Alcohol Awareness: 6 Top Tips To Raise Awareness & Reduce Consumption

For Alcohol Awareness Week we look at how you can deal with alcohol in the workplace.

It’s one of society’s most acceptable and accessible drugs. It’s used to wind down in times of panic and stress and it’s also killing 20 people a day – it’s alcohol! Around 167,000 working years were lost to alcohol in 2015 and it costs the NHS £3.5bn per year in England alone. For Alcohol Awareness Week we have compiled a few ways you can raise awareness and support colleagues:

Educate

• Provide alcohol awareness/consumption information to help colleagues understand how much they drink per week and how this can affect their health and job. Staff intranet, news bulletin, or staff newsletters are a good way to do this. You can also post information in staff kitchens, break areas and bathrooms.
• Implementing regular alcohol awareness training and employee health checks can help employees monitor, realise and benchmark changes with regards to their individual alcohol consumption.

Do Something Different

• Swap out the monthly team drinks for something different which brings a real team benefit whilst still being fun and sociable.
• Reduce the amount of free drinks available at staff conferences and Christmas parties.

Care

• Understand that changes in employee behaviour could be because they’re struggling with alcohol addiction. Don’t judge and punish; care for and support. People turn to alcohol for many reasons and this could be affecting their performance. Try to understand what is going on in their life and affecting their productivity and behaviour at work.
• Employ a common-sense, person-centred approach rather than a cold faced, people management process.

These are just small steps organisations of all sizes and in all sectors can take to help raise awareness of alcohol and its affects. For further help and information on services we offer around alcohol awareness, call us on 0151 236 6608 or visit our website.

All facts and stats found in this blog post were published on the Alcohol Change UK website.