Work and wellbeing in the midst of a pandemic - a blog series

Sustainability is all about balancing social, economic and environmental needs, and as sustainability professionals this is an ethos that usually permeates our home lives as well as professional. It is an increasingly mainstreamed way of thinking – which is good, because as well as being the best way to bring about the change in behaviour our planet needs, it also means us crusaders get to stop being  ‘the friend that will always glare at you for using an unnecessary straw’ in the pub or the colleague that will helpfully remind you about the SDGs at any given opportunity.

Over the last couple of decades, sustainability in HE and FE has seen a shift, from a primarily environment focus, to a wider understanding of the need for progression in all areas of sustainability. A particularly big change of focus in the last decade has been mental health and well-being, its importance, and how to have a good work (or study)/life balance.

Most of us had this pretty well sussed (with obvious room for continuous improvement) until the pandemic hit. COVID-19 is a devastating virus – with a scale of fatalities not seen for a century outside of war. It has long lasting implications for humanity, but it also has immediate implications under lockdown. How do we maintain our work/life balance during this time while continuing to ensure our own and our families well-being?

We are delving into the lives of members to find out how they manage just this! What challenges have they experienced? What positives have they found? We will share these weekly.

To kick start this – we offer up our own experiences at EAUC. We hope this is useful, and perhaps you find some things you relate to in amongst our experiences. We all have different home lives and slightly different jobs, so it has certainly been interesting to read these from our side!