Marshall Centre writes:
Head of Wellbeing, Jo Boyd, has developed a training course on resilience and delivered the first iteration to our team a few weeks ago as a trial. The session covered topics such as growth mindsets, dealing with failure and finding your purpose in life. Developing resilient teams who can stay calm under pressure, manage their stress levels, respond to feedback and embrace change is more important now than ever before.
Yesterday, one of our team member’s resilience was put to the test when she found out that she was scammed out of a large sum of money. She received an urgent message from what she thought was a member of the senior leadership team asking her to purchase gift cards from the supermarket. This did not seem too unusual as we sometimes give members of the team gift cards for long service awards. Before she left the supermarket, she received another message asking her to purchase a further £900 worth of gift cards and this started to ring alarm bells. She stalled, suspecting that there was something amiss, and returned to the office to seek advice.
She spoke to her line manager who called the senior member of staff who allegedly sent the instructions to buy the gift cards. The senior member of staff confirmed that it was unfortunately a scam. When the line manager broke the news, our colleague was devastated and experienced many emotions. She blamed herself for falling for the con, she was upset that she lost a considerable sum of money; she felt helpless and ashamed. In stressful moments like this, it is normal for our brains to revert to operating in the most primitive part, the amygdala, which is responsible for keeping us alive and the options this part of the brain gives us is limited to: fight, flight or freeze. Our colleague froze. She was overwhelmed with stress and did not know what to do. Her line manager stepped in and took control of the situation for her. The manager calmly explained to her colleague that she would have time to cry later, but if they wanted any chance of solving the problem and managing the crisis they needed to act quickly and calmly.
Together they made a series of phone calls to the police, bank, supermarket and gift card company. They spoke to many supportive and understanding people who helped them freeze the funds and prevent the scammers from accessing the money. With each phone call and small bit of progress, our colleague regained more power and confidence that she could bounce back from this awful situation. With support from her colleagues, she demonstrated incredible resilience and creative problem-solving skills.
At Marshall Centre, we are lucky to have 100% of the management team trained in Mental Health First Aid. It was a very stressful and upsetting situation for our colleague, but the team were prepared to offer the emotional support she needed to manage the situation and come to a positive resolution.
“It’s amazing to see how supportive my colleagues were as I was convinced I had lost a lot of money. There were so many emotions running through my head that it was so hard to function, but I am very lucky that my line manager’s quick thinking led me through the situation, and we were able to get the money back. It has given me a valuable lesson in resilience, perseverance, leadership and the importance of a good working environment. It was lucky that we had the resilience training with Jo a few weeks ago as this also helped me to get through a very stressful situation. It’s hard to tell someone not to panic but I recommend that if you are ever in a predicament, breathe, drink plenty of water and make a logical plan. Try not to allow your emotions to take over so that you can act quickly and, most importantly, communicate your feelings! I felt stupid, frustrated and angry but everyone around me supported me through it.”
We’re really proud of our team at Marshall Centre - well done everyone!
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