Canadian researchers hope results from a new survey will help inspire employer and government efforts to better support workers facing COVID-19 and related work-life challenges. 
 
Work-life balance is a self-defined state of well-being that allows individuals to manage multiple roles at work, home and in the community. Based on a growing body of research and the experiences of working people, achieving this state of well-being is a challenge for many and beyond the reach of some.
 
While this challenge confronted workers before the pandemic, the current COVID-19 crisis has resulted in unprecedented new demands on time and emotions for workers as they deal with changes in their employment situations, including working from home or providing essential services. Couple this with the need for many to juggle expanded care responsibilities for children and/or elderly parents and work-life balance may be jeopardized all the more. These issues we have heard anecdotally, but how wide-spread is the problem? And what precisely is its impact?
 
Globally respected work-life balance researcher, Dr. Linda Duxbury, professor, Sprott School of Business, Carleton University, is looking for answers to these questions. She and research partners want to better understand how COVID-related challenges are affecting workers and their families. They want to know what specific issues are keeping them up at night, how this is impacting their mental health and how they are coping.
 
To help find answers, they hope you will complete this survey and share your experiences. They are also asking you to consider assisting them with wider distribution by forwarding this request through your social media channels. Participation in the survey is voluntary, anonymous and confidential and will take approximately 20 minutes. 
 
Researchers findings will aim to help inform effective workplace and regulatory responses to address worker COVID-related struggles to achieve critical work-life balance.
 
The survey will be available until Monday, December 21, 2020. Complete this survey online:
 
English survey
French survey

WHSC …here to help now

The COVID-19 crisis presented an unprecedented challenge in terms of providing access to Workers Health & Safety Centre (WHSC) essential and mandatory training programs. In response, we created virtual classroom training that ensures the integrity of the learning process and safety of participants and instructors. The vast majority of training participants report the WHSC virtual classroom experience as “excellent,” enabling them to achieve clarity of communication, participation in the class and group sessions and demonstrated knowledge of learning objectives.

Many of our training programs help employers meet training and competency requirements for supervisors, joint health and safety committees and worker health and safety representatives, all of whom play essential roles in the pursuit of healthier, safer workplaces, including controlling COVID-19 transmission in the workplace. Many of these training essentials, including our revised COVID-19 training program, are currently scheduled in our virtual classroom.

Beyond scheduled classes, and where participant numbers warrant, we can work with you to coordinate almost any of our training courses in a virtual classroom for all workers, workplace representatives and supervisors.

Need more information still?
Contact a WHSC training services representative near you.
Email: contactus@whsc.on.ca
Call: 1-800-869-7950
Visit: www.whsc.on.ca
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Additional related resources:
COVID 19 impact study. More researchers want to hear from workers
National workplace violence and harassment survey recently launched
COVID precautions protect workers’ physical and mental health, study
COVID-19 rates higher among racialized and low wage workers
WHSC COVID-19-Resources