What’s going to work in a national ‘ mental health recovery plan ’?

The 2022 Workplace Health Report commissioned by the NHS flags some worrying trends for employers: 58% of employees claiming to be experiencing mild symptoms of anxiety, and 18% that they have already been diagnosed with a mental health problem.

There is a gender divide. In the study, carried out by Champion Health, 37% of men reported symptoms of anxiety and 32% of depression, compared with 62% of women reporting anxiety and 61% of depression.

The main cause for stress was found to be levels of workload, followed by a ‘lack of control’, and ‘lack of support’. Outside of work, 30% of employees pointed to financial wellbeing as the biggest cause of stress.

On their own

Meanwhile, at the same time as more than half of employees are reporting mental wellbeing concerns post-Covid-19, relatively few are getting any support. Only 9% of employees say they are currently receiving support and treatment. 61% claim to have never received any kind of help. Three-quarters of those who have accessed support are women.

Sean Duggan, the CEO of the NHS Confederation’s Mental Health Network, is calling for the Government to map out a mental health recovery plan for the UK, looking at long-term policy and filling shortfalls in funding for NHS services.

Who’s on call?

“It’s critical that we, as a country, acknowledge that we’re living in a different world when it comes to mental wellbeing,” says EAPA UK chair Eugene Farrell.

“The Champion Health report urges employers to think about the causes of stress in their organisation, and how these can be mitigated with more reasonable workloads and targets — based on an assumption that if things do go wrong the NHS will be there to deal with mental illnesses.

“Experience shows there isn’t the capacity, waiting times for appointments and treatments can be very long, and employees are put off from getting any help at all.

“In this context, immediate support through an EAP is an essential. Confidential professional support that’s always available and provides a channel into counselling when it’s needed.”

Can wellbeing be a priority at the same time as post-pandemic growth?

Fewer than a quarter of managers in new research say that employee mental wellbeing is a priority for them in 2022.

The research by King’s College London an South Westminster Business Alliance also suggests that managers are also aware of their own shortcomings: 78% agreed they wouldn’t be able to spot the signs of struggles with mental health among their teams. The main causes of issues were found to be related to work rather than home.

Hybrid working, it was discovered, just makes the signs of poor mental health among employees harder to spot.

Troubles ahead

The findings come at a time when growing financial pressures — from spiking energy bills and inflation generally — are likely to bring more stresses on employees and their relationships.

King’s College researchers suggest the coming months are a critical time for establishing good processes of support. “There is increasing awareness of the rise in mental health challenges, which have been accelerated by the pandemic. It is a crucial moment in time for employees returning to hybrid working, so is vital that businesses do all they can to support,” said Lucy Strang, Research Associate at the Policy Institute, King’s College London.

“Our research finds that participating companies were advocating health and wellbeing checks, so it is encouraging that given time and resource required that they can deliver and better support employees.”

How growth happens

“Businesses in 2022 are certainly prioritising growth and recovery,” says EAPA UK chair Eugene Farrell.

“The question is whether an issue like employee wellbeing gets lost in the drive for implementing the necessary changes and hikes in effort. In many ways, the ability of organisations to grow will be based on resilience, the breadth and depth of staff — their engagement and performance. And ultimately all of those things depend on wellbeing and making sure managers and the workplace culture  overall is set up to help.”

A third of employers are still not talking about mental health

In the second year of the global pandemic — when more employees were struggling with the fall-out from all the initial threats and disruption, the disconnection from routines and colleagues, and no end to problems in sight — all employers would have been expected to step up their attention to people’s wellbeing.

Through a YouGov poll, the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (Acas) asked employers whether they had talked in person to staff about mental wellbeing in the past year. 

Making contact

The survey findings, gathered in time for February’s ‘Time to Talk Day’, showed that more than a third, 35% had not brought the subject up with people (3% didn’t know or couldn’t remember, and another 3% preferred not to say).

In response, Acas has called for employers to make sure they are “approachable, available and encourage team members to talk”, as well as keeping in regular contact with remote and hybrid workers. It has also highlighted the importance of meeting individual needs for different methods of talking — via phone, email or video call.

Value of being pro-active

“The past two years have seen a real focus from HR teams on wellbeing as a whole — but that doesn’t mean the box has been ticked on mental health,” says EAPA UK chair Eugene Farrell. “Occasional awareness campaigns aren’t enough.”

“Steep rises in the use of EAP services in 2021 have been one signal of how employees have needed professional support and people to talk with confidentially. Our latest research at EAPA also shows how the more pro-active employers are in promoting their EAP the bigger the ROI, £8.00 for every £1.00 spent on average, but up to more than £15.00 for some of the most engaged EAP-users.”

