Self-care is especially important for HR professionals, who take on the challenges of an entire organization. Host Monique Akanbi sits down with Joelle Moray, founder and CEO of Integrate Wellness, to discuss attainable practices to improve self-care and boundary setting. This podcast is approved for .5 PDCs toward SHRM-CP and SHRM-SCP recertification. Listen to the complete episode to get your activity ID at the end. ID expires April 1, 2026 Honest HR is the go-to podcast for aspiring and informed HR professionals intent on transforming workplace challenges into golden opportunities. Hosted by Amber Clayton, Monique Akanbi, and Wendy Fong, this podcast brings you insights, trends, and actionable advice through relatable stories from the REAL world of HR. Along with Honest HR, the HR Daily newsletter delivers daily insights, trends, and expert advice, empowering HR professionals to build a productive, engaged workforce and drive organizational success. Subscribe to HR Daily to get the latest episodes, expert insights, and additional resources delivered straight to your inbox: https://shrm.co/voegyz --- Explore SHRM’s all-new flagships. Content curated by experts. Created for you weekly. Each content journey features engaging podcasts, video, articles, and groundbreaking newsletters tailored to meet your unique needs in your organization and career. Learn More: https://shrm.co/coy63r
Self-care is especially important for HR professionals, who take on the challenges of an entire organization. Host Monique Akanbi sits down with Joelle Moray, founder and CEO of Integrate Wellness, to discuss attainable practices to improve self-care and boundary setting.
This podcast is approved for .5 PDCs toward SHRM-CP and SHRM-SCP recertification. Listen to the complete episode to get your activity ID at the end. ID expires April 1, 2026
Honest HR is the go-to podcast for aspiring and informed HR professionals intent on transforming workplace challenges into golden opportunities. Hosted by Amber Clayton, Monique Akanbi, and Wendy Fong, this podcast brings you insights, trends, and actionable advice through relatable stories from the REAL world of HR. Along with Honest HR, the HR Daily newsletter delivers daily insights, trends, and expert advice, empowering HR professionals to build a productive, engaged workforce and drive organizational success.
Subscribe to HR Daily to get the latest episodes, expert insights, and additional resources delivered straight to your inbox: https://shrm.co/voegyz
---
Explore SHRM’s all-new flagships. Content curated by experts. Created for you weekly. Each content journey features engaging podcasts, video, articles, and groundbreaking newsletters tailored to meet your unique needs in your organization and career. Learn More: https://shrm.co/coy63r
Rate/review Honest HR on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Monique Akanbi: Welcome to Honest HR, the podcast for informed and inspiring HR professionals. I'm your host, Monique Akanbi. we're exploring the topic of self-care for HR professionals. Why it's important. What it looks [00:00:30] like and how to maintain it.
Joining us is Joelle Moray, founder and CEO of Integrate Wellness.
Welcome to Honest HR Joelle.
Joelle Moray: Monique, I'm so excited to be here. Thanks for having me.
Monique Akanbi: We are excited to have you here and, for our audience, I'm really excited because Joelle and I made this connection about two or three months ago.
and at that time, our conversation was [00:01:00] based around just this hustle culture and being high performing and how do we as HR professionals really take the time out to care. For ourselves as we are always look, caring for our organizations and the employees within our organization. in the first couple of months with the new White House administration, we have seen rapid changes, to the world of work impacting. Everything from Title VII to [00:01:30]immigration policies to Inclusion and Diversity. in times of upheaval, HR professionals are often the go-to support system, for employees and for employers as well. But today we're going to focus on our HR professionals and how they can ensure, also taking care of themselves. So I am ready to jump in. We ready, Joelle?
Joelle Moray: I am ready.
Monique Akanbi: Awesome. So my first question, for you [00:02:00] is, why is self-care particularly important for HR professionals compared to other professionals?
Joelle Moray: Oh, such a great question right out the gate. the simple answer to that is you are not just dealing with your own stress, overwhelm issues, challenges, whatever it might be. You're dealing with everyone else's as well. I'm so sorry. Sorry about that.
Monique Akanbi: It's okay.
