There’s a shocking story in yesterday’s Guardian.
In summary, research carried out by Lime Insurance found that 51% of UK workers feel under pressure to put on a brave face at work, and four in 10 said they felt less mentally resilient since the covid crisis “Fewer than one in six (16%) said they felt their mental health was very well supported at work, despite 81% wanting their employers to give them help with their mental wellbeing.”
Read that again. Less than 16% of people feel their mental healthy is very well supported at work.
81% want their employers to do more to help with their mental health.
16% to 81% is a big gap. If you’re an employer, putting in a health support system for your people is going to be a big draw now, and into the future.
That means that not only are you supporting your workforce, but you’ll be attracting the best, because you’re offering what they need.
Although this survey was focussed on mental health, we shouldn’t forget that we’re holistic beings and that our physical health influences our emotional health, mental health, and vice versa. They are interlinked.
Our approach is to empower people with the tools and knowledge they need to improve their wellbeing across all these areas.
Here’s a simple example: our diet can directly impact our stress levels, with high sugar and ultra processed foods causing inflammation and impacting our gut biomes (which play a huge role in regulated our mood), which in turn then causes more stress, which in turn can push us into making more poor food choices…
We have to be aware that while any steps to address mental health at work should be applauded, we need to also address the multiple factors that can negatively impact employee health: physical, emotional and mental.
By providing simple tools and education you can improve your team’s heath (and with it performance, satisfaction and productivity) and start retaining and attracting great talent.
We’re privileged to be working with both SMEs and multi-nationals doing exactly this, and we’re passionate about helping people understand the complexities of wellbeing with simple solutions that can positively impact them quickly.
If you’d like to know more about our corporate work, get in touch.