer seem so high and almost everyone knows of someone who has struggled with their mental health.
Wellbeing at Agrovista
From an Agrovista stand-point, we’ve been discussing mental health behind the scenes for some time. We just wanted to make sure that whatever we put into place had meaning, would last and was accessible to all. The result of that is Wellbeing at Agrovista.
This is an all-encompassing term for any aspect of wellbeing in the workplace, to recognise that we are all individuals with our own unique problems and stresses. We want to provide the tools employees need to access the right support and information quickly.
Mental Health Awareness Week
We’ve chosen to launch Wellbeing at Agrovista to coincide with Mental Health Awareness Week as a starting point, focusing on this one aspect of human wellness. Although mental ill health can indeed have a negative impact on business productivity, it’s much more than that. This is our opportunity to support employees and invest in them as individuals.
Join us throughout the week as we share resources, stories and open up conversations within the wider Agrovista family. We’re also hoping to recruit colleagues to sign up to become volunteer Mental Health First Aiders.
All encompassing health and wellbeing
But, perhaps you won’t feel the need to access support for mental health, instead you work in a role that impacts your physical fitness or ability to handle stress. We’re planning to address this through focus weeks throughout the year where we explore other contributory factors associated with health and wellbeing.
Times are changing, especially with the ongoing threat of COVID-19. That’s why it couldn’t be more important to launch Wellbeing at Agrovista, even if it means for the time-being, it’s support through the constraints of social distancing.”