Your Employee’s Mental Health
Dear Friends,
In the past two weeks I have personally interviewed 2 individuals who struggled with mental/emotional health issues pre-COVID. In both cases, their employers let them go over it. Imagine all the mental and emotional issues currently brewing in the workforce right now?
Over the past 6 months, employees have been faced with historical portions of uncertainty brought on by the stress of the pandemic, isolation from the quarantine, political unrest, racial tensions, the inability to visit their friends and family and so on. This entire year has caused an enormous amount of stress and anxiety on every single person in some way.
This Fall will especially be difficult on working parents who likely will be tasked with homeschooling their children, which, I can assure you from personal experience, is WAY more difficult than any career demands they have. Not only will it be a huge distraction from their work productivity, it will be a huge stressor on them and their families.
I encourage you to take time to educate yourself on the topics of stress, anxiety, and overall mental health as it very well may be the biggest challenge your employees will ever face. Here are some suggestions:
Remind employees of the impact of their work. The #1 employee motivator is connecting employees with those that benefit from their work (Source: Harvard Business School). Why is what they do so important?
Over communicate with and listen to individual employees. Try not to lump all employee situations together. Instead, communicate with and listen to each of them as individuals. Develop a stress-reduction plan tailored for each employee if possible.
Look for the early warning signs of employee stress/distraction. Provide individual managers with a list of the early warning signs that alert them of increasing employee stress and anxiety. When a potential issue is identified, encourage managers and HR Partners to act proactively and positively.
Rachet up transparency and communication. Some anxiety is caused by uncertainty. Whenever possible, increase transparency so that employees are not surprised about company actions that affect their pay, benefits, and job security. It is crucial to go out of your way to fully explain “why things are happening” because that understanding helps build employee trust.
Flexibility. Encourage individual managers to increase job flexibility in work scheduling, work location, and paid time off so that employees have the flexibility to meet their changing needs.
Revisit your mental health benefits. Make everyone aware of your employee assistance program, bereavement, and other mental health benefits that you offer.
Here are a few resources I would recommend:
My wife, Dr. Sheryl Ziegler, is a Psychologist and was recently interviewed on 9News regarding the toll unemployment can take on your mental health.
Brad Feld, the Founder of Foundry Group and an incredibly well known Venture Capitalist and Author spends a lot of time writing about mental health as evident by his 46 blog posts on the topic.
Tim Ferris, a famous author, investor and a Podcaster has been interviewed regarding the depression issues he has faced.
Drop me a line with what future topics you would like me to address. Thanks!
Be well,
Steve