Many organizational leaders today are eagerly talking about learning goal setting for building resilience in themselves and their employees. According to Seijts and Latham (2012), goals establish a safety zone for creating new, promising ideas for taking positive action. My FABULOUS Transformation Framework for Fostering Resilience helps leaders take positive action to achieve their learning goal of increasing employee wellbeing. My framework puts a leader’s strengths into practice and helps them set their learning goals, which improves their organizational wellness leadership skills.

When leaders share this goal methodology with their staff, employee wellbeing is enhanced. They may be facing several challenges (e.g., lowered productivity, retention) that are impacting the company. Having FABULOUS goals is a critical step in mitigating the impact of job burnout, compassion fatigue, and vicarious trauma on employee wellbeing.

The FABULOUS goal methodology is a plan that builds personal resilience in leaders by focusing on their healthy habits and outcome behaviors. A business goal is a leadership tool that focuses on a final desired state for each employee. As you share your goals and influence those who report to you, make sure that the goal aligns with your employees’ core values. Communicate your goal and be transparent about your own issues regarding work-life balance, wellbeing, and resilience.

FABULOUS Goal Setting in the Workplace

With that in mind, here are eight pillars of FABULOUS goal setting: Flexibility, Attitude, Boundaries, United, Laughter, Optimism, Understanding job satisfaction, and Self-compassion.

1. Flexibility: a realistic and attainable goal can trigger your brain’s reward system, which can bring about resilience. Brainstorm ways to reframe your thinking to achieve your goal to lessen burnout and build personal resilience.
2.  Attitude: explore a mindset of looking past your bias, fears, and self-sabotaging habits while maintaining a positive attitude enhances your ability to achieve your learning goal.
3.  Boundaries: keep healthy boundaries to achieve your learning goal.
4.  United: overcoming compassion fatigue and vicarious trauma together.
5.  Laughter: incorporate a sense of humor into your ongoing practices from learning goal setting to accountability.
6.  Optimism: remain hopeful and have confidence in your ability to achieve your goal.
7.  Understanding job satisfaction: recognize how your goals help you to be fulfilled at work.
8.  Self-compassion: if you get frustrated with task complexity, obstacles, and mistakes, be kind to yourself. You are not the only leader who struggles with achieving a goal.

According to Callander (2020), a business goal is a desired final state that accomplishes business ambitions. Whether the learning goal is building resilience at work or increasing employee wellbeing, stay goal driven as you gather information, gain knowledge, and acquire the skills to pass along to your employees. Moreover, anticipate problems and possible detrimental effects when setting goals (Oettingen, Wittchen, & Gollwitzer, 2013).

 

Goal setting is a process of planning and action to manage any problems related to burnout and building resilience that come up. So, keep in mind these points:

• Write down the number of ideas I need to acquire or develop to accomplish the task effectively (Locke & Latham, 2002).
• Have a high commitment to my learning goal for it to be effective in increasing my performance (Latham & Seijts, 2016).
• While I plan my goal, I may get negative feedback and become frustrated as I search for task relevant information (Seijts et al., 2013).

Focus on actions that help your staff

By incorporating the FABULOUS Framework for Wellness into your goal setting, you create a new process that removes barriers to achieving work-life balance and employee wellbeing. The goal of mitigating burnout begins with a constructive action step: focusing on a FABULOUS action plan to achieve career resilience.

References

Callander, J.S. (2020) Business Goal Setting (BGS) bridging strategy and organisational behaviour; as part of strategy development, what elements of business goal setting contribute to employee intellectual buy-in? A multiple case-based study. University of Southampton, Doctoral Thesis.

Swann, C., Rosenbaum, S.,  Lawrence, A., Vella, S.A., McEwan, D. & Ekkekakis, P. (2021) Updating goal-setting theory in physical activity promotion: a critical conceptual review, Health Psychology Review, 15:1, 34-50, DOI: 10. 1080/17437199.2019.1706616.

Oettingen, G., Wittchen, M., & Gollwitzer, P. (2013). Regulating goal pursuit through mental contrasting with implementation intentions. In E. A. Locke, & G. P. Latham (Eds.), New developments in goal setting and task performance (pp. 523–548). NY: Routledge.