Joelle Moray: so [00:02:30] just gimme one second. I don't know why I have not coughed all morning and now I'm trying to talk,
Monique Akanbi: Uhuh. That's okay. then I can start the question over if you, if that works. Does that okay? Yeah. Got it? Yep. Okay.
Joelle Moray: sorry.
Monique Akanbi: That's okay. 'cause my nose is itching too, so gimme one second. for some reason. Okay. All right. So Joelle, why is self-care particularly important for HR professionals compared to other professions?
Joelle Moray: Yeah, such a great question, right? It's because [00:03:00]everyone kind of deals with their own, stress, their own sort of purview. Everyone you just are concerned about yourself and your lane and what you have. However, HR professionals deal with everyone's not just their own.
Oh my goodness.
I'm sorry. I'm gonna keep going. It's like something just got me. I'm so sorry. Okay. I'm gonna skip keep, going. So HR professionals. Tend [00:03:30] to be where everyone goes with all of their stuff, right? Whether they are feeling burned out, whether they need to take medical leave, whether they're just having an issue with their, direct supervisor.
Whether they're having an issue with their coworker, whether they're just, whatever they're coming to the HR person for. It could be because they're looking to develop and they wanna become a leader in the future. It could be,positive thing. But for the most part, the HR folks, as You are the dumping ground, [00:04:00] right?
People come into your space with all their stuff. They have a dump truck full of stuff, and they're like, I'm just going to unload this on you, and now I want you to fix it. And so it's even more so important for HR professionals to care for themselves because they're taking on the energy, the challenges of everyone, not just their own.
Monique Akanbi: Yeah, it makes me think back, at a previous organization where, In practicing [00:04:30] HR, I would take the long route home. So technically route home was about a. Two to five minute commute, which sounded good, but when you have gone through a day where you have been that buffer, leadership and employees and also just just absorbing everything that is going on, whether it's an employee issue or an overall organization issue, it just.
I, for me, I would just take a 10 minute drive [00:05:00] versus a five minute drive, just to decompress. So that way when I showed up at home, they didn't get all of the baggage that I, accumulated throughout the day. and I just mentioned how HR. Often acts as a buffer, between leadership and employees.
So we're balancing both. does this role contribute to burnout and how can self-care really mitigate that for HR professionals?
Joelle Moray: Oh my goodness. Yeah, [00:05:30] because it, you are taking on. Directives from the leadership
you're taking on the impact of those directives from the employee side. So it's really coming at you from multiple ways, right?
It's not just one avenue of things that are coming in, and
we have something in our nervous system known as our allostatic load, and this is the amount of stress that your body can actually handle at any given time.[00:06:00]
And here's an analogy I love to use when talking about the allostatic load. Think about your dishwasher at your house. Okay? There comes a point when you cannot get anything else in there, right? So now some people, just throw the dishes in there. Just however other people, it's like Tetris where everything has its place.
and depending on who lives in your house, everybody can, load that dishwasher differently, but at some point, nothing else will fit in [00:06:30] there. The only way to. Have more space in the dishwasher is to run it, to clean everything that's in there. Take everything out and put it away. The allostatic load in your nervous system works similarly to that.
There's, a finite amount of stress and, information that your allo, the allostatic load refers to. I'm at capacity. I can, I have no room for anything else, and the only way for me to be able to [00:07:00] deal with anything else is to get rid of what's in here now. So to your point of that, taking that longer commute home is a really beautiful way to empty a little bit of it.
Now, you're not gonna empty that total dishwasher in a 10 minute drive, but you're gonna give yourself enough capacity so that when you walk in the house and you're all. Now you gotta be mom and partner and whatever else, right? It's like everyone's meeting you at the door with their problems of the day
what's for dinner and where's my [00:07:30] soccer cleats and everything else.
And you're like, oh my God, I have no space for any of this. And so that's how that all static load, that's what that refers to. So we have to understand how that works scientifically. This is how your body works.
Monique Akanbi: Yeah.
Keeping with that, I shared for me one of the ways that I cared for myself and that example was to take a longer commute home. Are there other ways HR professionals, or [00:08:00] things that other, that HR professionals can do to really mitigate stress in between?
