As part of National Work Life Week, and on World Mental Health Day, Karen Warren considers how leaders and managers can introduce mental health awareness into team conversations, to help people feel comfortable to be open if they’re struggling and create a supportive work environment.
Do your team ever see you have a bad day? While you don’t need to be an open book at every moment, it can be useful to think about how you communicate your difficulties.
What emotional words do you use?
Expressing frustration, disappointment and regret on the difficult days, and your happiness and satisfaction on the great days will help people to connect with you. They’ll see that you’re affected by the high and lows of business, just as they are. Using words like annoyed, fed up, overloaded and overwhelmed doesn’t mean you’re ‘being emotional’. Those words will help you to constructively share the challenges of your day. If your team see you do that, they’re more likely to come to you if they’re struggling.
Leaders and managers often worry that they need to have all the answers when people are struggling, but that’s not necessarily the case. In my experience, people want you to listen more than anything. They know the answers lie with them, but by taking the time and creating a safe space for the conversation, you show that you’re prioritising their health and wellbeing and are invested in wanting them to be well. Being listened to completely can feel truly wonderful if you’re struggling. As part of the conversation, you can signpost them to the support that’s available in your business. If work issues are making things difficult you will need to act, but an open mind and a compassionate ear can really make a difference.
Consider the ways in which you can introduce mental health and wellbeing into your conversations with your team; one-to-one catch ups, team meetings and general team-talk. You can talk about:
1. The perceptions, stigma and stereotypes of mental health difficulties
Talk to your team about how they perceive people with mental health difficulties. Encourage them to be honest and give them the time and space to challenge their pre-conceived ideas. For instance, how would they feel if, in an interview, someone talked about working through a period of depression?
Would they recruit them? What would be their perception of that person, honestly? Would it be a red flag?
2. Asking for help
If you identify your options for support on a good day, you’re more likely to use them on a bad day
We can be really bad at asking for help. As a team, discuss the options for support available at work, such as HR support, Occupational Health and Employee Assistance programmes, and outside of work – GPs, family and friends, and mental health charities such as MIND and CALM. If you identify your options for support on a good day, you’re more likely to use them on a bad day, and that’s when you’ll really need them.
3. Positive mental health and wellbeing
We often think of mental health as a negative thing, but the five ways to wellbeing are an effective way to think about how you and the team will keep yourselves well. The five ways are:
- Connect
- Be active
- Take notice, be mindful
- Keep learning
- Give, offer support
Discuss these as a group to help people see that positive mental health and wellbeing look different for everyone. They might also give each other ideas, which is a great way for them to connect and share their experiences.
4. Introducing the Conversation
You can lead a conversation on what you’re doing well and not so well as a team to support positive mental health and wellbeing. It’s a good opportunity to develop a wellbeing charter and make commitments to each other, like taking a lunch break at least three times a week, if people typically work through or eat their lunch at their desk. By making the commitment to each other, you can compassionately challenge anyone who’s still not taking a break.
You don’t need to discuss your own mental health experiences. You can lead the conversation without bringing your own experiences into it. Initially, you might see a mix of responses, with some people happy to share openly and others more guarded. But as these conversations become more familiar, people are likely to feel more comfortable to be open.
To continue the conversation at different times, you can also talk about:
- What is mental health? Is it always a negative thing?
- What’s positive mental health and how do you keep yourself well?
- What can cause mental health difficulties? Discuss general topics like work difficulties, relationship problems, financial pressures, and the impact of physical health conditions.
- How do you think the pandemic affected people’s mental health, both positively and negatively?
- Would you know if someone had a mental health condition? Would it affect their ability to do their job?
Invest in Conversations
With busy work lives, leaders and managers can be reluctant to make time for conversations with their teams. However, knowing where your people are at means you’re less likely to be side swiped by a team member calling in sick and being signed off for weeks. It is an investment, but you can create an effective culture of workforce wellbeing, with lower levels of sickness absence and staff turnover if your people feel safe to talk to you when they’re struggling.
How will you create those conversations this week?
Karen (pictured) offers coaching, training and consultancy solutions to support employers and managers to manage performance, behaviour and attendance issues and with individuals and organisations to deliver a range of wellbeing, personal and professional development solutions. She is the author of ‘Workforce Wellbeing – how to build organisational strength and resilience’, which helps businesses to develop effective workforce wellbeing cultures, and has developed the online programme ‘Managing Difficult Conversations to Achieve Successful Outcomes’.
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