How to successfully incorporate mental health and wellbeing into your strategy
By Simon Brown-Greaves and Radhika Chelliah
Right thinking:
In this article, Simon and Radhika explore the state of mental health in Australia, highlighting the pivotal role workplaces can play in addressing mental health and wellbeing challenges.Integrating mental health and wellbeing into the strategic planning process is essential.
By incorporating employee health and wellbeing as a strategic initiative or pillar, organisations can mitigate evolving workforce risks and address current and emerging ‘ripples’ such as absenteeism, productivity and the costs associated with mental health claims.
Moving beyond mere compliance to a more holistic view that includes understanding and mitigating workplace risks is crucial.
As an unknown Chinese philosopher once said – ‘we live in interesting times’.
One of the more recent ‘interesting’ issues has been the extraordinary rise of mental health as a significant workplace issue. This issue has progressed to the point where the mental health of your workforce should now be part of the strategic plan.
The state of mental health in Australia
Why are we surprised? In the broader community, we have seen a steady increase in the prevalence of diagnoses of anxiety and depression, and recent credible research conducted in Australia suggests that a significant number of young Australians identify as suffering from a mental health condition:
- Black Dog Institute (2024) noted that 32% of adolescents report having experienced extreme stress.
- Australian Bureau of Statistics (2023) noted that 42.9% of Australians aged 16-85 had experienced a mental disorder in their life, while 38.8% of those aged 16-24 had reported a 12-month disorder.
We are also now living in a world where some of the most recognised and trusted brands in Australia are mental health organisations such as Beyond Blue. More recently regulators are now introducing strict requirements in the domain of psychosocial risk – a concept that was largely unrecognised 15 years ago. Many Australian businesses are also wrestling with the concept of legislating a ‘right to disconnect’, an idea that took root in Europe over a decade ago but is now part of the Australian legislative framework. Whichever way we look at this issue it has well and truly impacted organisations and in turn created a need to address the mental health and wellbeing of our people.
The role of workplaces in addressing mental health and wellbeing
Our work with our client organisations is clearly indicating that these issues are now playing out in a number of ways. Workers’ compensation data from Safe Work Australia now highlights that mental health claims are significantly escalating, increases in industrial issues linking mental health to safety concerns; and widespread adoption of terms such as ‘psychological safety’ has the potential to contribute to quasi-industrial campaigns and can be correlated with a reduction in leaders’ confidence to deal with these complex issues. In our experience, this is often connected with a genuine desire to make the workplace welcoming and inclusive in a way that enables people to bring their ‘whole self’ to work. Research data links absenteeism, productivity, turnover, and morale to the wellbeing of the workforce, creating a compelling business case to focus on employee mental health. Further, there is a growing recognition of the need to identify and mitigate particular occupational risks and hazards that have traditionally been seen as just ‘part of the job’. Recent high-profile cases send a clear message that this historical approach is no longer acceptable (e.g. WorkSafe v CSV ; Kozarov v State of Victoria)
So – what does a contemporary workplace need to consider in order to address these evolving trends?
Integrating mental health and wellbeing into the strategic planning process
At Right Lane Consulting, we think that the starting point is to integrate mental health and wellbeing into an organisational strategic planning process. There are three things we suggest:
1. Set optimal mental health and wellbeing as a goal
During your next strategic planning discussion, set optimal mental health and wellbeing as a goal, and incorporate relevant measures and initiatives. This approach is not only efficient, but ensures that the mental health and wellbeing of the workforce is seen as an important factor in achieving the business strategy.
2. Focus on positive concepts
It is critical to avoid taking a solely compliance-based approach. Our take on contemporary and evidence based research as well as our direct experience in working with organisations to address this issue suggests that we are best served by a strategy that focuses on positive concepts such as wellbeing and mental health rather than deficit models that focus on ill health and disorder.
3. Take a holistic approach that supports prevention and intervention
It is important to take a holistic view based on the notion that an effective mental health strategy is largely focused on understanding and mitigating the specific workplace risks to worker health and wellbeing. It is equally important to provide support and post hoc interventions when team members are struggling with their wellbeing.
