Rikke Brokøb Ølholm Petersen: “We must not become blind to the pressure we face as employees and leaders”

When expectations rise without the conditions keeping pace, it is not only a systemic challenge. It also becomes something that must be carried by leaders and employees, who have to make the tasks add up in practice every day.

Rikke Brokøb Ølholm Petersen recognises this clearly. She is a unit manager in the Danish Prison and Probation Service, responsible for, among others, nurses, laboratory technicians, dentists and dental assistants, and she has previously been head of department in the 1-1-2 Emergency Medical Services in the Capital Region of Denmark. Across both worlds, she sees the same pattern: increasing expectations for service, quality and accessibility, combined with a heavy workload and time pressure.

“A sense of powerlessness and of not being able to do well enough can quickly arise when you are caught between high professional ambitions and the wish to make a difference on the one hand — and what is actually possible on the other.”
– Rikke Brokøb Ølholm Petersen

One concrete example she sees is in the Danish Prison and Probation Service’s work to ensure better reception and release processes for, among others, vulnerable inmates. The task is important, and resources are also allocated to it. But when the workload and time pressure are already high, it can still be difficult for the individual to see how new tasks are supposed to fit into everyday practice. This is where the difficult questions quickly arise: How can this be done in time? What should we do differently? And what should we let go of? Here, it becomes crucial to speak openly about both the pressure and the uncertainty that comes with it.

According to Rikke Brokøb Ølholm Petersen, it becomes particularly vulnerable when the pressure of expectations takes hold in professional identity. Because then it is no longer only about busyness and priorities, but also about the experience of whether one can be the leader or professional one wants to be.

A central point for her is therefore that the pressure of expectations must be made visible within the work community. Not in order to give up, but in order to make the pressure clear and share it collectively.

“It is important to talk about the elephant in the room and create a shared language for the fact that the pressure created by expectations does not look the same for everyone. We need each other in order to stand strong in it.”
– Rikke Brokøb Ølholm Petersen

Rikke Brokøb Ølholm Petersen recently attended a talk by the institute’s founder, Rikke Høgsted, on the expectations crisis at the Danish Nurses’ Organization’s conference in Nyborg. One of the most important things she took away from it was precisely that we must not become blind to the pressure of expectations. Because if the pressure is not seen, talked about and taken seriously collectively, there is a great risk that it will end up as an individual burden instead of being handled as a shared challenge.

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