There seems to be a real focus on getting a mental health first aider in every workplace now, with some advocating bringing in a legal requirement. Mental Health First Aid in Scotland and England claim to have already reached over 400,000 individuals in the UK. Why then, have the statistics on mental health at work shown decline and are currently at their worst ever with 57% of all work-related illness now down to mental health issues? (source: hse.gov.uk).
I am not suggesting that this is a reflection of the mental health “first aid” concept as I have no issue with organisations sending people on mental health first aid courses, spending money on mindfulness courses, webinars or any other intervention that educates appropriately. But, education alone does not solve the root cause of mental health issues at work. If the cause remains, no amount of spotting symptoms will provide long term change.
In addition to establishing a financial business case, one of the reasons stopping organisations from doing anything (according to Deloitte in 2018) was “the lack of collective knowledge of best practice”.
What does that mean?
Best practice is defined as “commercial or professional procedures that are accepted or prescribed as being correct or most effective”. Ok, that makes sense. Organisations want to be able to do what’s most effective. The problem is, what is effective for one organisation is not necessarily the same for another. It’s a bit of a following the herd problem, which is very corporate in nature, find what works for one and everybody jump on the band wagon. I get it, I’ve come from that environment and now I can see just how hard it is for organisations to get mental health at work right.
At Mind and Mission we believe that there is no collective best practice, only best practice for your organisation.
There are some policies which will work in every organisation, for example ensuring your staff have a voice and eliminating outdated people policies like absence triggered performance conversations. What will really make a difference is working out what the issues are specific to your organisation, sector, industry, demographic, size and culture (to name a few). Once you really get a handle on the issues and know what your employees think about their roles, workload, performance and working relationships, then you can begin to establish the best plan of action to tackle and permanently address workplace mental illness.
This is the primary focus of our programme at Mind & Mission. Working with leadership to really stay ahead of the curve.