A third of employers are still not talking about mental health – EAPA UK

Why a four-day week won’t transform workplace wellbeing

A group of around 30 companies across the UK are taking part in a new trial of a four-day working week.

The pilot is being carried out by the 4 Day Week Global partnership made up of the University of Cambridge, University of Oxford, the Autonomy think tank and Boston College. Under the six month scheme, employees will be given the same pay but will also be expected to deliver the same degree of productivity.

The UK project follows in the footsteps of Iceland where working hours were cut to 35-36 each week for 2,500 workers. An analysis of the outcomes showed how there had been rises in both productivity and wellbeing. Scotland announced plans for its own trial in 2021.

Output focus

The pilot is seen as having the potential to being about a step-change in the nature of work. According to the 4 Day Week website: “The UK works longer hours than most of Europe. It is not making us more productive. It is making us stressed, over-worked and burnt out.

“The four-day week challenges the current model of work and helps companies move away from simply measuring how long people are ‘at work’, to a sharper focus on the output being produced. 2022 will be the year that heralds in this bold new future of work.”

Research backs up the value of shorter working hours to UK staff. A survey by Censuswide for ClickUp found that almost a third were “actively looking for a four-day week” or have already agreed one with their employer.

No silver bullet

“Presenteeism isn’t healthy for anyone, so a more flexible attitude to working hours, with more focus on getting work done rather than time spent at a desk has to be a step forward,” says EAPA UK chair Eugene Farrell.

“At the same time it’s important that HR and employers are clear about what offering shorter hours actually means in practice. Encouraging good mental health isn’t so simple as a four day week, as we’ve seen from more people working from home.

“On the surface WFH means flexibility, more time for family and friends. But it also means no divide between home and work. Sometimes a greater sense of pressure. Isolation. More people working longer without noticing. And what about when extra time at home only exacerbates worries and concerns around relationships or finances?

“Four day weeks may well be a significant part of the future of work for many, but in terms of wellbeing it’ll just be one factor in a complicated picture where listening and understanding individual situations will continue to be critical.”

Why the overworking ‘cult’ lives on

“We dehumanised the workplace a long time ago,” says Anat Lechner, New York University’s clinical associate professor of management.

“For many companies, it’s still: ‘If you don’t work, then someone else will come along and do it. And if that’s not gonna help, we’ll allocate it to the AI. And if the AI takes over, we’ll put together a gig workforce.’

Academics are pointing to this year as a critical crossroads for society as a whole. Is wellbeing really a priority, or as we learn to live with Covid-19, do we re-focus on work and careers and what will impress bosses? Management experts argue that we’re not entering a new period where health at work comes first at all: the cult of overworking is too strong, and nothing has really changed.

Since the start of the pandemic, figures suggest working weeks have only got longer for many workers.

“It’s not necessarily a message people like to hear,” Lechner points out. “They think they enter a relationship with an employer where the relationship says, ‘I work hard, you take care of me’. Again, this is a 20th Century mindset.”

Why we overwork

Historically, there are a range of reasons why overworking has gained in status and acceptance. Most recently, since the 1980s, there has been a romanticisation of work — especially among middle class knowledge workers — in films, TV and media generally. Overworking has been seen as being part of a successful life; the busier people are, the less they sleep even, the more glamorous their life.

“Workplaces can be very unhealthy environments – if there was any time to change the way we work, now is the time to do it,” according to Christina Maslach, professor emerita of psychology at the University of California. “If you take a plant and put it in a pot and don’t water it and give it lousy soil and not enough sun, I don’t care how gorgeous the plant was to begin with – it isn’t going to thrive.”

Practical wellbeing

“Nothing good will come from pretending that the new rafts of wellbeing programmes being introduced by employers are an answer in themselves,” says EAPA UK chair Eugene Farrell.

“And hybrid working hasn’t necessarily meant less stress. In many ways the UK workforce is just feeling more pressures generally: the pressure to renew their levels of performance post-crisis, as well as pressure to take care of their wellbeing.

“For wellbeing to truly be a priority there has to be a level of trade-off in terms of working hours and performance targets, the expectations of management, so that for the longer-term our relationship with work becomes healthier. No more boom and bust.”

Will workplace friendships survive in the remote and virtual worlds?

Asked what has most affected their mental health, 41% of WFH staff in a Gazprom survey said it was not being able to socialise with their colleagues.