Joelle Moray: Oh yes. There are several things that, that you can do. So for the purpose of this, when we're talking about at the end of the day how to deal with this. What we wanna do is take micro recoveries throughout the day, so recovery doesn't have to wait till the end of the day, doesn't have to wait for the weekend, doesn't have to wait for your day off.
A micro [00:08:30] recovery are sort of small moments of rest throughout the workday. And when we take these little mini breaks throughout the day, what we're actually doing is improving our resilience. We are, emptying some of that allostatic load and allowing ourselves to have room for more. And this can look like.
A two minute stretch between meetings, so one meeting ends, the next meeting is gonna begin, and I realize. A lot of times those things butt right up against each other, right? You're leaving [00:09:00] one meeting early and getting to the next meeting late. I totally understand that. However, it only takes a couple of minutes for some of this reset to occur for these micro breaks.
So simply standing up, walking away from your computer for a minute. Go to the restroom, get something to drink, stretch a little bit. Literally just move your body just a little bit. take a little drink of water and just walk away from your device. Your laptop for just a few minutes is a great way to practice that kind of micro recovery.
If [00:09:30] you do that throughout the day, several times, you're gonna notice that you have much more capacity for whatever else is in your day. And that's just one. I have lots of other things to share with you too.
Monique Akanbi: love micro recoveries just because it is, attainable, right? There's something small. but a huge impact, right? So something that I can do that I don't necessarily have to alter my entire day,
Joelle Moray: Yeah,
Monique Akanbi: do, to really practice self-care, but I can [00:10:00]incorporate it into my day.
Joelle Moray: exactly.
Monique Akanbi: with our podcast, which is Honest HR, I'm gonna be honest in this moment. one of the things that I struggled with was creating boundaries
Joelle Moray: Yes. Let's go there.
Monique Akanbi: And creating boundaries, because as an HR professional, we inherently or tell ourselves this story that we have to be everything to [00:10:30]everyone. I. At all times. And what that meant was being available on the weekends where maybe I'm with my family and an employee issue or an organization issue has come up, or in the evenings where I'm spending time with family or even just alone, to, decompress. And then something comes up and. I have not created that boundary and I'm trying to be better at it. I'm really trying, it's a work in progress, this is something that I've struggled [00:11:00]with and I know others struggle, with that. And are there ways that you can share with our audience to help protect that time and that energy and really set firm boundaries just for the care of yourself?
Joelle Moray: Oh, I love talking about boundaries. I'm so glad we're going there.
So boundaries are actually a form of productivity and engagement. They're actually not a disconnection, they're not a barrier. So as you said, so [00:11:30]many HR professionals feel like you have to be available 24/7 and I don't believe in the phrase work life balance, but what I do believe in is work life boundaries.
When we set boundaries, we actually increase our efficiency as well as our wellbeing. So a simple way to Do, I'm gonna give you a tool first, and then I'm gonna talk about the barrier to the boundary. Okay.
Monique Akanbi: I'm ready for the tool. Okay?
Joelle Moray: Okay, so the tool is [00:12:00] time blocking for super deep work. So if there's something that really needs your attention and focus time, block it, say from eight to 9:00 AM or nine to 11:00 AM or whatever it is, I'm gonna work on this thing.
Whether it's your quarterly report, your whatever it is, something that needs a little bit more of your concentration and just block it out on your calendar even, right? And say, and I realize sometimes people don't look at our calendars or they ignore that, what our calendar says or what have you.
But you could even put something like, focus time nine to 10:00 [00:12:30] AM and communicating out with folks, Hey, when you see focus time on my calendar, I'm not available then, but I'm available any other time around that. Just not for this particular time. and so what you're a set effectively doing is setting like office hours.
Remember back in college, like the professor office hours, right? So you're saying, here's the times I am available for, specific employee concerns.
So that time block allows you to be much more focused, which reduces your [00:13:00] personal overwhelm, and it also starts to create a little bit of expectation about your availability.
So that is the logistics. Let's talk about the challenges to doing this.
Monique Akanbi: Okay.
Joelle Moray: Most of us have challenges with setting boundaries because namely, we are afraid of what setting a boundary will do to the relationship. I am afraid if I set this boundary, you're gonna be upset, or I'm not gonna be seen [00:13:30] as dedicated.