Seijts, G. H., Latham, G. P., & Woodwark, M. (2013). Learning goals: A qualitative and quantitative review. In E. A. Locke, & G. P. Latham (Eds.), New developments in goal setting and task performance (pp. 195–212).  NY: Routledge.

Seijts, G. H., & Latham, G. P. (2012). Knowing when to set learning versus performance goals. Organizational Dynamics, 1(41), 1–6. doi: 10.1016/j.orgdyn.2011.12.001.

Promoting Self-Compassion and Suicide Prevention in a Vicarious Trauma-Informed Workplace

Suicide remains a critical global health concern, demanding accessible interventions to safeguard those working with those who are traumatized, grieving, or struggling with a crisis in their life. Exposure to vicarious trauma is a reality for police, firefighters, emergency personnel, mental health professionals, and social workers, potentially leading to symptoms mirroring those they assist.

First responders and helping professionals have the opportunity to develop internal resources that can help them manage suicidal thoughts. These professionals may have feelings of thwarted belongingness—where they feel disconnected and don’t belong—and perceived burdensomeness—feeling like a burden or liability—both of which are strongly linked to suicidality. The research underscores that low self-compassion exacerbates these factors, highlighting the potential for enhancing self-compassion to reduce the risk of suicide (Bianchini & Bodell, 2024).

Professionals can develop symptoms similar to those they help, such as anxiety, hopelessness, isolation, low self-esteem, and depressive symptoms, all of which are associated with suicidal thinking. However, individuals with high levels of anxiety and depression and who practice self-compassion are less likely to engage in suicidal behaviors (Kelliher-Rabon et al., 2018). Self-compassion mediates the link between negative affect and suicidal ideation (Hasking et al., 2019). A vicarious, trauma-informed workplace acknowledges these challenges and the need to support these professionals.

Can self-compassion be the difference between life and death?

Self-compassion involves directing kindness inwardly. It is a crucial aspect of addressing suicide risk among first responders and helping professionals. It can be nurtured through internal resources that empower them to navigate challenges with self-kindness and understanding. So, what are these internal resources? Alongside resilience, creativity, problem-solving skills, mindfulness, self-awareness, and a positive outlook, several other internal resources contribute to fostering self-compassion:

1. Coping Strategies: Techniques like relaxation, emotional regulation, and seeking social support can help manage difficult emotions.
2. Spirituality: beliefs and practices that foster self-acceptance during tough times.
3. Adaptability: Being open to change enhances perspective and supports self-compassion amidst challenges.
4. Sense of Purpose: Clarity in life’s meaning strengthens resilience and sustains self-compassion through setbacks.
5. Emotional Intelligence: Understanding and empathizing with difficult emotions aids in responding to challenges with self-compassion.
6. Appreciating Social Support: Strong relationships bolster feelings of connection and support.
7. Prioritizing Physical Health: Exercise, rest, and nutrition bolster mental well-being, facilitating self-compassionate responses to challenges.

Best Practices for Fostering a Self-Compassionate Workplace

Although there are various strategies to prevent suicide among professionals, agencies and organizations can implement these practices:

• Cultural Shifts: Foster a workplace culture that prioritizes wellness and emotional well-being.
• Leadership Responsibilities: Equip leaders with skills to model and support self-compassionate behaviors among supervisors and teams.
• Peer Trust: Cultivate trust and collaboration among team members to create a supportive environment.
• Holistic Approach: Embrace holistic self-care strategies encompassing mental, emotional, and physical well-being organization-wide.

Challenges in Vicarious Trauma Prevention Efforts

As a keynote speaker and trainer on compassion fatigue and vicarious trauma, I have learned much from the attendees of my programs. Here are the challenges that they bring up regarding their efforts to prevent vicarious trauma in the workplace:

• Insufficient prioritization of vicarious trauma-informed practices in workplace culture.
• Lack of clear guidelines on stress reduction strategies and protective factors.
• Limited financial resources are allocated for vicarious trauma-informed training and support.
• High turnover rates necessitate frequent vicarious trauma training.
• Employees’ inadequate self-care skills and uncertainty about where to seek help.
• The emotional strain is heightened by current events and societal issues.

