Abstract:

Psychosocial risks and the resulting impacts on the mental and physical health of employees are among the most topical issues in the field of occupational safety and health. Stress is widely recognised as an important factor affecting the productivity and well-being of individuals and teams alike. Other factors that can lead to psychosocial risks are e.g. excessive mental workload, unclear tasks, amount or lack of information, uncertainty, ineffective or inadequate communication, poor time management. The authors of the present article were also involved in a project that investigated the impact of psychosocial risks on employees of labour offices in the Czech and Slovak Republics. The results of this project, as well as the findings of other studies, point to the need to build stress management skills, psychological resilience, effective communication, creativity, critical thinking, teamwork, etc. in higher education and lifelong learning. At the Faculty of Security Management of UNIZA we provide courses in which we develop these skills: Psychology and Crisis Intervention; Crisis Communication; Development of Work Teams. For the needs of practice we provide further education, an accredited course: crisis management, which also includes modules focused on crisis communication, basics of crisis intervention. The paper will describe the learning opportunities that can be used to develop the soft skills of students and staff that are needed for the 21st century.

Keywords:

Employee education, psychosocial risks, work stress, survey, prevention.