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December 04, 2024
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- Employees now expect mental health resources. Use these support strategies to make sure your tools have an impact.
Employees now expect mental health resources. Use these support strategies to make sure your tools have an impact.
To help your employees address their mental health, your resources can’t just exist—they need to be properly supported and tailored to your unique needs. Whether you already have tools in place or you are just starting to develop your strategy, here are a few tips for making sure your mental health initiatives are a success.
When it comes to supporting employee mental health, robust resources and strategy are more important than ever. The events of the past year have put employee wellbeing through the wringer:
90%
of employees now report that their workplace stress affects their mental health.
60%
of employees do not feel they receive adequate support from supervisors to help manage stress.
66%
of employers expect a mental health crisis in the United States within a year.
But to help your employees address their mental health, your resources can’t just exist—they need to be properly supported and tailored to your unique needs. Whether you already have tools in place or you are just starting to develop your strategy, here are a few tips for making sure your mental health initiatives are a success.
Leadership involvement is key
“Eighty-eight percent of employees appreciate when their leadership discusses mental health, but only 35%... said that leadership actually does talk about it.” Simply put, leadership support of mental wellness matters. Here are three suggestions for meaningful leadership involvement in promoting your company’s wellbeing and mental health resources:
- Train leaders to recognize warning signs of depression and too much stress. Helping employees address mental health issues before they get out of hand is a meaningful way to turn your genuine care about your employees into action.
- Build a culture of connection by checking in regularly. And make sure to give your managers the workload capacity to make these interactions meaningful. A genuine back and forth will develop lasting employee trust and make managers less likely to miss any warning signs on display.
- Expect managers to model healthy behaviors, so your employees know they can prioritize self-care. Having robust tools in place won’t matter if your leaders seem to value working extra hours or meeting improbable expectations. Managers can encourage employees to practice self-care simply through living by example.
Use non-traditional strategies to meet your company’s unique needs
53%
of all workers now feel mental health benefits are essential following the events of the past year.
And because mental wellness resources are an even higher priority among millennial employees, that number is only going to grow.
But how you go beyond traditional benefits and provide those resources should depend on your industry, unique company culture, and specific employee needs. Offering a few mental health hours each week, providing expert financial wellness resources, providing a student loan assistance program, an opportunity for daycare reimbursement—these can all be great ways to engage your employees with their health and your company’s culture. It’s all about determining the right strategy for you.
Make it easy to access resources
Quick and well-promoted access to your third-party benefits providers, EAP resources, and more can help improve employees’ mental healthcare access, lower healthcare costs, and increase employee productivity. It’s also why Navigate recently launch our Ecosystem Partnership Program—to offer even deeper, more comprehensive options to clients, including the opportunity to use Total Brain’s science-backed mental health and brain performance self-monitoring and self-care platform.
Want to learn more about the state of employee mental wellbeing?
Watch our Speaker Series session on mental health as a panel of experts discuss how to address mental health concerns in the workplace even after the pandemic has subsided.
Sources
https://www.mhanational.org/mind-workplace
