ISOLATION, long swings, 12-hour shifts and a culture that shuns vulnerability are, according to FIFO Zero co-founder Blake Wood, the major contributing factors to the shockingly high levels of mental health and substance abuse problems among FIFO workers.
Mr Wood faced his own demons when his nine-year FIFO career descended into chronic anxiety, panic attacks, depression and suicidal thoughts, and after losing a close friend to suicide, Mr Wood decided to get help.
After taking George Helou’s EP7 seven-step program, Mr Wood and Mr Helou created an adaptation of that program – FIFO Zero – a targeted and practical way for FIFO workers to get the follow up help they need to stamp out suicide among FIFO workers.
Mr Wood said that as the Are You Ok? ambassador for BHP, he had seen the good work that the programs were doing, but while these programs would start the conversation, there would be no follow-up and no way for people to seek further help.
FIFO Zero aims to empower people with practical knowledge about their emotional well-being, and to connect those who need help to trained coaches in the hope that they will be able to engage with the workplace in a more positive way.
“I would share my story and just have workmates come up to me and say “mate, I’m going through the same thing” and they were,” he said.
“People just don’t have the skills and the tools to cope with their emotional well-being.
“We want people to know there is nothing wrong with them if they’re feeling the pressure from these challenges.
“We need to teach people a level of resilience, and they need to know how to make their situation better.”
The program also aims to tackle the systemic cultural problems within the mining industry associated with job security, and speaking out about job frustrations which are often amplified by extreme working conditions.
“If you have communications problems that are as fundamental and as straightforward as someone afraid they’ll lose their job for speaking up about their frustrations, how are they ever going to speak up about the stresses in their personal life? It’s just not going to happen,” he said.
“If you’re working in the desert on the rail in the Pilbara, you can be swinging a sledge hammer for 12 hours a day, it’s next level hot and it’s an experience.
“But you have a high number of people that thrive and a high number of people that struggle.”
And therein is where Mr Wood sees a solution – a change in perspective.
“The environment is the same for everyone but our interpretation of, and our reaction to, that environment guides how we respond to it,” he said.
“It’s just so important to have these conversations.”
