Ten months into the pandemic, the virus that causes Covid-19 remains out of control. A stubborn recession, the urgent need for racial justice, and now threats of political violence in every state are increasing the collective sense of anxiety. For nonprofit workers who help others deal with these challenges, the risk of burnout is severe.
“Not only are we dealing with all the trauma of supporting people, we’re also navigating our own families and our own distress,” says Yolo Robinson, CEO of the Black Emotional and Mental Health Collective.
If employees are “overworked, overtaxed, overstressed, underpaid, then you’re actually creating harm in the community.”
The challenge for nonprofit leaders is to help their employees through these anxious days. To learn more, the Chronicle sought out Robinson and one of his colleagues at BEAM to learn how they are applying their professional expertise in mental-health counseling to their own organization.
Perhaps most important for managers is to acknowledge emotions so employees will feel they have permission to express their concerns, says Dionne Bates, senior mental-health adviser at BEAM and a licensed counselor. She acknowledges that experiencing sadness, anger, or anxiety can be difficult; many people try to detach from their feelings as a defense mechanism when they witness or experience suffering.
“Your staff may have developed coping strategies to present to you as ‘fine’ when they’re under duress.” Don’t believe that your staff is not being affected. “Your staff are being impacted,” Robinson says. People may respond to stress by overworking or underworking, he explains. Even if you don’t notice any changes in employee productivity, don’t assume everything is OK, he says.
One of the best ways for a manager to help employees, Bates says, is to simply ask: How can I support you in this moment? This gives staff members control and allows them to decide what, if anything, they want to share.
Managers may not be able to fix things for their employees, Bates adds, and that may make them uncomfortable, but “it may be enough for you to just be with them while they are trying to fix it,” she advises.
The economic, racial-justice, and health crises can be an opportunity for nonprofit leaders to reimagine work and productivity, Robinson says. It can be easy to forget that people who work at nonprofits are also part of their communities, he adds, and if employees are “overworked, overtaxed, overstressed, underpaid, then you’re actually creating harm in the community,” he cautions.
Here are ways that nonprofit managers and leaders can protect and promote the mental and emotional health of their employees without spending a lot of money.
Revisit projects, outlines, and objectives for the year. Ask what is realistic now. What can happen in the time frame that you’ve set for your projects? Expecting projects to be implemented according to pre-Covid time frames is probably not realistic, Robinson says. Consider how to restructure the way you’re doing work these days to make sure staff members can stay well so you don’t cause additional distress.
Create new ways to offer support. “I’ve seen some organizations do some really beautiful and supportive things,” Robinson notes, such as sending self-care kits to staff members or offering a cash bonus. He acknowledges that cash-strapped organizations may not be able to afford such luxuries, but because many people are experiencing unprecedented challenges or crises, offer what you can to help, he advises. For example, BEAM instituted half-day Fridays in the spring “because we realized that in this particular moment, this is not business as usual,” Robinson says. Since then, he reports no decrease in productivity and mentions that studies have shown four-day workweeks are effective at increasing productivity in certain industries.
You don’t have to spend a lot of money. Consider activities people can do together to reduce stress. BEAM has been invited to many organizations to do things like guided meditation or other activities to help workers decompress, says Robinson. However, don’t assign a group activity without seeking input from your staff, he advises. “Find out what they are interested in doing because if you do something nobody wants to do, it’s just more stress,” he says.
Check your own stress level. As nonprofit leaders, we often wonder if we should be doing more, especially in a crisis, says Robinson. These thoughts are driven by anxiety, he explains. So he tries to be mindful that “I’m still setting reasonable expectations, still doing solid work but not creating more distress — from my own distress about the distress,” he says with a laugh.
Make sure you are making sound decisions and not pushing employees beyond the brink in the midst of a very challenging time, he says, adding: “It’s important to have board members or employees who can tell you: This seems like a bit much for right now. This seems a little excessive.”
Be creative and deliberate about building community: “Have regular [virtual] meetings with people you care about” to keep stress at bay and to maintain perspective, Bates advises.
Schedule check-ins with your staff members. Pay attention to subtle shifts in workers’ behavior because stress and anxiety can show up in a variety of ways, Robinson says. Changes in a person’s behavior, such as acting more aggressive in meetings or an inability to meet deadlines, could be a sign the person is struggling. Scheduled check-ins can make it easier to bring up these kinds of changes, he says, especially when people are unaware they are acting different. BEAM created a tool to help make difficult conversations easier and to keep them productive and positive.
Be transparent with staff members about the organization’s finances. “We present our budget to our staff so they know what’s going on,” Robinson says, because he worked at too many organizations “where nobody seemed to know what the budget looked like.” Being honest and realistic with your staff can alleviate their anxiety — or give people a fair chance to prepare for their future elsewhere if they may be let go, he says. Plus, sharing information on the organization’s financial health builds trust and connection among employees.
Assess and improve organizational wellness. “There are toxic work environments, tense work environments, and [often] people don’t feel comfortable disclosing what they’re experiencing” when they are having trouble coping, Robinson says.
The current crises may offer an opportunity to assess the health and wellness of your staff and your organization’s culture, he says. Such assessments should start, Robinson says, with leaders asking questions such as: What kinds of systems, practices, and policies do we need to put in place to help us bolster, support, and sustain the staff? What would that look like?
BEAM helps groups anonymously survey staff and then create a plan for training or capacity building to address deficiencies. Assessments often reveal a need for training in communications or emotional intelligence, for example, he says. But fixing a problem is not a one-time event, he cautions. Real change requires at least six months of effort, but it can often improve a nonprofit’s long-term sustainability.
BEAM shares the Black Virtual Wellness Directory of wellness professionals and offers toolkits and resources for individuals and virtual training for communities fighting for social justice. If your organization can’t afford to bring somebody in to support this work, seek out resources and tools online, he says.
“Our organizations are needed so much right now, but we’re needed to show up in a way that we can actually be useful. If we’re burned out, if we’re underpaid, if we’re buried in microaggressions and other kinds of unnamed harm, then we’re not effective to so many people who need us in this Covid-19 crisis.
