Situation Extremis

How would you respond if you found your child after a suicide attempt, a close colleague had drowned in suspicious circumstances, or your workplace had been bombed?

Any form of extreme stress can have detrimental consequences on performance levels. Consider the impact of:

• a critical incident – terrorist activity, natural disaster, war

• a personal incident – serious road accident, sexual assault, bereavement

• significant organisational change

• ‘culture change’ – moving to a different organisation and/or a new geographical location

• long-term stress or mental illness

The way we deal with trauma varies greatly depending on our psychological make-up, our past experiences and the nature of the incident. We expect physical injuries to be treated immediately, but rarely are psychological injuries, with their longer-term implications, even acknowledged.

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Situation Extremis (contd.) 

A traumatic experience causes the most extreme form of negative stress and can overwhelm people with intrusive psychological and physical symptoms. Panic attacks, difficulties in concentrating, fatigue, anger, guilt and numbness have all been reported following a traumatic experience. As human beings are individual in their psychological make-up, there is no standard pattern of response