The Benefits of Mindfulness in the Workplace

What Does a Spiritual Practice Have to do with Workplace Safety?

By Shahbano Aliani & Uzma Ahmed Khan

Mindfulness is understood to be a mental state achieved by bringing one’s awareness to the present moment, while calmly acknowledging and accepting one’s feelings, thoughts, and bodily sensations. The practice of mindfulness is associated with many benefits, including peace of mind, mental clarity, increased creativity, and improved health and relationships.

In the recent past it may have been considered a ‘New Age’ fascination. However, increasing research on and awareness about the mind/body connection and its direct impact on many aspects of human wellbeing and behaviour has resulted in a growing interest in the benefits of mindfulness in the workplace.

And that makes sense, doesn’t it?

The workplace is where we spend a major chunk of the day and being more aware and mindful in the way we spend this time – be it working on tasks or interacting with others – is apt to bring a positive change in how we feel, behave and perform at work.

A significant number of Fortune 500 companies in the US recognize the link between mindfulness and leadership and hold mindfulness programs for their employees. Some even have meditation rooms on site. There is also a growing appreciation for the link between mindfulness and lowered stress, which positively impacts employee health, productivity and absenteeism. In Australia, there has been interest in the link between mindfulness and occupational health and safety (OHS), in some sectors, including the mining sector1.

How can mindfulness affect occupational safety?

Before I answer that question, I would like to relate a personal story. In the late-nineties I was living in New York City with my husband. One Sunday morning, I spent about an hour on the phone with a dear friend. Our conversation was about a long-standing conflict and I got off the phone feeling very frustrated. My husband suggested we go for a stroll and we walked out to the nearby boardwalk, which ran along the Hudson River. I don’t remember anything about the walk – the weather, the conversation, or the landscape. All I remember is that as we navigated our way back home across the highway that ran parallel to the boardwalk, I almost got run over by a car. I only realized the car was heading straight at me when it was only inches away. I am not sure what exactly happened after that, but somehow I managed to scamper to safety as the car whizzed past me at over 100 miles an hour.

Shaken by the near miss, I wondered how I could have not seen a speeding car zooming straight at me on the highway. I realized it was because my mind had been almost entirely on the telephone conversation from some hours ago. Most of my attention was caught up in that drama, leaving none for the present – where I was and what I was doing. Even though my eyes and ears were functioning perfectly, it was as if devoid my attention they had been rendered completely useless.

What had made me perilously unavailable in the present was my “internal dialogue.” Internal dialogue is the conversation we have with ourselves (in our heads) about our past and our future. Generated by our biography, the character of internal dialogue is generally regret or resentment (when directed towards the past) and anxiety (when directed towards the future). The higher the pitch of our internal dialogue, the more attention it consumes and the less mindful or attentive we are in the present, increasing the chances of poor perception that can have any number of disastrous consequences, including difficult interactions with others, mistakes and dangerous accidents.

Even without extreme drama – like a recent fight with the spouse or the boss – taking up our attention, most of us are not mindful. This is because a lot of our attention, at the conscious and subliminal levels, remains caught up in the past or in the future, unless we devote time for deliberate mindfulness practice.

In addition, when it comes to work, we perform tasks to achieve a specific result or outcome. This means that unless we are mindful – that is, we bring our attention consciously to the present moment – most of our attention is on getting the task done, or on the outcome, which is in the future. By definition, there is even less attention available for the process, which is in the present. As a result, the process suffers and there is increased likelihood of poor quality, mistakes, damage and accidents. The irony is that attention on the outcome compromises the outcome, while attention on the process results in good outcomes and increased safety.

How can you become mindful?

The bad news is that mindfulness is not a magic pill; you cannot purchase it and no one else can give it to or do it for you. It is an individual skill that requires commitment, discipline and effort.

The good news is you can be anyone, anywhere, doing anything and you can incorporate mindfulness into your work and life.

In order to become mindful all you need to do is to bring your attention to the present moment by rescuing it from your internal dialogue and become process rather than outcome driven. There are two pieces of work that need to be done with internal dialogue that have extremely beneficial results over time:

1. Silencing internal dialogue: one of the best methods for this is to establish a daily meditation practice of at least twenty minutes. Meditation requires no special equipment or skills. For a simple, yet profound meditation, all you need to do is sit comfortably, with your spine straight, in a quiet place, close your eyes and rest your attention on your breath and/ or ambient sounds.
2. Changing the character of internal dialogue: is concerned with cultivating gratitude and trust in order to transmute resentment (towards the past) and anxiety (about the future) that generally forms the character of our internal dialogue. Again, this requires no special skills or equipment but does require commitment and effort to let go of resentment, resolve guilt and be more grateful and trusting towards people and life2.

What can employers do to cultivate mindfulness in the workplace?

Enterprises can make mindfulness a company value and run regular programmes for employees to help them understand the benefits of mindfulness while teaching them practical tools and practices they can incorporate into their lives. They can encourage and subsidize mind-body programmes, such as meditation or yoga, for employees.

More importantly, employers can institute mandatory meditation practice, for instance at the start of the day/ shift for employees, investing both organizational time and facilities in it.

Employers can also assign mentors who can help colleagues become more mindful and create forums for employees to share their experiences and stories regarding mindfulness and workplace performance and safety.

Furthermore, organizations can deliberately become process, rather than outcome driven – which tends to be the default setting for most people. This would include measures that hold employees accountable for contribution rather than results, so that employees are supported and encouraged to be more mindful.

Cultivating employee mindfulness is likely to have profoundly positive effects on not just safety, but the personal wellbeing of each employee and business performance in general.

Uzma Ahmed Khan

Uzma Ahmed Khan is a Human Resource (HR) and Training professional with over a decade experience. She currently works as the Head of Human Resources at a the National Clearing Company of Pakistan Ltd – a Capital Market Institution in Karachi, Pakistan where she is responsible for leading all initiatives for development & operations of HR.