I'm not gonna be seen as a leader. I'm gonna be seen as lazy, et cetera. So I'm terrified to set this boundary because of what you are to think of me.
So it's not the tool itself. We understand logically what time blocking is. We understand what focus time is where a lot of us struggle. Is with giving ourselves permission to do that.
And we can set boundaries by using super positive language. We [00:14:00]don't have to use negative language. We don't have to say no. We can say yes and yes if it can be a bit of a negotiation. Hey, Monique, I really need to talk to you about this issue that I'm having. Are you available? Yes, I'm available. At 11:00 AM does that work for you?
And finding a time, having other people be in charge of your calendar is aenergy destroyer. And it also significantly adds [00:14:30] to your stress.
I like to think of it like this. Do you tell your dentist when to have hours? Do you tell your physician when to have hours? No. They say We have an opening at three 15.
you're gonna take it or you're not. Right? But when it comes to things like HR, it feels a lot more intimate. It feels a lot more personal. So we feel like we wanna be available and we wanna be available because we wanna be seen as a dedicated employee as well, right? We wanna be seen as a leader, we wanna be seen as someone who's dedicated to being [00:15:00] here.
And so it's in that giving yourself permission for the boundary is a really magical place. And when you're able to set those expectations for people, you're accomplishing several things. A, you're managing your own overwhelm, stress, you're also setting some expectations and you're opening up really clear communication.
More significantly, what we're seeing across enterprises is that you are now giving the employees permission to do the [00:15:30] same thing. And when we do that, we are seeing, there's a, really beautiful Harvard review study that talks about this massive increase in employee engagement and productivity. Just from this simple little shift, because when the leaders of an organization will do this, it gives everyone else permission to do the same thing in super professional and respectful ways.
Everyone's stress becomes better. Everyone's burnout improves, everyone's resilience improves, and our engagement, [00:16:00] productivity improve to boundaries is where it's at.
Monique Akanbi: Ooh, okay. I just may need a second to digest all of that. and I like the term of work-life boundaries, right? we've seen this transition of work-life balance, work-life harmony, work-life integration, but at the root of it is how do we create boundaries? And so
Joelle Moray: Yeah.
Monique Akanbi: glad that you called that out. can HR professionals. [00:16:30]
Handle or manage compassion fatigue,
and while caring for themselves, but still being present for employees and their organizations.
Joelle Moray: Yeah, so compassion fatigue is a very real thing. And so let's talk about first quickly, the signs that you might be in. Compassion fatigue,
Monique Akanbi: Yes.
Joelle Moray: right? So if you, HR professionals are helpers. You are a helping profession. I. You are here to help people. You're helping the [00:17:00]organization. You're a leader.
You're helping people in real time. And so just the nature of that, there's this massive energy exchange in the work that you're doing.
And so
when we just continue to push through and keep going and taking all these things on, taking on the energy of other people, it really starts to. let me say this. We're passionate about it, right? You're [00:17:30] doing the work because you believe in it and because you're passionate about it. So a, really clear sign that you might be in compassion fatigue is when you start to get a little apathetic.
When things that you used to care about, you don't anymore. So someone comes into you and they're really like, the wheels are just falling off, right? And all of a sudden, and, there's always more to the story. and then pretty soon they're like, oh my God. Just found out like, this thing is happening in my marriage and oh my God, my kid is sick.
And I, it is just, [00:18:00] oh my God, my mom's in a nursing home. And you're like, whoa, okay. There's more going on here. And you're not in compassion fatigue. When you're super in that conversation, you're asking questions, you're offering ways to be supportive. You're offering ways to help this person manage all these things.
You're in compassion fatigue when you're like, oh God, when is this
Monique Akanbi: right?
Joelle Moray: up, girl? My mom's in a nursing home too. You'll hear me and you're complaining about it. [00:18:30] probably in compassion fatigue when you, so when you have that sort of I just don't care. If one more person comes in here today with this X, Y, Z problem, like I, I'm out, I'm shutting my door.
I don't wanna hear it. That's compassion fatigue when you stop caring, right? And I'm not saying stop caring in like this, like you're a terrible person. This is what compassion fatigue looks like.
So a great way to keep ourselves in check and preventing compassion fatigue is something [00:19:00] that I call the press pause method, and I really like alliterations.
