How to build a Mentally Healthy Workplace: Strategies for Employers

Building a mentally healthy workplace ensures individuals feel valued. All growth begins with a positive culture where your people are prepared to come to their place of work and dedicate themselves to its goals and objectives. Studies from the CIPD have shown that over a quarter of organisations in the UK with an established health and wellbeing strategy report improved productivity amongst their workforces. Proactive approaches and strategies are required.

Leadership and senior management need to build a working environment where individuals feel stable, supported and have the potential to develop. Uplifting your people and cultivating an environment of wellbeing, togetherness and development will boost productivity and enable expansion.

Why is a mentally healthy workplace important?

Overall, leadership and workforces are in agreement on the topic of mentally healthy workplaces and the value they provide organisations and their people. However, research suggests there is a clear disparity between the level of wellbeing support offered by an organisation and leadership and that which individuals receive. 96% of senior leadership believe their organisations are doing enough to support employee mental wellbeing, whilst only 69% of individuals believe their organisation is providing adequate support for their mental health. This disparity indicates that whilst organisational leaders believe, for the most part, their organisation is operating to a high efficiency, just under a third of its individuals feel they can perform to their capacity due to their mental health.

Mentally unhealthy working environments can often lead to high levels of presenteeism, which refers to when individuals’ productivity decreases as they are attending work ill or not fully functional. Whilst this is seen with physical illnesses, people coming in with the common cold, etc. These days, it is most notable among employees struggling with their mental health. As physical symptoms can be harder to spot than poor mental health, individuals feel they must attend work as they may not receive the necessary support.

When employees are comfortable and eager to work and achieve the goals of their organisation, it creates cohesion and encourages development. Professional accomplishment and career progression is not enough for many individuals in today’s modern world. The average turnover rate for individuals in the UK is 35% whilst research suggests that a healthy staff turnover rate is 10%. It is extremely difficult to establish stable and consistent growth with high turnover rates as it diminishes the value of a mentally healthy workplace and results in increased costs.

How do managers need to consider?

When developing a strategy for a mentally healthy working environment, senior leadership needs to consider a multitude of factors including work-life balance, signposting, openness and inclusion. To assist with creating a culture of openness, we have created a helpful guide available for download, with advice on how to successfully cultivate this culture.

1. Work-Life Balance

Without a proper work-life balance, individuals can quickly become stressed, burnt out and resentful of their place of work. Approximately two-thirds of UK employees list work-life balance as a crucial factor when searching for new roles, which contrasts with the fact that 31% believe they do not have a satisfactory work-life balance. When people are bringing their work home with them and are not able to focus on their personal lives, relationships or passions, and they will feel stunted by their organisations.

When organisations ensure their people can maintain and enjoy a satisfactory work-life balance, stress levels will decrease, which has proven mental and physical wellbeing benefits. Individuals who can make the most of their personal time can focus on maintaining a healthy diet and exercise regime, fulfilling hobbies and healthy amounts of sleep. This will lead to greater engagement and a more productive and communicative workplace.

2. Mental wellbeing support

Establishing values which your people can follow, and support is vital, but sometimes external factors may ensure this is not enough. In instances where individuals’ mental health standards are declining, an organisation must provide the appropriate support to them. This might be achieved by raising awareness of various mental health conditions through awareness days to eliminate any stigma surrounding the topic.

Organisations must establish a culture of openness with due process. This allows individuals to come forward and communicate any of their concerns with senior leadership and receive the support they need to succeed in the workplace. This culture of openness will enable greater inclusivity, ensuring your people feel seen, valued and it will inspire greater innovation.

To further support individuals within your organisation with their mental wellbeing, effective signposting should be implemented. Providing individuals with easy access to mental health support through Mental Health First Aiders, counselling, literature and other training is essential. This ensures individuals can not only access support regarding their work lives, but also for their personal issues. Individuals respond to an organisational culture and process that signifies how much they value their people and their wellbeing.

3. Values and principles

Processes and strategies are one thing but actioning them effectively requires commitment and leadership. This is why senior and organisational leadership need to establish clear values and principles. Their attitudes and convictions will directly inform organisational culture which may allow for a mentally healthy workplace strategy. If leaders demand high workloads in shorter periods, it will result in increased stress. This may be effective for some organisations. However, if there is no effective support alongside this, individuals may feel isolated, burnt out and their productivity will very quickly decrease. Senior leadership must clearly communicate organisational culture with their people so that they feel confident of the support they will receive. Otherwise, there is the potential that they will disengage with the organisation.

How to train individuals to support each other

For a mentally healthy working environment to become self-sustaining and an ingrained element of an organisation, individuals need to be aware of how they can support each other. Although senior leaders must establish the values and the culture itself, its existence is reliant on individuals believing in the culture and furthering it. This can be achieved on a professional level by supporting those around them to grow in their roles with the necessary skills. It can also be achieved on a personal level, encouraging individuals to be open about any issues they are experiencing, and seek the necessary support.

