Mental health at work: A Founder’s Guide

Introduction

Do you know that 15% of working adults have a mental disorder? While the COVID-19 pandemic has made mental health at work the spotlight of most workplace-related conversations, employees’ mental health was still a major issue before the pandemic. Mental health conditions can occur whether or not work has causally contributed to them. 

Poor mental health adversely affects your employee’s cognitive, emotional, behavioral, social, and relational well-being and functioning. It also affects their physical health, personal identity, and well-being as related to work. Your employee’s capacity to engage at work is consequently lessened as their productivity and performance are affected. Lost productivity results in financial costs and affects them and you and, by extension, the business. 

Founders like you need to start looking at employee well-being not only from the perspective of a ‘bonus’ but from a ‘benefit.’ Boosting your employees’ well-being should be considered as a benefit similar to those of health insurance, incentives, and more. This creates more value for the organization, improves talent attraction and retention, and creates an enabling work environment.

Key takeaways

• Mental health conditions can impact an employee’s cognitive, emotional, behavioral, social, and relational well-being, leading to reduced productivity and performance at work.
• Founders should consider employee well-being as a benefit, creating more value for the organization, improving talent attraction and retention, and creating an enabling work environment.
• Founders should create a reliable two-way communication channel and adopt practices that focus on the causes of mental health, not just symptoms.
• Protecting and promoting mental health can be achieved through clear policies and procedures, wellness programs, and partnering with providers of mental healthcare.
• Founders should facilitate work conditions that support mental health, including adapting to the working environment, offering support programs for returning to work, and assisting employment initiatives.

Founders, sign up for our workshop to learn how to handle difficult conversations with your team about their mental health.

Register for free

A Founder’s role in valuing mental health at work

As the Founder, two ways of valuing the mental well-being of your employees are creating a reliable two-way channel of communication and adopting practices that not only focus on the symptoms but also the causes of mental health. Let’s dive a bit deeper into these.

Open dialogue on mental health

One thing that you don’t want to struggle with is providing your employees with psychological safety and a reliable communication channel to speak out. The key to doing this is exhaustive communication which is done through regular employee engagement. Additionally, the importance of the involvement of the leadership and senior management cannot be stressed enough. Psychological safety will only be created when your employees see leaders like you speak out about mental health at work.

Causes rather than symptoms

None of us can avoid workplace stress at all times. However, it is important how quickly we, or rather, your employees recover from such stress and its impact. Your employees are expecting you to adopt practices that support and improve their mental well-being at work. These include flexible working options, daycare services, and policies for fair compensation. While talking about mental health at work, focus on what causes such issues at work and how can contribute to alleviating them instead of waiting for the symptoms to appear and then providing support to treat them.

Learn how to ensure the mental well-being of your employees at work

3 ways to protect and promote mental health at work

Your employees are undoubtedly questioning your role in protecting and promoting mental health at work. While there are many ways in which you can do that, the top 5 include – clear policies and procedures; wellness programs; and partnering with providers of mental healthcare. Let’s look into these in a bit more detail:

1. Establish clear policies

An increase in stress levels can lead to disruptive behavior in your employees that also affects their work. To overcome this challenge, your company can have clear policies on what classifies as disruptive behavior. This will signal that an employee is not in the right mindset to work. Moreover, the policy can also enlist any processes for leaves, professional assessment and evaluation support, and conditions to return to work.

2. Organize wellness programs

Organizing wellness programs for mental health at work will help your team manage stress levels and other skills that contribute to resiliency. Your team may hesitate to participate in these programs due to discomfort in disclosing their concerns related to mental health, rigid work schedules, or the inability to find value. To face this challenge, ensure that you involve your team in deciding which programs to adopt.

3. Get external support from experts

Not all your employees might show clear signs of mental health problems. For some people, challenges in their personal lives can bleed into their professional lives. In such cases, it is best to refer such team members to mental healthcare experts for proper evaluation and support. You can also provide access to employee assistance programs to your team that provides confidential and effective support.