Press pause is a really easy thing to get your head around. Like I'm literally gonna press pause when we press pause. We're not stopping, we're just walking away for a minute with the intention of coming back. So very similar to a micro break pressing pause. Only takes a few minutes. Again, it only takes about five to 10 minutes to get your nervous system to start to regulate.
It doesn't have to be this big thing. You [00:19:30] don't need to go take a nap for 90 minutes, right? You just need a few minutes. So pressing pause when we press pause. Here's what you're gonna do, especially if you start to feel yourself in that mode. You are going to first of all, schedule it. We need to schedule pauses in our day.
Like I was saying about, put on your calendar focus time, you could do something very similar here. Or focus time could be one of, in your focus time you could start with a little press pause. So you're just gonna put it on your calendar. I'm gonna take a [00:20:00] break at 10 30 today. From 10 30 to 10 40.
Literally gonna get myself 10 minutes. I'm gonna time it out. Alright? I'm gonnagive myself 10 minutes. Perfect. So I scheduled it, I've timed it now. Here comes the magic. No talking and no technology. So no technology during this break. No phone, no watch, no laptop, no nothing, no technology, no scrolling, especially no scrolling
and no talking to other people.
because you [00:20:30] really need that break. And then you're gonna have a little bit of movement again. Just get up and walk around the room. You just stand up, right? Just literally just stand up outta your desk for a few minutes, stretch a little bit, and then come back. And connect with yourself. Just close your eyes for a minute and just ask yourself, okay, where am I right now?
All right, I'm feeling a little bit anxious. All right. What is most important right now that I do? And then move forward with some [00:21:00] intention and a little more clarity in what you're doing. So just ha, and that whole thing can be accomplished in about five or 10 minutes. Walk away from all technology, get up and move a little bit, and come back and go, okay.
How am I? All right. I'm feel, I feel my heart. Rate up a little bit what's most important right now, and just pick that one thing and then move forward with a little bit of intention, and you're gonna reset everything by doing that.
Monique Akanbi: So I'm pressing pause right now [00:21:30] just because that was a really good. Tips and advice to give just from, from we often meet, we meaning HR professionals often feel guilty for caring for ourselves, and you have just given us three. Four, honestly, practical ways that we can really practice self-care.
I think when we think about self-care, we think, oh, I need to go get a man or a pet, I need [00:22:00] to go to the spa, or I need to make, take a beach day, or I need to take a mental health day. And those are forms of self-care. I'm not saying that those aren't,
Joelle Moray: For sure.
Monique Akanbi: even the thought of those forms of self-care feeloverwhelming because
Joelle Moray: Yeah.
Monique Akanbi: it becomes, I don't have time to take a get a Manny or a Petty, or I don't have time to take a day off just to really focus on myself.
So you've given us. Work-life boundaries, creating those boundaries. You've given us the press pause method, [00:22:30] to be able to do that. You've given us micro breaks, all things that we can incorporate throughout that day while still focusing on ourselves and taking care of our employees and our organizations, and even in our personal lives, taking care of our families.
So thank you so much for even just those pieces of self-care, for our audience so far.
How can HR professionals advocate self-care policies without feeling guilty or [00:23:00] overburdened?
Joelle Moray: Oh, so good. I'm so, happy that you asked this question. Advocating for, to have very specific policies that go way beyond, oh, here's, we have an e, a p. If you wanna go to a therapist, great. You should still have that. However, we gotta go a little bit deeper, right? These things when we talk about creating a wellness culture, a culture that [00:23:30] understands that when people are not stressed, when they feel like they have a purpose and value, when they feel seen and heard, they are significantly more productive, engaged.
They innovate better. They collaborate better with each other. This will literally affect your bottom line. We have seen that companies who invest a little bit into their employee's wellness will see it double or triple return on that investment just simply in productivity [00:24:00] and less absenteeism due to illness, right?
When people are coming to work stress, this is not good. However, we can put all the policies in the world into an employee handbook, but none of that matters if the leadership of the company is not doing it. Also.
So the best way to advocate, in my opinion for some of these things is to have the leaders of the company doing the same things.
