Client: Administrator referred by employer (patent attorney firm)
Location: South East (with head office in London)
Case Overview:
The employee was struggling to meet the demands of their role, administrator for a legal firm specializing in patent law, in a demanding role requiring high attention to detail. The employee worked from home with two days in the office each week. The employee struggled with anxiety and depression, as well as challenges with communication, concentration and focus resulting in an increase in intermittent absences. The employer reported an increase in errors in the employee’s work. The company had taken steps to reduce their workload and increasingly checked their work but approached us for suggestions on how to better support them.
Intervention:
Our occupational psychologist provided an initial vocational rehabilitation assessment, and from this created a wellness action plan that could be shared with their manager and HR to help the employee manage their wellbeing, highlight potential warning signs of future setbacks and identify support structures, in order to boost productivity. Our occupational psychologist also worked with the employee to develop strategies to manage their wellbeing outside of work, together they specifically focused on finding ways to maintain a healthy lifestyle and making time for hobbies. Using the initial assessment, we made a number of additional recommendations to further support them. The employee struggled with typing and literacy so assistive reading and voice recognition software was suggested to help reduce the number of errors made. To help manage the employee’s focus, noise canceling headphones were suggested. Other recommendations included strategies for managing the employees notes and how best to set clear deadlines and tasks in manageable chunks to help aid the employee’s organizational skills. Suggestions were made to the employer on how to efficiently communicate needs to the employee in a visual way to support their learning style. Following this, we held regular check in meetings every two weeks, then reduced to once a month.
Outcome:
This resulted in the employee reporting increased wellbeing, and we received extremely positive feedback from HR who reported reduced absence levels, and a reduction in errors in the employee’s work. Furthermore, the report, recommendations, and ongoing guidance, enabled the employee and line manager to develop more effective strategies for communication, as well as successfully delivering tools to find effective ways of boosting and maintaining productivity.