HRM Current Affairs Assignment paper

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George Brown College Canada *

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1008

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Management

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Apr 3, 2024

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Current Affairs Assignment o Your title slide must include full name, last name and student numbers for both members. You must include the title of your presentation on the first page as well. o Summary of the article/ event/news o Why was the topic selected. o How is it related to HR and in what capacity? Identify the connection to the specific HR topic and explain it briefly. o What did you learn, conclude and apply in the future? Share 3-4 takeaways. o Provide recommendations and action plans. TOPIC ‘It scars you for life’: Workers sue Meta claiming viewing brutal videos caused psychological trauma. https://www.euronews.com/2023/10/19/it-scars-you-for-life-workers-sue-meta-claiming-viewing- brutal-videos-caused-psychological Summary of the article: More than 20% of the staff Meta hired to check the violent content of Facebook and Instagram are on sick leave due to psychological trauma. The images posted on the social networks they were supposed to check showed the worst of humanity: videos of murders, dismemberments, rapes and live suicides. Employees have criticized the working conditions imposed by the company on the content moderators, which leave them extremely exposed to serious mental health problems such as post- traumatic stress disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder and depression to say the least. Francesc Feliu, lawyer for more than a dozen workers who decided to sue the company, explains "We are talking about people who were healthy and suddenly these mental disorders appear. Some of these workers have attempted suicide," Moreover, the first complaint came from Europe, Chris Gray, a contractor Facebook worked with in Ireland in 2017, whose contract as a content moderator lasted only a year. He explains in an interview with Euro news, that "I didn't realise how much it affected me. It was only later that I realised I was a mess, I was very stressed. I couldn't sleep and I became very aggressive. If anyone ever talked about my work, I would cry afterwards," When he realized he couldn't cope any longer, he tried to talk to the company psychologist. "I filled in questionnaires saying I felt overwhelmed at work. But it took ages to get an appointment with someone". In addition, the workers were not tested beforehand to see if the people they were hiring had any prior mental health issues, something that might make them unfit for the job. However, when contacted by Euronews, Facebook claims that it is working with Telsus to urgently address the issue. "We take the support of content reviewers seriously and require all companies we work with to provide 24/7 on-site support from trained practitioners."

Workers say that even five years on, many are still undergoing psychological treatment. Some are even afraid to go out on the street. "This kind of content scars you for life. We are not machines or computers without feelings," says Feliu. They say that if the employee can already see after 10 seconds the reason the video should be censored, then there is no need to watch the whole video. They also complain that the moderator often has to watch the same video again and again because more than one user has reported it. What does Facebook say about the issue? Facebook claims that there are "technical solutions to limit exposure to graphic material as much as possible". "People who review content on Facebook and Instagram can adjust the content review tool so that graphic content appears completely blurred, in black and white, or without sound." Three years ago, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg described criticism of the company's working conditions as "a little overdramatic". The comments, made at a staff meeting, were leaked to the press. "It's not that most people just see horrible things all day long. But there are really bad things that people have to deal with, and making sure that they have the right counselling and the space and the ability to take breaks and get the mental health support that they need is a really important thing," Zuckerberg told employees. But that is not the experience of former workers. "The company's policy is to deny it," says the Spanish lawyer.

Reason for the Topic  The reason I chose this topic is because first and foremost, Mental health is something I think is very important to prioritize.  Every one of us is going to enter the workforce sooner or later. Some might experience issues regarding mental health, but others might not.  However, by prioritizing it a little more, we can help each other out and everyone close to us a little better.  For the longest time Mental health isn’t really considered as important as one’s physical health for example. Nonetheless it’s very important that everyone prioritizes both their physical health as well as their mental health.  Personally, I grew up in an Asian household and the culture I grew up in is that if you’re physically healthy you should work and you could work, that’s all that matters. Mental Health is nothing but a hindrance and not a big deal, and one should just get over it. But that is not the case as Mental health affects us not only our jobs but also our daily lives. Related to HR and in what Capacity? Identify the connection to the specific HR topic and explain it briefly.  One of the main topics this relates to is CHAPTER 3, Promoting Employee Health and Safety Through Organization Culture  In this chapter we talked a lot about Creating a healthy and safe work environment.  The duties and responsibilities of employers, employees and supervisors  Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) legislation that helps protect your health and safety at work.  The three basic rights  Stress at work and the disabilities related to this. A clear example of this is Mental stress resulting in a mental condition such as anxiety, over workload and depression.  Other topics that are related to HR are Job description, and the recruitment & training process for the job. What did you learn, conclude and apply in the future?  One of the main takeaways is the importance of prioritizing resources for employees. It is the responsibility of the employers to allocate resources required to help the employees do their job effectively without compromising their own health and safety.

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Benefits such as Mental Health days, paid sick leave, proper working hours and proper working conditions are very important in stressful jobs such as these.  Another takeaway from this is knowing your rights and the law.  Both employers and employees should be knowledgeable of the OHS legislation and our three basic rights. Right to refuse dangerous work and know that you’re protected from reprisal. Right to know about workplace hazards and have access to basic health and safety information. Right to participate in health and safety discussions and health and safety committees.  On the other hand, employers should make sure that employees are aware of the resources that are available to them. One might say that they are experiencing mental stress but also are not utilizing the proper resources that are available to them.  Lastly, making sure that the Job description and the whole recruitment process is up to date and very specific when it comes to finding the right candidates and the right fit for these jobs. Again, as they mentioned in the article, people with preexisting mental health conditions should not be recommended to do jobs like these, not to discriminate against but to prevent them from experiencing more trauma.  Don’t be afraid to reach out to your supervisors or employers about your current working conditions and make use of resources. At the same time, try not to keep doing jobs that are harmful to you. o A lot of jobs can be very deceiving in terms of having a job posting for one thing without fully disclosing job duties and responsibilities. Recommendations and Action Plans  Relating to the article and issues presented, one of my recommendations is definitely allocating a lot of resources to mental health professionals and support to the workers.  As Chris Gray mentioned, it took him ages to get an appointment with someone.  It’s already a given that jobs like these can and will affect a person psychologically and mentally, not having enough resources to tackle these problems is just brutal.  The fact that a lot of the issues the employees go through they can’t fully talk to their family, friends or their support circle, it is very important to have these resources for them to not only effectively do their job, but also to move past the horrible things they see in their jobs.  REFERENCES

Llach, L. (2023a, October 19). “it scars you”: Facebook workers claim brutal videos caused trauma . euronews. https://www.euronews.com/2023/10/19/it-scars-you-for-life-workers- sue-meta-claiming-viewing-brutal-videos-caused-psychological Heaney, C. A., Price, R. H., & Rafferty, J. (1995). Increasing coping resources at work: A field experiment to increase social support, improve work team functioning, and enhance employee mental health. Journal of organizational behavior, 16(4), 335-352. Harnois, G., & Gabriel, P. (2000). Mental health and work: Impact, issues and good practices. Steiger, M., Bharucha, T. J., Venkatagiri, S., Riedl, M. J., & Lease, M. (2021, May). The psychological well-being of content moderators: the emotional labor of commercial moderation and avenues for improving support. In Proceedings of the 2021 CHI conference on human factors in computing systems (pp. 1-14). Zhao, N., & Zhou, G. (2020). Social media use and mental health during the COVID 19 ‐ pandemic: Moderator role of disaster stressor and mediator role of negative affect. Applied Psychology: Health and Well Being, 12(4), 1019-1038. ‐ Barrett, P. M. (2020). Who moderates the social media giants. Center for Business.

HRM Current Affairs Assignment paper

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