Shasta Nelson is author of The Business of Friendship: Making the Most of Our Relationships Where We Spend Most of Our Time. “Work is the number one place where people make friends,” she says. “Loneliness has been proven not only to contribute to health issues and unhappiness, but also to impact workplace productivity, employee retention, innovation, and the company’s profitability. Research has shown that loneliness in the workplace can lead to an increase of absenteeism by nearly 37%, and a 16% decrease in profitability with a 65% decrease in share price over time.

“We’re more likely to be lonely at work if we’re a new hire, senior leader, male, Hispanic or African American, in poor or fair physical or mental health, Generation Z or Millennial, or working remote.”

Arranging friends

Employers have been finding new ways to encourage socialising, even if it means sticking to Zoom or Teams.

Trayport, an energy trading software firm, won the 2021 Employee Benefits award for supporting employees during the pandemic. The response of HR included a ‘working from home doesn’t mean working alone’ wellbeing campaign. Trayport arranged new online activities linked to a wellbeing theme each week, as well as quizzes and other entertainments like a magician. The wellbeing offering was expanded to include virtual classes in yoga, mindfulness and fitness.

Other employers have set up virtual happy hours for after work catch-ups, team games and encouraged the use of chat forums for casual chit-chat.

Who’s listening now?

“Organised events for socialising are one thing — but the reason why so many friendships are made at work, and why those relationships are so valued, is that they weren’t the result of formal, organised activity,” comments EAPA UK chair Eugene Farrell.

“The moments over cups of coffee and meeting on the stairs were where people were just being themselves. Sometimes it was just the chance to let off steam about demands from the boss, to step outside work roles and identities, that kept people feeling human.

“The concern must be that if people aren’t able to make or keep up face-to-face friendships then they don’t have those colleagues who they can take into their confidence. There’s even fewer people they can share their worries with, about work or home life.

“In this context, the EAP is an even more important listening service, making sure everyone has an outlet for talking openly and in confidence with a friendly, well-informed supporter.”

Will workplace friendships survive in the remote and virtual worlds? EAPA UK

Why do employees feel like mental health support has been disappearing through Covid-19?

FutureLearn research found that the great majority of employers didn’t offer any mental health support in the workplace (68%). Since the start of the Covid-19 crisis this figure has increased — but only to 58%. One in five of the 1,000 UK businesses surveyed said they were looking to re-evaluate their mental health policies.

Meanwhile, a study from Mercer Marsh Benefits among 332 UK HR and reward professionals and 162 staff has suggested that only around half of employees felt they received the support they needed during the pandemic. This is despite spending on benefits having increased considerably over the past two years. 78% didn’t think benefits had changed while in reality most had introduced new wellbeing offerings.

Second and third waves

Ongoing awareness of practical, everyday mental health support is becoming more rather than less important because of the dangers of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The NHS expects there to be 230,000 new cases of PTSD as a result of the pandemic.

“It is vital that anyone exposed to traumatic events is properly supported at work and home. Early and effective support can reduce the likelihood of PTSD,” says Professor Neil Green Greenberg, Royal College of Psychiatrists.

“Students of previous pandemics will also know that the mental health burden often lags several years behind infectious disease because getting back to normal is challenging for many people. This is the second, silent pandemic.”

Needing more

“Perceptions of mental health support at work have changed,” said EAPA UK chair [https://www.eapa.org.uk/] Eugene Farrell. “What might have looked and felt like a solid example of services, signposting to advice resources and digital content, has become a disappointment.

“People are expecting more. Especially in a context where they’re being told their employer is investing more than ever into health and wellbeing, and in many cases the fall-out from the pandemic is only just starting to have a real impact. So that means making sure that the full range of EAP services are in place, and that communications and awareness of what that means, how services can and should be used, are everywhere and a priority through all channels.”

Why do employees feel like mental health support has been disappearing through Covid-19? EAPA UK

What will it take for men to start opening up on health?

Almost half of men say their mental health has declined during the pandemic, claims research carried out for Men’s Health Awareness Month.

Worse — 60% say they wouldn’t talk about mental health issues because of fears around what it would mean for their career.

Men’s health in general continues be a picture of challenges, many of which could be addressed by earlier and more honest conversations about health. One in five men die before they reach 65: suicide remains the biggest cause of death for men under 45; 67% of men are overweight or obese. Testicular and prostate cancer continue to be common threats despite being treatable conditions that need to be caught early.

Breaking barriers

This year’s International Men’s Day has focused on the importance of relationships between men and women, how bridging the gaps between the sexes will help with attitudes and perceptions towards men. Research by social scientists has shown how children with supportive fathers grow up happier and more secure.