In conclusion, creating a workplace that embraces self-compassion involves addressing challenges in vicarious trauma prevention and implementing comprehensive strategies that support employee well-being at every level of the organization.

Where should you start when you want to mitigate the impact of secondary trauma? You may want to immediately go to mindfulness training and self-care techniques. However, first, you need to learn about secondary trauma, risk factors, and symptoms. To fix the problem, you need to understand the problem. Being that the emotional toll of caring can compromise your functioning, this article lays the foundation for your self-care and addresses the following:

1. Describe secondary trauma following exposure to primary trauma.
2. Identify professionals at risk.
3. Compare two types of indirect contact with trauma material.
4. Examine secondary traumatic stress symptoms.

What is Secondary Trauma

Imagine a day when no child suffers from physical abuse, when no teenager lies in an ICU bed after a drug overdose, and no parent grieves their child’s suicide. These experiences, stressful and traumatizing, are considered incidents that bring about primary trauma. As professionals learn of this traumatic material, they can experience secondary trauma. Although the trauma did not happen to them, somehow, they experience the same symptoms as the person who suffered the primary trauma. Secondary trauma symptoms mimic the symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Secondary or vicarious trauma can occur immediately following the exposure to another person’s single traumatic event or after several events. It occurs when there is some interaction between the professional and the traumatized person or their traumatic material (e.g., watching a video, reading a document). This is especially challenging when professionals are exposed to these traumatic events daily.

When you experience primary trauma, you experience certain symptoms. Secondary trauma symptoms mirror the other person’s primary trauma symptoms such as high levels of stress, anxiety, depression, insomnia, and avoidance. You may be easily triggered and have racing thoughts.

When secondary trauma symptoms are experienced in the workplace, your functioning decreases due to impaired judgment, low productivity, pushed boundaries, and poorer quality of work. Staff friction can develop. Your working environment suffers due to increased absenteeism and higher staff turnover.

Reflective Question

What secondary trauma symptoms have you experienced?

You may consider yourself empathetic and compassionate. Compassion satisfaction is the feeling of gratification you get from caring. However, you may lose your ability to feel compassionate, and become less satisfied with your level of compassion satisfaction. As you re-experience the other person’s phenomena, you no longer feel clinically competent. Your perceived self-efficacy diminishes as does your level of compassion satisfaction.

Who is at Risk for Secondary Trauma?

Secondary trauma risk factors are those who are younger, female, and have less experience in their job. Exposure to a person’s traumatic material could bring up unresolved issues from your past. If you experienced a prior trauma, and that experience is unresolved, you are at a higher risk for secondary trauma. If you experienced domestic violence, sexual assault, or a traumatic death, and have not worked those events through, your job can reactivate that personal experience. Another person’s primary trauma can become a trigger. Being exposed to their trauma material while sharing the same trauma history, can put you at risk.

Forensic nurses, emergency department nurses, oncology nurses, pediatric nurses, and hospice nurses are particularly at risk for secondary trauma. Others at risk include those practitioners who are exposed to traumatized populations in the courts and criminal justice system, such as victim advocates, prosecutors, trial attorneys, judges, probation officers, and court reporters. Therapists who work with children, child welfare workers, and case managers involved in the care of traumatized children are also at risk.

Those who work with traumatized persons and those who indirectly have contact with trauma material are at risk of secondary trauma. Two indirect exposures to trauma material:

1. Indirect trauma person/person: professionals at risk for secondary trauma work directly with those who experience primary trauma as they listen to or observe traumatized individuals, or –  those in physical pain or psychologically suffering. Those at risk include professionals, such as clinicians, clergy, lawyers, child protective services workers, probation officers, foster parents, shelter staff, police officer, fire fighters, first responders, and teachers.
2. Indirect trauma person/data: professionals at risk for secondary trauma may read traumatic material in records, documents, files, and letters. Those at risk include a professional who watches videos of a traumatic incident or listens to frightening 911 calls. Those at risk include court coordinators, magistrate support clerk, and victim advocacy administrative staff.

Reflective Question

Based on your job description, what puts you at risk for secondary trauma?