If you’re part of a business that is driven by profit, it’s likely this question may pop up when the discussion of training or employee initiatives comes up.
In this article, we’ll look at why investing in your employees’ mental wellbeing can impact the bottom line and how it can create a more effective team.
When working with a mental health first aider, employees have been known to increase productiveness, efficiency, and even decided to stay with businesses for much longer than they would have if they didn’t get this support.
Meaning no need for replacing them, no need for retraining others, or no need for someone else to pick up the slack on project delivery or workload which would have been left behind.
CFO: “What happens if we invest in our people and they leave?”
CEO: “What happens if we don’t and they stay?
Having mental wellbeing initiatives increases morale around the workplace as employees know that employers care for them with the knowledge that there is support if they need it.
In January 2020 Deloitte brought out an ROI survey that looked at the link between the mental wellbeing of staff and the companies finances.
With a sixth of workers experiencing a mental health problem at any given time. It was found that poor mental health not only contributed to half of all sick days taken but has cost the UK up to £45billion.
The report went on to summarise an average of £5 return on every £1 spent by businesses in the UK on the mental wellbeing of their staff.
If the type of work and deadlines you’re setting your staff or the workplace environment you’re putting them in is causing mental health issues. It’s worth asking yourself the following question:
“Do you have a responsibility to look after the welfare of your employees?”
If the answer is yes, then you may be morally obliged to support your staff with their mental wellbeing. But don’t worry – with an organisation such as Red Umbrella and Care Coins, it’s much easier than ever before.
With so much already going on – it can be an additional burden for leaders of organisations to become their teams’ therapist every time there is an issue. Honestly, in most cases, leaders aren’t trained for this and it’s certainly not why they signed up for the job.
The implementation of Mental Health First Aiders across your organisation will provide team leaders with the support they need when one of their team comes to them with a mental health issue. Meaning they don’t carry the burden of trying to ‘figure out’ the best way to go about the problem (which they could get wrong) and allows them to focus on what they’re there for – driving their teams success.
It also means that they do not get overwhelmed or stressed when they have to listen to their workforces problems (as they’re not the best person for this – a specialist is) this can then trickle down and they can even become better people to work for.
In today’s world, there is really no reason to have to choose between having internal mental health first aiders (MHFAider) or access to professional therapists. The MHFAider should be the first point of call and be there to support, listen and signpost, if they then believe the person they’re talking to needs additional support – they can refer them to a trained professional therapist, so basically the answer is you need both.
Organisations such as Care Coins also enable your business to not only provide 121 support with therapists when it’s needed but also offer 121 life coaches for your leaders, and much more, check out www.carecoins.co.uk
As Sir Richard Branson once said: “Train people well enough so they can leave, but treat them well enough so they don’t want to”.
To find out more about how you can implement mental wellbeing initiatives in your workplace, drop us a line today.
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