Bolstering resilience in Customs: the wellbeing of our people

Abstract

Bolstering resilience should apply equally to our organisational systems and our people. Our people are the greatest asset of our customs administrations, and the wellbeing of our workforce directly impacts the effective performance of our administrations. While positive steps have been taken to strengthen organisational resilience within customs administrations, this paper contends the resilience of our people, and the subject of mental health, is not sufficiently addressed in our administrations. This paper recommends customs administrations place equal importance on the mental and physical health of their employees by putting frameworks and guidelines in place and that these are backed by practical actions to build resilience in the customs workforce. Every customs officer can take action to change the resilience culture in our customs administrations by initiating the conversation on mental health and eradicating the stigma. As our customs administrations face a complex and rapidly changing future, it is critical that we not only build organisational resilience, but that we also focus on the resilience of our people.