With the theme of this World Mental Health Day (Thursday 10 October 2024) being ‘It’s time to prioritise mental health in the workplace’, Towergate Health & Protection is making a bold move and calling on employers to empower their employees with the tools and skills necessary to take responsibility for their own mental health.    

Debra Clark, head of wellbeing for Towergate Health & Protection, says: “Mental health needs to be prioritised in the workplace but this does not need to be a dictatorial approach. Employees should instead be supported by being given the means to take responsibility for their own mental health.”    

Providing the building blocks 

The workplace provides a great opportunity to put the building blocks in place for employees to take responsibility for their own health and wellbeing. The employer can support employees through a variety of wellbeing initiatives that cover the mental, physical, social and financial aspects of health and wellbeing, which together support overall good mental health.    

Resilience 

Courses and webinars are available that specifically aim to train employees to improve their resilience. These equip employees to cope better mentally and emotionally in a crisis, be able to recover more quickly from setbacks, and have the capacity to withstand challenging situations.  

Good mental health  

Apps for mindfulness, good sleep hygiene, and stress reduction are now widely available. While some of these can incur a cost, they are now often included in workplace wellbeing packages. Headspace, for example, is available within some healthcare offerings and includes guided meditation, sleep casts, and podcasts on everything impacting mental health, from money matters to fertility.  

Joint responsibility 

While it is the employee’s own responsibility to look after themselves – not smoke, not drink too much, exercise regularly, eat well, and so forth, the employer can also support them in all of these areas. This can be by providing smoking cessation support, guidance on alcohol consumption, gym membership, fitness apps and nutrition advice.    

Debra Clark says: “Good mental health in the workplace can and should be a mutually beneficial partnership. If the employer provides the right tools for the job, then this can help the employee to take greater responsibility for their own mental health. Improving mental health behaviours will result in less absenteeism, less presenteeism and so greater productivity and more profitable outcomes.”