Reducing Stress and Finding your Sweet Spot

© BCB / FRB Media

Working in the hospitality industry is considered to be strenuous and stressful, and bad for a person’s health over the long term – including their mental health. It is pretty much common knowledge among everyone who has ever worked in the industry. But: there are things that can be done to counteract constant stress and improve well-being, and it starts with a person’s attitude. Kris Hall from the ‘Burnt Chef Project’ explained how in his captivating presentation at Bar Convent Berlin 2023.

At the start of his ‘Stress Reduction Workshop’, Kris Hall showed the audience a picture of a typical British house. The weather is pretty poor. It is a snapshot taken in 2017, and the house is where Hall’s therapist has their practice. Hall captured this moment, as it was the moment in which he was finally able to bring himself to get help.

Escaping the downward spiral

Before reaching this point, he had gone through many years of physical and mental distress, most of which was caused by his job and stress – problems that Hall tried to escape through things like alcohol and drugs, like many other people worldwide. Many people work under constant stress and are both physically and mentally drained, leading them to use various substances and enter into a downward spiral like Hall did. It was in May 2019, about two years after he began therapy, that he made a decision: to show others how they, too, could escape this downward spiral.

#notjustforchefs

With just 50 British Pounds of seed capital, he launched the ‘Burnt Chef Project’, an organisation that offers programmes for people at all levels of the industry to improve their health and well-being, under the hashtag #notjustforchefs. The project has been a big success, as today the ‘Burnt Chefs’ are active with local volunteer teams in nearly 80 countries around the globe. The initiative organises trainings in companies like pub and restaurant groups, offers e-learning courses (some of which are free of charge), supplies tips for breathing exercises and greater mindfulness in daily life, and provides support. The organisation’s own podcast, ‘The Burnt Chef Journal’, hosts talks with experts and sufferers about the complex and widely relevant topic of mental health.

Mental health is no less important

The speaker asked the audience a question: just what, exactly, is mental health? Do we really understand what it means? Because while we learned at school just how important it was that we look after our physical health – sufficient physical activity, a healthy diet, etc. – the subject of mental health is frequently neglected, according to Hall. Yet this is at least equally important, because it is only when we take a holistic approach that people can be truly healthy. According to the WHO definition, “Mental health is a state of well-being in which an individual realizes his or her own abilities, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and is able to make a contribution to his or her community.”

One trillion US dollars in lost productivity

Mental states can run the gamut from outstanding: bursting with energy, joyful, delivering high performance – through just surviving or getting by: nervous, irritable, withdrawn, concerned – to a full-blown crisis: fear, exhaustion, insomnia, absenteeism. According to the auditor and corporate consultancy Deloitte in its 2022 study, it is estimated that lost productivity due to poor mental health costs the world one trillion US dollars. Hall explains that these different states can alternate frequently. It is a feeling that is sure to feel familiar to many people working in the hospitality trade. For some, it is ‘only’ a matter of how a shift is going, what the customers are like, or how full or empty the establishment is. The goal: for everyone to be okay and stay that way.

© BCB / FRB Media

Finding the sweet spot

Stress, according to Hall, is a key factor in determining our mental state. Stress has been around for as long as there have been people. For our ancestors, it was the thing that put us in survival mode – fight or flight – for example if we found ourselves confronting a tiger. In today’s hospitality business, ‘tigers’ might be noise, drunken customers, or pressure at work. But even the exact opposite, i.e. occasions where time seems to be standing still, are not good for us. As Hall reminds us, we experienced this all too often when we were stuck in lockdown – only to be swamped by work the second people were allowed to return to normal life. The key is to find that sweet spot, that ‘flow state’ between burnout and ‘boreout’. Because if someone’s mental health gets out of balance, they may make more mistakes (increasing the risk of injury), exhibit poor performance, suffer headaches and joint pain, or fall victim to presenteeism (working while ill) (you can find out more on this in the presentation given by the ‘Healthy Hospo’ team at BCB 2022).

Spot, stop, swap

What can be done to improve well-being? According to Hall, the first step is to: Spot – learn to recognise the signs that you might be starting to have trouble. Secondly: Stop – put an end to the typical actions taken to avoid the problem (ranging from too much caffeine or other substances to continuously scrolling through your smartphone. Instead: be present in the moment). And thirdly: Swap – switch over to routines that can promote long-term mental health, like brushing your teeth twice a day.

CAN DO

Hall’s acronym for success is “CAN DO”:

Connect – maintain social connections
Active – even 15 minutes of sports and physical activity a day leads to positive benefits
Notice – be sure to register your surroundings. This can include conscious breathing or a sensual experience in keeping with the ‘5, 4, 3, 2, 1’ grounding technique: (consciously) observe five things, listen to four sounds, touch three things, smell two things, and taste one thing – according to Hall, this should be quite easy to do in a bar with the things normally found there
Discover – experience new things, such as through hobbies
Offer – share your time with other people, do volunteer work, or even collect litter found on the street; foster self-efficacy.

Kris Hall closed with a tip for the trade professionals in attendance: recognise, and celebrate, the things that you are already doing well for your mental health. And begin thinking about the things that you might be able to do differently in future.

How? There are many concrete aids, guidelines, and background information available on the initiative's website: www.theburntchefproject.com