What can employers do without pushing advice onto a male workforce that can already be flippant or sceptical when it comes to health campaigns?

Flexi-men

“In times of stress and crisis, a man still wants to see themselves as the rock, strong and dependable,” says EAPA UK chair Eugene Farrell.

“They think they can’t show weakness in case that affects their prospects at work and how people think of them at home. Nothing is ever that simple, and so real problems around health that might start out minor, get ignored or denied.

“It’s all about helping men be more flexible and adaptable. Not so much a rigid rock of strength, but able to stretch and change when needed. Employers can help by simply making sure all staff get breaks and lunchtimes, are given the space and time outside of everyday pressures to keep in touch with how they’re feeling and to do something about it.

“Until the male cultural identity evolves further, the anonymity of the EAP and its direct link to professional advice continues to be important for men in particular.”

Will banning out-of-hours contact stop the rise of burnout?

New laws in Portugal mean employers can’t email, phone or message their workers outside of their contracted hours.

The sudden rise in the numbers of Portuguese working remotely has led to a re-think over conditions and the impact on employee health. The legislation also means employers can’t monitor staff activity at home, and they must provide the necessary equipment and pay a star of electricity and Internet bills.

Burnout begins

The move comes at a time as more governments become more aware of the new combinations of pressures facing employees.

New studies suggest that employers are only just beginning to see the consequences of the months of stress, overworking and disruption caused by the pandemic. A Glassdoor analysis of reviews suggests a 128% increase in people talking in terms of ‘burnout’ since April 2021 — most of all in the technology, business and finance sectors. According to Jill Cotton, careers advice expert at Glassdoor: “Many employees have been able to ‘grin and bear’ the impact of Covid-19 through 2020, but the one-year anniversary has proven to be a tipping point. They’re thinking again about their home and work lives, and we’re seeing UK job vacancies reach a record high due to the ‘Great Resignation’.”

Workplace culture specialist O.C. Tanner Europe found the pandemic had contributed to a 15% global rise in burnout, a figure which jumps to 81% among lower-performing company cultures. Its 2020 Global Culture Report claims that even mild burnout causes a 220% decrease in the probability of employees being highly engaged.

Signs of flames

EAPA UK chair Eugene Farrell said: “Employers need to recognise that in many ways, a year on from the new emergency and peak in problems, the crisis in employee mental health is only just starting. There has to be agreement at top levels over what to do about employee burnout, the need to ensure there’s a sense of collective responsibility, bosses and staff looking out for each other.

“The EAP is an essential in terms of making sure everyone has access to practical support and advice, that no-one has to feel like there’s nowhere to go without having awkward conversations with a line manager.

“But there’s also a need for HR and management attention to workplace cultures: do employees have a sense of control over their workload and practices; are they encouraged to take leave for rest and re-charging; do people feel able to just take a short break away from their screens, have a walk at lunchtimes and get proper breaks?”

Will banning out-of-hours contact stop the rise of burnout? EAPA UK

Why staff keep bullying and discrimination to themselves

A survey by law firm Bolt Burdon Kemp among 2,000 UK workers has suggested that just half think their employer will take their complaints of bullying, discrimination or harassment seriously.

Staff worry about how managers and HR will respond to their complaints, and what the implications will be for how they are perceived and their careers. Meanwhile, when problems are left unaddressed, the strains increase, relationships break down, and there are ripples of effects across teams and workplaces.

The study found that 59% of employees felt it was too expensive to turn to a professional law firm; 52% that there were too many barriers to getting legal support. Only 41% were comfortable with approaching a law firm at all.

The discrimination map

Data from last year points to widespread potential problems. A Key Law study found that more than a third of employees had either seen or experienced bullying themselves in the past three years.

A nationwide study by YouGov for Indeed in 2021 has claimed that London is they city where staff are most likely to be subject to discrimination (up to 30%). Then comes Northern Ireland (29%) and the Midlands (28%). The national average is 23%. The problems are far greater for people with minority ethnic backgrounds (where the figure relating to those likely to experience discrimination rises to 49%); people who are LGBT+ (47%) and those people with a disability (33%).

Always listening

EAPA UK chair Eugene Farrell said: “Listening to an employee’s concerns is a central part of the employer’s duty of care. Bottling up problems, whether it’s the result of issues at home or at work, is never helpful for either side. That’s why there have to be open channels for people to talk and access the advice they need.

“Just to have the option of opening up to a line manager on one hand, or going straight to a lawyer on the other, is no way to encourage a healthy workplace culture. Impartiality and independence is the critical thing. EAPs are always there to provide that early support, a bridge to defusing the most difficult situations.”