© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina Well-being through work

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina Managing Critical Transitions Fluently at Workplaces AEDUCA, Olomouc 12 Sept 2011 Tiina Saarelma-Thiel Head of Training and Development, Organizational Psychologist

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina Introduction Because the population is ageing has the prolonging of work career become one of the crucial questions of welfare state and sustainable national economy in Finland as well as in Europe. At work places we can influence with several activities on young people's settling into work life, middle-aged employees unbroken work career and, aged employees' possibilities and willingness to continue to work. In this presentation I provide a model how to manage the typical critical transitions which appear during life course at work places.

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina Transitions affect everyone during life course During the life course one meets several transitions which belong to different phases of life. Transitions affect everyone regardless of one's age. They are not directly combined to age, although many of them spring up in the same order and in a certain age group. Transitions appear both at individual and organizational level. Typically transitions accumulate. Individuals can be absorbed into the cycle of success or failure.

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina Role changes In sociology transition means a change in your role in studies, human relations or work life. Typical role changes are e.g. the shift from student to employee, parenthood, divorce, becoming a manager, ending up being unemployed, getting a new job again, from healthy to disability, exit from labour market, and even return from retirement back to work.

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina Structure of life or psychosocial development In psychology transition means (a) to think over one's own structure of life and how to change it (Daniel Levinson) or (b) as articulated by Erik H. Erikson who explains eight stages through which a healthily developing human should pass from infancy to late adulthood.

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina How to make critical transitions fluent? I would like to introduce a model of how to connect critical transitions with good managerial practices at workplaces as a part of good personnel policy and age management.

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina What should be done at workplaces? First, we should recognize typical and critical transitions which affect the employee, work community or organization. Second, we should anticipate their impact on health and well-being. Third, we should build-up managerial practices to enable smooth shift from one transition to another. We should consider the whole work life course and develop good managerial practices to enable fluent transitions from the first workplace until retirement.

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina Typical transitions and managerial practices to support them Typical transitions from individual side are: (1) How to settle into work life (2) how to manage a promotion or changes in duties (3) how to manage the shift in own work ability (4) what to do if your career is in cross roads (5) how to exit from labour market in a smooth way. The measures from company side could be following: (1) Successful recruiting (2) career planning and mentoring (3) return-to-work practices (4) change management and personnel development, and (5) good retirement policy.

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina A Model for connecting transition clusters with good managerial practices during work life course. (Tiina Saarelma-Thiel 2007,2009, 2011)

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina (1) Settling into work life The aim is to help young people to settle into work life and shift from student to employee. The managerial practice can be called successful recruiting, and it can include following measures: (a) creating contacts to educational institutions to recruit students. (b) offering practical training, summer jobs or apprenticeship. (c) enabling to combine university studies and working periods. (d) giving introduction and occupational guidance at the beginning of the work career to enable the socialization process of the newcomer. (e) building-up junior/senior pairs. (f) learning how to act in work life. (g) pre-employment examination by occupational health service to exclude potential health problems connected to certain job.

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina (2) Managing a promotion from worker to foreman. The aim is to support and train young, new managers to jump into a new role or when an employee gets significant changes in his/her duties. The managerial practices are planning one's career for whole life course so that it utilizes both the individual and the organization. It includes manager’s training into the new role by giving leadership coaching or mentoring. The employee needs occupational guidance for new duties. All age groups need lifelong competence development during work career.

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina (3) Managing a shift in work ability from healthy to disabled. The aim is to help the employee to return quickly back to work and labour market after a long absence e.g. sick leave period or severe accident. Early support and return-to-work practices for managers can be used. They include e.g. modification of one’s job description, relocation, training for new tasks, flexibility in working hours e.g. part-time-job, negotiation of work ability with occupational health service, occupational rehabilitation and substitute arrangements.

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina (4) Career in cross-roads The aim is to support the employee when he/she faces threats of unemployment, is loosing a job or wants to rebuild him-/herself. Often people also want to voluntarily change into a new job. The managerial practices are (a) good change management e.g. enhancing participation in change management process, supporting well-being in organizational transitions, organizing training programs to cope with changes and, (b) personnel development e.g. to look for new career possibilities or to support becoming employed.

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina (5) Exiting labour market smoothly. The aim is to support the employee to exit from labour market in a smooth way and in a right time. The retiring process has three phases: thinking about retirement often 10 years beforehand, making the decision to retire and, finally timetabling the retirement. The right timing is important both for the individual and organization and therefore we need a personal exit plan. The managerial practices are to create a good retirement policy and give support for longer work life. continues…

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina These measures could be (a) to help to create a personal exit plan long beforehand (b) to do long-term successor plans – e.g. how to share "tacit knowledge" or to share one's experience even when he/she is already retired. (c) to provide Age Management Programs (d) to arrange flexible work for older workers for recovering e.g. flexibility in working hours or day offs. (e) pre-retirement training prepares toward good and healthy third and fourth age and gives facts about one's pension and how to break-out of working life. (f) to maintain a “senior bank” of retired personnel who are still willing to work periodically.

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina Conclusions This created model gives a new perspective to personnel policy, personnel risk management and age management. It covers the whole work life course, contains the potential critical phases that affect the personnel and, offers managerial solutions to them. It offers a framework applicable at company level. Transition manager training is one way to implement the mental structure into the organizations.

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina Literatura SAARELMA-THIEL, T. Eteenpäin kriisistä. (Onwards from Crisis) Työterveyslaitos, Helsinki Written in finnish. SAARELMA-THIEL, T. A Model for Connecting Critical Transitions with Good Managerial Practices. 14th European Congress of Work and Organizational Psychology, Santiago de Compostela, May 13-16, 2009

© Finnish Institute of Occupational Health – Saarelma-Thiel Tiina Thank You! 19