Most organisations now have some form of responsive counselling service – an EAP (employee assistance program) which has evolved rapidly over the last 10 years. Good EAP programs provide trend data and valuable insights into the workforce and its specific mental health and wellbeing issues. They have also diversified to provide a range of ancillary and at times proactive programs – from financial counselling to specialist support for workers with diverse cultures and backgrounds.
However, the integration of a clear preventive strategy into the overarching plan is less common.
Prevention has a number of key elements – do we have a clear understanding of our obligations and requirements in terms of the new compliance landscape?
Have we examined our psychosocial risk data to accurately determine the most important roles and activities that may place our people in psychological harm’s way?
The good news is that these risks are generally well known and most likely have incident or survey data that points to those that are most relevant. Regulators are now collecting and reporting on the most likely psychosocial risks that underpin mental health claims data – these include (unsurprisingly) bullying and harassment; occupational violence; exposure to emotionally charged or disturbing content, and of course, breakdowns in workplace relationships.
Right Lane Consulting’s framework for considering mental health and wellbeing
Our framework identifies the enablers and elements to consider when incorporating mental health and wellbeing into your strategy. The core enabler which underpins the strategy is awareness of mental health and wellbeing within the organisation and accessibility to support. This forms a strong foundation for the four elements and four enablers of a good mental health strategy, as outlined below.
A component of an effective mental health and wellbeing strategy is the importance of supporting supervisors and middle managers to understand their role when it comes to staff wellbeing and mental health. Building confidence and capability for this cohort is critical and underpins many of the other elements of the plan. Communicating the plan to all team members in a way that is engaging and accessible is also important.
Commitment to a preventative approach can be complex and inevitably requires focus on job/role design and collaborative approaches to pre-empting psychosocial risks rather than simply ‘picking up the pieces’ later. The benefits of this approach, however, are measurable and impactful with a growing library of case studies in the Australian context where a collaborative and consultative approach has led to the reduction of hazards and better management of psychosocial risk. Positive flow-on effects include lower claim numbers and costs and improvements in employee engagement and morale.
Notes:
1. Psychosocial risks are the result of work related hazards that have the potential to negatively affect the mental health and wellbeing of employees. The changing and evolving regulatory frameworks across Australia require workplaces to identify and manage psychosocial hazards and the risk of associated harm. Typically, hazards include 17 research based factors such as unreasonable job demands, low job control or fatigue. See https://www.safeworkaustralia.gov.au/sites/default/files/2022-07/model_code_of_practice_-_managing_psychosocial_hazards_at_work.pdf
Want to know more?
If you would like to discuss this article in more detail, please contact:
Simon Brown-Greaves
Email: simon.brown-greaves@rightlane.com.au
Simon is a Senior Expert at Right Lane Consulting.
Simon Brown-Greaves has over 40 years experience as an organisational psychologist. Most recently he spent 2 years as the inaugural Chief Mental Health Officer at Australia Post. Prior to this he spent 15 years leading FBG Group, a specialist mental health strategy advisory firm that was acquired in 2022 by the global APM Group. During his career, Simon has worked directly with boards and executive teams to develop and execute effective workforce mental health strategies across the public, private and for purpose sectors.
Radhika Chelliah
Email: radhika.chelliah@rightlane.com.au
Radhika is an Engagement Manager at Right Lane Consulting.
Radhika has 9 years’ experience in consulting, with an interest in organisational wellbeing and change. Her work includes improving organisational effectiveness, enabling high-performing teams, and culture change. She is also on the Right Lane Consulting People & Culture working group. Radhika holds a Masters Degree in Human Resource Management and Organisational Analysis from King’s College London, CIPD Level 7, PROSCI certified change practitioner, and a Bachelor of Commerce degree (Accounting) from Monash University.
References
Australian Bureau of Statistics. (2023). National Study of Mental Health and Wellbeing. https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/health/mental-health/national-study-mental-health-and-wellbeing/2020-2022
Black Dog Institute. (2024). Navigating Australia’s Mental Health System in 2024. https://www.blackdoginstitute.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Navigating-Australias-mental-health-system-in-2024-Consumer-Report.pdf
Safe Work Australia. (2022). Managing psychosocial hazards at work Code of Practice. https://www.safeworkaustralia.gov.au/sites/default/files/2022-07/model_code_of_practice_-_managing_psychosocial_hazards_at_work.pdf