No business can survive without its employees. Whether you’re a sole trader and the only employee is you, or you run a big corporation with hundreds of employees, they are the lifeblood of your business. They are the people who keep your business running, your customers happy and money coming in the door. If your employees are happy, healthy and engaged in their work, they’re going to produce better results for the business. So really, it’s in an employer’s best interest to provide mental health support for their employees from the very start, rather than waiting for things to reach boiling point.
Your Obligations As An Employer
As an employer, you have what’s known as a ‘duty of care’ towards your employees, which means you are expected to do everything you can to support your employee’s health, safety and wellbeing, within reason. That includes their mental health. In fact, you’re expected to treat mental health the same as physical health, with equal importance placed on both. This is where a lot of employers tend to fall down.
But let’s look at what the law says. According to The Equality Act 2010, someone with poor mental health or a mental health-related condition can be considered disabled if:
- Their condition has a substantial adverse effect on their life. For example, if they regularly can’t focus on their tasks, or it takes them longer to complete their tasks.
- It lasts, or is expected to last at least 12 months.
- Their condition affects their ability to do normal daily activities,
So you see, it’s all too easy for employers who don’t consider the mental health of their employees (or don’t care) to slip into discrimination territory and end up in a boatload of trouble. Which is why it pays to be proactive, not reactive.
Spotting The Signs Of Mental Health Problems
Remember, not everyone is going to show obvious signs of poor mental health. And it’s very important not to make assumptions about how people are doing, or take action on your own. However, just a few of the signs that someone might be struggling include:
- Appearing tired, anxious or withdrawn
- Increases in sickness absences or being late to work
- Changes in the standard of their work or their focus on tasks
- Being less interested in their tasks than they previously were
- Changes in usual behaviour, mood or how they act around the people they work with
Sometimes it can be difficult to spot these things, particularly if you have employees working from home. That’s why you need to have a team of managers who understand the seriousness of mental health issues, and who can spot the signs and offer support as soon as possible. If you have concerns about the mental health of an employee, then ensure you signpost the appropriate services, or contact us for support.
Make Sure You Address The Real Issues
This is a rookie error, and something so many businesses end up doing without really realising it. A group of managers will gather around a big table and talk about the issues they think are happening in their business, what problems their employees are facing and what actions they could take. And while that looks great on paper, there’s one big problem. The solutions always target what the managers think employees want, rather than what employees actually need. Which means you could be doing a lot of work without actually seeing any results. No one wants that!
Now, you could hold a big meeting and ask employees what support they felt they would need, and that would get you a bit closer. But there will always be some issues that employees won’t feel comfortable discussing in a group, with their managers or their teams in general – and these are often the issues that make the biggest difference to their working lives. This could be anything from deeply personal struggles all the way to bullying from a manager impacting their mental health (which happens more often than you would think). While businesses can put all sorts of wellness programmes in place to make life better for their employees, if the real issues aren’t being addressed, the problems are going to stay, fester and eventually cause people to leave you. So instead of dealing with what you can see, look deeper and try to find out what is actually bothering your employees, and what they actually want from you. If you need some help working out what that means, get in touch here.
‘But They Could Be Faking It…’
This is something we hear a lot from clients when we first come on board, and you’ll usually find these companies have the worst mental health among employees. Yes, sometimes employees might take a mental health day when they’re really just hungover. It’s no different to them taking a sick day for it and should be treated the same way. And if you have evidence to suggest that an employee is lying about their mental health (for example, their conduct doesn’t match their description of their issues), then an investigation is warranted.
But here’s the thing. Most employees would rather tell you they were sick, than admit to struggling with their mental health. So you’re more likely to have an employee taking lots of sick days and pretending to have food poisoning than taking mental health days when they aren’t really ill. Studies show that 1 in 2 workers would rather fake illness than disclose mental health issues, so faking mental health issues really should be at the bottom of your list of concerns!
You see, employee mental health isn’t just about acknowledging things are tough and making posts on mental health day. It’s about understanding the real issues your employees are facing every day, and taking steps to address them. Whether it’s burnout, bullying or a difficult manager – these are the issues that really matter. If you can demonstrate that your business is not only willing to have open, honest discussions and listen to concerns but willing to act on them as well, then you will find yourself with a happier, healthier workforce who understand you have their wellbeing at heart.
At vivoHR, we work with business owners to help them get their HR right from every angle. That includes making sure their employees are happy and healthy. If you have any concerns for the mental wellbeing of your team, vivoHR has trained mental health first aiders who would all be happy to help. Just get in touch and we can arrange a free consultation.