Do wellbeing initiatives make employees feel worse?

Do wellbeing initiatives make employees feel worse?

University of Cambridge research has found that stress management classes, apps, coaching and other wellbeing events have no benefits for employee mental health.

Stress management classes, in particular, were found to lead to more stress. The findings come from an analysis of evidence from Britain’s Healthiest Workplace (26,471 employees working for 128 UK employers), comparing the wellbeing levels of those who participated in various wellbeing initiatives with those who had not.

The only staff who benefited were those who took part in volunteering or charity work.

Too convenient?

“These types of interventions appear to be a convenient option for employers concerned with mental health, including the government, which as an employer implements various wellbeing programmes throughout the civil service and NHS,” said researcher William Fleming.

“Merely offering short-term programmes or classes is not satisfactory for solving long-standing problems of worker wellbeing.”

Instead, employers need to be thinking more in terms of the working conditions and the role of management – the responsibility at the top not just the workforce.

“It should not be the role of employees to persistently address their own mental health, but that of management to comprehensively consider and address the structures of work which cause harm through stress, trauma and uncertainty.”

No short-term fixes

EAPA UK chair Eugene Farrell said: “That can be the problem with one-off classes or digital tools. They focus attention onto problems, make people self-conscious and focused on themselves and their state of mind. Sometimes that is going to mean more problems, not less – a greater sense of another duty and responsibility to do something about.

“We know from so many years of experience that employees are looking for an outlet for their built-up pressures. An independent source of support. Not just more attention to their performance and the need to somehow ‘perfect’ themselves. That means access to professional support and a route to solutions.”