To some extent, the pandemic has given way to an ‘always-on’ and pervasive way of working. As much as boundaries between work and personal life have started to blur, your employees want to cling to work-life balance even more. This way, the pandemic has worsened the difficulties that many of us were already experiencing.

Facilitate work conditions to support mental health at work

Your employees have the right to participate fairly and fully in the workplace. As the Founder, there is a lot you can do to accommodate sustainable working conditions that support your employees who struggle with their mental health. Some of them are adapting the working environment to their capacity, supportive programs for returning to work, and assisted employment initiatives.

Adapting working environment

Workplaces can be tailored to the abilities, needs, and preferences of employees with mental health conditions. Giving specific employees flexible work schedules, more time to finish tasks, stress-reducing modifications to assignments, time off for medical appointments, or routinely encouraging meetings with managers are a few examples.

Support programs for returning to work

To assist workers in meaningfully returning to work following an absence caused by a mental health problem, return-to-work programs that provide phased re-entry and reasonable accommodations with ongoing clinical care also help.

Employment initiatives assistance

Initiatives for supported employment help people with serious mental illnesses find employment opportunities and sustain them through continuous mental health support and employee assistance programs.

Find out how DEI mandates impact mental health in the workplace

Creating an enabling and inclusive work environment

Creating a conducive environment for change can enhance mental health at work. Founders like you, with the input of relevant stakeholders, can play a crucial role in this process. In practice, this involves enhancing:

1. Leadership and commitment to mental health at work by integrating it into relevant policies
2. Investment in adequate resources, such as dedicated budgets, to improve mental health at work and provide mental health and employment services to under-resourced companies
3. Rights for workers to participate in employment by aligning employment laws with international human rights instruments and enforcing non-discrimination policies
4. Integration of mental health into existing occupational safety and health systems across sectors
5. Involvement of workers in decision-making by conducting meaningful and timely consultations with workers, representatives, and individuals with mental health conditions
6. Evidence-based actions, including the latest guidance on psychosocial risks and intervention effectiveness
7. Compliance with labor laws and regulations, including the integration of mental health into the obligations of national labor inspectorates and other compliance mechanisms

How can Ungender help you?

At Ungender, our team of experts advises that safeguarding and advancing mental health at work involves enhancing the ability to identify and address mental health issues at work, particularly for those in managerial positions who oversee others. To protect mental health and promote the well-being of your team, we: 

1. Provide mental health training for managers, which equips them with the ability to recognize and handle emotional distress among their supervisees and enhances their communication and listening skills
2. Conduct training for workers to enhance their knowledge of mental health and reduce stigmatization of mental health conditions in the workplace 
3. Offer interventions for individuals to develop stress management skills and alleviate mental health symptoms

Join us in our online workshop and learn how to support your team through tough times.

Sign up for free

FAQs

What is mental health in the workplace?

Mental health in the workplace refers to an individual’s emotional, psychological, and social well-being in a work setting. It involves the ability to manage stress, work productively, and interact positively with colleagues.

How mental health affects you at work?

Poor mental health can negatively impact an individual’s work performance, resulting in absenteeism, decreased productivity, and reduced job satisfaction. It can also cause physical symptoms, such as headaches, fatigue, and difficulty concentrating, which can affect job performance.

What causes poor mental health in the workplace?

Poor mental health in the workplace can be caused by various factors, including high job demands, low job control, poor relationships with colleagues or supervisors, a lack of support, and job insecurity. Personal factors, such as financial problems or family issues, can also contribute.

How to improve mental health?

Ways to improve mental health include practicing self-care, such as exercise, healthy eating, getting enough sleep, seeking professional help when needed, practicing relaxation techniques, setting realistic goals, and maintaining a work-life balance.

How do you talk to an unhappy employee?

To talk to an unhappy employee, listen actively, show empathy, and acknowledge their concerns. Try to identify the root cause of their unhappiness, provide support, and offer solutions to help them address their issues. Follow up to ensure that their concerns have been addressed and to offer continued support.