Tag: depression

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Organisational learning about depression in the workplace: a community of practice of silence and avoidance

Author/s: Lisa Davies

Edition: Volume 46, Number 1, April 2006

Summary: The economic and social impact of depression on the Australian workforce (Hickie 2002; Hawthorne, Cheok, Goldney and Fisher 2003) is only recently being acknowledged. In 2004 I undertook semi-structured interviews with people with human resource responsibilities in the deregulated sector of information technology in South Australia. The interviews focused on their accessibility to work-based education about depression and asked their opinions regarding the merit of such education.

Keywords: depression, Australian workforce, human resources, work-based education

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Workplace learning: depression as an ‘undiscussable’ topic in eight information and communications technology organisations in South Australia

Author/s: Lisa Davies

Edition: Volume 48, Number 2, July 2008

Summary: More than 800,000 Australians every year are affected by depression. Despite evidence that depression is manageable, that people can be successfully treated in individually appropriate ways and that earlier identification and treatment are associated with  more rapid recovery, depression appears to be poorly recognised and understood. In this paper, I focus on depression in the workplace. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with human resource managers in eight organisations within the deregulated information and computing technology sector in South Australia. I focus on managers’ ability to access information about depression, and their beliefs about the value of work-based education about the illness. I also report on managers’ understandings of prevailing attitudes towards depression and mental health education in their workplaces. The analysis is conducted within a qualitative, interpretive framework.

Keywords: mental health, depression, workplace, managers, access, information

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