Is your workplace as mentally healthy as you think?
Some 59% of employees say their employer thinks their workplace is “mentally healthier than it actually is,” and 39% worry their mental health condition could negatively impact them at work, according to a 2024 American Psychiatric Association report.
The US mental health crisis is why Stephen Sokoler, founder and CEO of preventive mental health consultancy Journey, wrote The Mental Health Advantage: How the World’s Best Companies Drive Performance and Wellbeing Through Proactive Mental Health.
Sokoler shared with HR Brew what people pros can do to help their employees’ mental health.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
What will HR pros learn from your book?
It would be the importance of focusing on proactive, preventive mental healthcare, as opposed to simply reactive care. And, a lot of our health system and a lot of what we have in corporate America tends to be reactive. Once there’s a problem, then we’ll provide support. But every study has shown, both in the workplace and in the lab, that if we can be proactive, if we can be preventative, there’s not only better outcomes for employees, but there’s better outcomes for the actual company.
What’s an example of proactive versus reactive mental health strategies?
Most companies have EAPs that are on the internet and they’re there, and it’s kind of “break glass for emergencies,” and it provides therapy once something has reached a critical point. And, when it comes to proactive mental health, it’s [about] how do we help employees to build healthy habits, so that they are able to keep themselves mentally and emotionally well and balanced to show up at work at their best.
How are we reducing stigma so that people can talk about mental health openly and get the care that they want? And how do we catch things early? So, how do we leverage things like predictive analytics and consistent engagement to make sure we have early intervention which leads to better clinical outcomes?…When it comes to physical health, like societally, we know that if you catch something earlier, you’re going to get a better outcome. And, it’s the same thing for mental health. So, how do we make sure that we’re able to find things when an employee is first challenged, versus waiting until they’re really at that breaking point?
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How can HR leaders start prioritizing proactive mental healthcare?
I always talk to HR leaders about speaking the language of the business, so we’re not talking about, simply, things, like engagement and employee satisfaction scores, although those are obviously critical measures. Let’s talk about reducing healthcare costs. If you’re a self-insured company, especially here in the US, you’re probably paying a lot of money for healthcare…If you can help people build healthy habits, if you can catch things sooner, they’re not having a panic attack, they’re not ending up in the ER, they’re not needing very extensive short-term leave or long-term leave. That really impacts the business.
Is there anything else HR should know about how mental health can impact a business?
At the end of the day, HR has a lot of broad range of responsibilities, but one of the main ones is performance…How do we build an organization that is going to perform at the maximum level? And employee mental health is one of the key levers there, and unfortunately, it’s often looked at…as a nice to have, or it’s looked at as, like, we’re doing this for the good of the employees…[But] people showing up at their best is going to have a really strong business outcome…Moving the thinking from an investment in mental health is a cost to it’s really an investment—that makes a big difference, and I think we’re seeing a lot of top-performing companies do that and making that mindset shift.
