Linked: Companies hope new benefits will solve your mental health issues. Don’t fall for it.

Rebecca may be on to something here, namely that many workplaces are offering some benefits, and many of them are certainly bragging about it, but are they solving the problem?

This is the crux of the broader and long overdue corporate awakening about the importance of employee mental health. American workplaces know they have a wellness problem, but most won’t do what’s required to fix it.

Instead of looking inward at emotionally bankrupt leadership philosophies, lackluster or nonexistent training for managers, and policies that emphasize productivity over physical safety and emotional well-being, companies bet on new or enhanced mental health benefits as the key to improving their employees’ mood and coping skills. Therapy and other wellness resources can be a valuable tool for surviving a challenging or toxic work environment, but what really needs to change is the workplace itself.

It’s cool if your company wants to provide an assistance program or pay for access to an app that will help with meditation, etc. Good for them. But, if the source of your mental health issues is the day-to-day stress of working in an understaffed, toxic, environment, for far less money than you’re worth, and they won’t address that? How much do they really care?

Fixing that is going to require a lot more, as the article below points out. How many organizations are willing to make those kinds of changes?

https://mashable.com/article/signs-youre-in-a-toxic-work-environment

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