Organisations rely on teamwork and communication. The more an organisation grows, the more it requires individuals to support each other. Without it, not only will new talent fail to develop as necessary, but the individuals already within the organisation will begin to regress. This is extremely detrimental for the mental health and wellbeing of all within the organisation. Recent studies indicate that 23% of organisation leaders are looking to address skill gaps and shortages. Through senior management supporting and passing on knowledge to others, they can create a self-sustaining cycle of training. This can result in reduced and minimised costs due to lower turnover rates and increased skill levels.

For individuals to effectively support each other they must feel confident to come together and collaborate on different objectives. Through establishing a culture of openness, where people can come forward with ideas and concerns, collaboration and support will naturally materialise. This may be within specific teams; this may be across departments. If the initial openness exists, communication and knowledge sharing will come as second nature. This will allow for new forms of communication to help with development such as constructive feedback. Without any anxiety about any stress caused by the feedback, individuals can learn more about their skillsets focus on the areas they need to further develop.

How to spot the signs of stress and poor mental health

Stress and declining mental health are not always clear and obvious, especially amongst workplace colleagues. This is why it is important to encourage your people to be open and to communicate clearly. It will allow individuals to feel comfortable to come forward with issues. This will help senior leadership learn more about individuals and better equip them to identify the key indicators of stress and poor mental health both in general and on a personal level.

Stress can affect people on a physical and mental level. It may disturb people’s sleeping patterns, cloud their judgement or even affect their appetite. When an individual experiences high levels of stress for a prolonged period of time, they will begin to experience burnout, which is a huge drain on productivity levels. The key signs of stress include:

• Irritation

• Struggles with decision making

• Skin reactions – rashes, hives, etc.

• Easily overwhelmed

Whilst a decline in mental health can have the same impact as high stress levels, it can be tougher to identify and may have far more concerning results. Stress can often be a trigger for a decline in mental health, but the decline can also be caused by a variety of factors, both in a person’s working and personal lives. The indicators for poor mental health include:

• Isolated and withdrawn

• Feeling anxious or worried

• Increased reliance on substances (alcohol, nicotine, etc.)

• Neglect and decreased performance (maintaining a diet, sleeping, hygiene, etc.)

Supporting staff to stay well and in work

Building and maintaining mentally healthy workplaces for individuals are two separate entities. Once a healthy working environment has been established, to further develop it, individuals need effective support. It is estimated that around 15% of working people in the UK exhibit symptoms of mental health conditions and, to add to that, 300,000 people in the UK with long-term mental health conditions lose their jobs each year.

Supporting individual wellbeing may be dependent on the environment. For example, neurodivergent individuals may require quiet spaces or noise-cancelling equipment to focus on their work. Without this, they may fall behind on work, leading to stress and anxiety. That is a key example of how there is a wide range of individuals who require support in a working environment and how their wellbeing requirements may vary.

Senior leadership should also engage in regular one-to-ones with individuals. This ensures they can track the professional development of individuals and gain an understanding of their personal wellbeing. Regularly partaking in these sessions enables decision makers to put processes in place and improve the standard of wellbeing for all people within the organisation.

As well as the previously mentioned methods regarding mental wellbeing, such as access to counselling, Mental Health First Aiders, and signposting to the necessary resources, leaders must consider physical wellbeing as it may have an impact on mental health. If individuals are offered physical wellbeing incentives such as cycle to work schemes, discounts with local gyms and healthy recipes, they will be better equipped to manage this aspect of their wellbeing. This is essential to maintaining a person’s mental health as physical and mental wellbeing exist in a symbiotic relationship.

How an EAP can help you build a mentally healthy workplace

Supporting individuals with their wellbeing is essential to organisational success and individual growth. However, for leadership, it is not always possible and is a difficult topic to broach. In certain instances, despite a culture of openness, clear signposting and procedures in place, individuals may not feel comfortable approaching their senior management. This is where an Employee Assistance Programme (EAP) can be vital. Using HA | Wisdom Wellbeing’s EAP, your people will have 24/7 access to accredited counselling who can provide expert support on a wide range of issues including work-based stress, personal relationships, finance and more. This service is available 365-days a year, so even when individuals are out of work, they can seek the appropriate support when senior leadership cannot provide as such. As well as this, leaders can be supported with life and leadership coaching so that they are better able to impart their knowledge to their people and create the previously mentioned self-sustaining supportive culture.

With access to the Wisdom App through our EAP, individuals can access a host of wellbeing resources. Resources such as step and hydration trackers allow them to focus on their physical wellbeing, accompanied with breathing exercises and healthy recipes to further support this aspect of their wellbeing. All this support and more are available through our EAP to help develop a healthy workplace culture.

Conclusion

It is vital that organisation leaders ensure a mentally healthy workplace culture for their people. It informs the direction and growth of their organisation going forward, enabling development, commitment and greater productivity. It is not always simple to develop, but it can be achieved and yields positivity for each level of an organisation.