We recently spoke to 1,000 employees across multiple industries, across the UK, and were surprised to learn that fewer than half knew their employer had a mental health or workplace wellbeing policy. When you also learn that less than a quarter of respondents said their current workplace regularly engages with them on the subject you can see why real change is not being achieved.
Disappointingly for too many UK businesses mental health is simply becoming a tick-box exercise – they are most likely aware of a national problem but fail to recognise the impact on their own employees. The numbers don’t lie and with 42.4% of employees suffering from stress, 35.2% from anxiety, 34% sleep problems and 18% panic attacks, it’s not the occasional incident and business productivity will suffer if we don’t act now.
The main concerns for businesses are that of absence, staff retention and recruitment. Four in 10 UK workers suffering from a mental health related illness will take more than 10 days leave, while 45.6% said they would look for alternative employment if they felt their employer did not provide support in relation to mental health conditions. For a business of any description this is a significant burden to bear, especially if you’re an SME that needs every person to be operating at their optimum in order to succeed.
