Global mental health crisis hits workplaces

The mental health pandemic is engulfing workplaces around the world, with financial services one of the hardest-hit sectors, businesses and economists have warned.

Deloitte research this year found that the proportion of UK staff suffering from all three key signs of burnout – fatigue, poor performance and emotional distance from work – was 17% in finance and insurance. However, the average was 12%. across all fields.

It added that the average annual cost of poor mental health per employee in the finance and insurance industry was £5,379, more than double that of the other 14 sectors covered.

This report adds to the growing body of research on the impact of the global mental health crisis on businesses and workplaces.

According to the World Health Organization and the International Labor Organization, approximately 12 billion working days are lost each year due to depression and anxiety, costing the global economy $1 trillion annually.

Kate Pickett, a professor of epidemiology at the University of York in the UK, said: “The scale of the problem is very worrying, especially among young people.”

“We ask whether we are simply measuring more mental illness because people are more willing to report it,” she added. “But the increase is so large that something real is happening.”

The factors contributing to the global mental health crisis range from the cost of living to the prevalence of social media. However, companies are increasingly looking at ways to promote the health of their employees.

John Flint, former HSBC chief executive and head of the UK’s New Wealth Fund, said: “Leaders must be prepared to host more dialogue on the full spectrum of mental health.” he told the Financial Times.

A WHO study found that cases of depression increased by 25% globally from 2020 to 2021, with COVID-19 exacerbating a long-term decline in mental health since the 2000s.

“We are still not back to pre-pandemic levels,” said WHO mental health expert Dan Chisholm. “Some people are still suffering from a severe hangover from the pandemic.”

Elizabeth Hampson, partner leading the research at Deloitte, said the deterioration in young people’s well-being is adding to the pressure on working parents, increasing from one in nine in 2017 to one in five by 2023. of children suspected of having a mental health disorder.

She added that parents’ concerns about their children’s mental health cost UK employers £8bn a year.

A global survey of 12,200 employees conducted by the international business partnership MindForward Alliance also found that mental health problems are more common in financial firms and law firms than in most other industries. It turned out to be true.

However, these sectors were found to be more committed than others to promoting mental health.

Alison Anstead, chief executive of MindForward, which works with companies to promote employee health, found that 85% of employees felt supported when executives openly addressed the issue. In contrast, only 31% said they did not.

Rob Jupp, chief executive of Brightstar Group, has battled depression since childhood and has made the mental health of his employees a top priority at his British specialist finance company.

“It’s embarrassing that we’ve been out of business for so long,” he said. “When I was a kid, it wasn’t acceptable to mention mental health. Then I started talking about it and felt much better.”

He added that employees meet monthly with a life coach and the company has had mental health first aiders in place for years.

Brightstar data shows that investing in mental health development pays off in terms of improved employee retention, reduced sick leave, and increased productivity compared to comparable companies. percentage higher, Jupp said.

A recent study by researchers at the University of Oxford uses data from job site Indeed to make the business case for investing in improving mental health in the workplace.

An analysis of responses from 1 million employees of 1,782 publicly traded companies in the United States found that there was a “strong positive relationship between employee health and company performance,” said a professor of economics at the University of Oxford. said Jean-Emmanuel de Neve, project leader.

We simulated the stock portfolios of the 100 highest-scoring companies in Indeed’s happiness survey and consistently outperformed major stock market indexes.

“We’ve found that how people feel at work is always a good leading indicator of future market and financial performance,” says De Neve. Since January 2021, the portfolio has performed 11% better than the S&P 500, he added.

But after major strides were made in improving workplace mental health, some activists like Anstead have expressed concerns about the backlash against “woke” attitudes and the belief that such concerns will further foster mental health disorders. , warns that there are worrying signs of a reversal.

“People are starting to use terms like ‘snowflake’ and blame mental health for economic inactivity, and there’s a lot of unhelpful rhetoric going around,” she says.

“We are concerned that this will lead to increased stigma and deter people from speaking up on this matter. This is a challenge for us and our business partners, but we will continue to fight. ”

Additional reporting by Michael Peel