If employees see leadership taking breaks, not taking their laptops on vacation with them, setting [00:24:30] work-life boundaries themselves, giving employees the right to disconnect after the workday is over and on the weekends, the employees are gonna do that as well. That's the best advocacy. In my opinion is to have the leadership of the company practicing things like the right to disconnect.
So when we are saying, I'm going on vacation, but I'm taking my laptop with me,
please stop. Just stop. Because you're sending a very clear message to employees that we don't value vacation time here. We don't value time off. [00:25:00] I got my phone with me on the weekend, don't hesitate. I'm just gonna be at my kid's game.
But it's not an important game. So I can take your texts. We all do that and we've gotta, we've gotta do better about that. So the best way to advocate is to have the leaders of the company doing the same things.
Monique Akanbi: Yeah, hear the analogy often of. Whenever we fly, right?
does the flight attendant say when they're going through all the safety instructions?
Joelle Moray: [00:25:30] Yep.
Monique Akanbi: in the case of emergency, put your mask on first before you help other person. And
remind myself of that, not in just in flying, but in the day to day, of really prioritizing myself first, because if I'm no good to myself.
Joelle Moray: yep.
Monique Akanbi: good can I be to anyone else?
Joelle Moray: Yep.
Monique Akanbi: what advice would you give as we wrap up? HR professionals, our audience in general, who struggle [00:26:00] with prioritizing themselves?
Joelle Moray: Yeah, so I think this goes back to what, when we were talking about the boundaries of giving yourself permission to do that,
why aren't you giving yourself permission, right? It's this feeling of I feel guilty if I don't. Why? you are literally putting yourself into dis-ease.
The name of the word disease you are putting, why would you do that? You are not gonna be any good to your kids if you are not here. You're not gonna be any good to your [00:26:30] kids if you're laid up in a hospital somewhere because you've put yourself into this state. You're not gonna be any good to your kids or your staff or whoever if you are literally sick.
And there are so many physical ailments that we know that are attributed to stress. You are not doing anyone any favors by falling on your own sword all the time. Put your sword down, and I'm telling you, when you take care of yourself, you give everyone around you permission to take care of themselves as well.[00:27:00]
I became a mom very late in life. I was 42 when my kids came, and both of my kids are adopted. they came, there's two of 'em. They both came in rapid secession from each other, and all of a sudden I was, mom and I spent 42 years being the center of my world, and all of a sudden I wasn't.
and even the reason I share that is because even I am still a human person. I am still a working mom. And even though these children [00:27:30] were quite literally gifts that were giving to me, I still gotta set some time. It'd be so easy for me to just be like, I gotta be everywhere all the time.
For them, I want them to know that they're loved and they belong and all the things 'cause especially because they're adopted and blah, blah, blah. Yeah. And they also need to see that I'm taking care of myself. So we have to give ourselves permission to do that, because they're gonna learn how to care for themselves by watching you.
Same with your family, same with coworkers, same with those who [00:28:00]report to you. Same with leadership. We have to lead by example. This is a great time to lead by example in what you're doing. You cannot breathe if you're underwater. You're not gonna be able to help them at all. So we have to get to that.
And if you really, are someone who struggles with giving yourself permission for this, then great time to maybe do a much deeper dive, for your own therapy, for own your own sort of self searching to really understand what's the root cause of that. Why aren't you giving yourself [00:28:30] permission to care for yourself,
Monique Akanbi: Another pause moment, and thank you sharing that. So as we wrap up, one last question and I would say 30 seconds or less, you have this phrase that's called chill achievers, or this group called Chill Achievers. tell us in 30 seconds or less, what is the chill achiever?
Joelle Moray: Chill Achievers is a community of high achieving people who wanna learn how to better take care [00:29:00] of their mental and physical health.
Monique Akanbi: Awesome. Thank you so much for sharing that, Joelle, and thank you. that's going to be it for this week's episode of Honest HR. A big thank you to Joelle Moray for sharing her deep insights with us. Honest HR is a part of SHRM's. HR daily flagship content series. Head to SHRM dot org. Slash HR Daily to learn more and sign up for the daily newsletter. You can also [00:29:30] catch us on SHRM's. Social media comment and be a part of the conversation. Thanks for joining and we look forward to seeing you next time.
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