Mental health at work

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In this piece are a plethora of succulent tips around the theme of Workplace Mental Health Interventions.

Organizations have a vested interest in helping to prevent the onset of mental and physical illnesses and to promote recovery. The longer an employee is away from work due to illness, the less chance there is of a successful return to the workplace. In a 2019 survey of more than 1,500 employees nationwide, more than a third of the respondents said they had left a job due at least in part to mental health. Of these, 59 percent said mental health was the primary reason. If you have an ongoing mental health problem you may be unsure of who to tell about it, when to tell them and how much to tell. you may be worried about how they may react and the consequences. Organisations need to communicate the benefits of a healthy workplace to line managers, who are typically responsible for implementing people management and wellbeing policies. They need to work closely with all areas of the business and provide practical guidance to ensure that policies and practices are implemented consistently and with compassion. Awareness of the scale and impact of poor mental health at work is increasing – in 2018, the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) found that poor mental health was the most common cause of long-term sickness absence in UK workplaces and that stress-related absence had increased in nearly two-fifths of organisations (CIPD 2018), while a Mind survey found that one in ten employees rated their current mental health as poor or very poor. The rise of remote or flexible work has rendered traditional wellness assessments that rely on in-person screenings obsolete. Managers should consider flexible, digital self-assessment tools modeled after user-friendly consumer apps. Completing a mental health check-in should be as easy as checking a social media feed.



Some people who have mental ill health find it useful to draw up an ‘advance statement’, which explains how they wish to be treated if they become unwell at work. If we spend our time worrying about emails we need to send, a project that needs finessing, or the results our boss is expecting, these blessings can become a source of stress. And that means our quality time with the people who matter is impacted, not only by our stress, but our distractedness. If you want to know how you can build on the support you’re offering for mental health, a great place to start is by looking at what you’re already doing. What measures do you currently have in place to support mental health? What are you doing well and what could you improve? By assessing where you are currently, you’ll know which areas need focusing on. Since mental health is a wide socio-economic issue, it would be important to look to and make use of management structures. We shouldn’t lose sight of what happens with high-level policy - for example, zero hours contracts can put real stress on people and enforce anxiety. Subjects such as workplace wellbeing support can be tackled by getting the appropriate support in place.

Self-reported Mental Health

Like chronic diseases, mental health disorders are treatable, and employers can use comprehensive strategies to cultivate supportive work environments. Every organisation has an opportunity to support and develop a mentally healthy workforce and thankfully it doesn’t need to be complicated. Normalizing topics around employee mental health in the workplace, and being able to identify and assess burnout risk, makes it easier for employees to get the organizational support they need before reaching a crisis point. Additionally, when employees feel like their whole selves are recognized in the workplace, they are more engaged and productive. You’re not a grain of sand in an ocean – you’re a rock being thrown into a lake. You will make ripples. Even though you’re just one person, what you do affects people around you. More than you know. How big an impact you make is ultimately up to you, but you do need to play your part in the mental health at work movement toward change. Organisations should ensure all staff have clearly defined job descriptions, objectives and responsibilities and provide them with good management support, appropriate training and adequate resources to do their job. An opinion on workplace wellbeing ideas is undoubtebly to be had in every workplace in the country.

Business owners have to give so much to talent that they are loathe to make any concessions for those who are denied this tag - those who are merely labour. The result is unconscionable income inequality. It is important to understand your employees and how they can benefit from a better approach to mental health, along with the pressure points you and your employees currently face. It is also worth seeing how much benefit your business could receive from investing in mental health, to help assess the scale of the programme you want to create and help you to prioritise your options. Managers have an important job in communicating organisational purpose and connecting an individual’s work with this purpose. This includes communicating and providing employees with timely information to enable them to understand the reason for the proposed change. Research shows that 70 per cent of failed organisational change processes are attributed to poor organisational health, such as lack of adequate investment in leadership and the quality of team environments. Improving psychological health and safety is a process of continual improvement. Everyone needs to be involved. Just knowing that someone is making an effort and is there to listen can be a huge support. It doesn’t make mental health challenges go away, and it’s no replacement for professional help, but sometimes people simply need to be heard without judgment. If you can do that for them, you’re helping!‍ Thinking about concepts such as how to manage an employee with anxiety is really helpful in a workplace environment.

Support Staff Who Are Experiencing Mental Health Problems

The human cost of poor mental health is huge, with poor mental health having an impact on the lives of many individuals and those around them. This manifests itself in a variety of ways both at work and at home, and impacts a person’s ability to manage other elements of their personal life. Collaborating on projects in large teams can be a source of stress for many employees. It can get frustrating and become tiresome if employees cannot track each other’s work or assess their contribution to a larger project scheme. Teamwork can be stressful – but it is inevitable part of work process. By enabling easy collaboration, you can optimize your employees’ wellbeing and decrease their stress levels. In order to sustain a culture of openness and transparency around mental health and wellbeing, employees should listen to and support team members with mental health and wellbeing concerns at both peer level and as line managers. Employees can support improvements in overall workplace mental wellbeing by ensuring they are aware of both how to raise concerns about colleagues and also what actions to support co-workers they can reasonably take. A leadership team that cares about mental wellness can positively impact everything from to employee culture to productivity. Work closely with the leadership team to keep them informed on the types of challenges employees may face, like anxiety, OCD, or depression. Share articles, invite experts to speak on the importance of mental health, and train managers to effectively support employees. Mental health is defined by the WHO as a state of mental and psychological wellbeing in which every individual realises his or her own potential, and can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to his or her community. Mental health is determined by a range of socioeconomic, biological and environmental factors. Communication that emphasizes that leadership cares about concepts such as managing employees with mental health issues should be welcomed in the working environment.

It can be tempting to invest everything in building self-esteem around work success. That often means that people with mental health problems give everything at work and are high achievers. It also creates a risk that when things go wrong, when mistakes are made, or when change is necessary, people may take it personally. Depression is a medical condition that often includes the symptoms of burnout (exhaustion, negativity and ineffectiveness), but can also include more general low self-esteem and, at its worst, suicidal ideation. Unlike burnout (which is caused primarily by work-related factors), depression can be triggered by life events, influenced by your genetics, or can sometimes happen for no reason at all. When having mental health conversations with team members at work, get to know your team members’ baseline, so you can notice when something’s off. Employers must provide reasonable adjustments to people who are eligible, including people with a mental illness such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder or depression. Identifying the right changes at work for you will reduce the impact of your health condition on your ability to work, and ensure you are getting the right support. This should also include planning ahead to agree arrangements in case you become unwell. Employing the right person for the job and getting the staffing right on particular projects in the first place is crucial to help prevent stress and promote individual resilience. A key source of work-related stress and poor mental health is a misfit between the individual and the role, or between the needs and values of the person and those of the work environment, or between the individual’s skills and abilities and the organisation’s demands on them. For employers not investing in wellbeing initiatives, employers duty of care mental health can be a difficult notion to comprehend.

Psychological & Social Support

Educate managers about the signs of mental health problems and train them to respond appropriately. A caring conversation between a supervisor and an employee could be instrumental in encouraging an individual to get help. What can employers do to address the mental health action gap and support employees? Supporting employees’ mental health centres on five elements: developing a mental health strategy; building a psychologically healthy and safe workplace culture; providing robust communications; ensuring adequate resources; and preparing for hybrid work. Kind and engaging communication and management practices are the mark of a good manager-employee relationship. Poor communication and practices, on the other hand, create strain on the relationship, create poor mental health, and increase workplace stress. Find supplementary information about Workplace Mental Health Interventions in this Health and Safety Executive page.

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