COVID-19 hasn’t left yet, but here we are riding the wave of another pandemic – and this one is far more insidious. Employee mental health is at an all time low, and recent studies show that up to 79% of employees are disengaged with their work, only there for the paycheck. Conversely, we are also seeing an increase in presenteeism and its nasty cousin, workaholism.
Unfortunately, workplaces are actually part of the problem, despite their efforts to the contrary. We are keen to support our employees, while carefully balancing the budget and making sure our productivity as a company doesn’t suffer. The problem, however, is that in trying to balance this, we put pressure on our staff to show up, whether this is intentional or not. Additionally, colleagues may have had so much time off isolating in the past 18 months, that they are afraid to take any further time off for both physical and mental health illness reasons. Colleagues are ‘working from home’ when normally they would be resting and recuperating, starting earlier and finishing later so that they have done enough to not get into trouble for being unproductive.
In an already competitive working environment, the last thing anyone needs is a depleting workforce, or an unwell and underperforming team. But how employers begin to tackle this can be conflicting.
If you are finding yourself behind the curve, and are working reactively, there is some good news. A new government scheme has been launched to fund mental health support in the workplace. Able Futures provides support to the people working and living with mental health difficulties, employers and providers of apprenticeships. They are a nationwide specialist partnership set up to provide the Access to Work Mental Health Support Service on behalf of the Department for Work and Pensions. It is entirely funded by the government, free to your employees, and you can register as an employer to see how many of your colleagues are accessing the help. Each person who signs up can access nine months of support for anxiety, depression and stress.
You might also consider training or appointing a workplace Mental Health First Aider, who will be trained to look out for the warning signs of mental health deterioration in their colleagues, as well as able to offer on the spot support in crisis, signposting and more.
If you’re ready to get ahead of the curve, it may be time to adopt a corporate trainer to work with your leaders and employees to improve the atmosphere and culture of the company, as well as the employee experience. A good trainer will address mindset, resilience, leadership, teamwork, and coping with change and uncertainty.
By equipping our people with the tools they need to succeed, as well as educating around boundaries and giving permission for them to discuss their mental health without discrimination, we ensure that we create the right ecosystem for our teams to thrive.