John Dowling

Said the following about Barry Edwards:

“The reason I am nominating Barry for this well-deserved award is for the support and encouragement he has given me to help manage my mental health issues.

Obviously this is a very personal subject for me to share and knowing that it will be seen by a lot of people in the industry does feel daunting, but it is equally important that Barry knows the difference he has made to me. I also hope that reading this will help others by raising awareness that there is help available for people with mental health issues in the rail industry.

I have suffered from anxiety and stress for a very long time which I have previously managed to hide away both from myself and other people. While it did not stop me from delivering my work, it has left me living with anxiety together with low self-esteem and confidence in my abilities.

Through Barry’s support it has enabled me to stop hiding from it and instead get help to manage this. Barry undertook to make a management referral to Care First our counselling provider to arrange face to face counselling sessions.

But he went further by ensuring we had time together after each counselling session to give me an opportunity to talk through as much or as little as I wanted from each session. Barry has shown a real enthusiasm for understanding both what I was going through and also the techniques I was learning from the counselling sessions to help manage the impact these feelings were having on me.

He then used this knowledge and his leadership style to proactively intervene at times when he noticed issues at work were affecting me. He would enable me to remove myself from the situation so that I could work through the various coping techniques I have been taught but at the same time without drawing attention to the fact that I needed to do this.

Barry has also been keen to support me now beyond the standard 6 weeks of counselling that is provided and is actively looking at how this can be achieved and again he has done this by taking the time to listen to me, rather than presuming that he knows what is right.

While it is early days, I am starting to see for myself the benefits of doing this and I can only thank Barry for his support and genuine enthusiasm for me to find ways to support my recovery. I wanted to nominate him for this award because it really demonstrates what a difference a professional and supportive line manager can make.“