Linked – Mental Health at Work: Managers and Money

I would like you to consider a situation for me. Let’s say one of your employees came to you stating that the office HVAC had broken and was far too warm to work.

Would you call someone to repair the HVAC or offer your employees lessons on survival in extreme heat?

We can all agree that when the problem comes from inside the building, you will do what you must to stop contributing to it. You’ve got a system causing harm to employees, and you fix the system.

Now, I want you to consider this research:

For better or worse, managers have a greater impact on our mental health than doctors and therapists — and even equal to that of spouses and partners. The Workforce Institute at UKG surveyed 3,400 people across 10 countries to spotlight the critical role our jobs, leadership, and, most of all, our managers play in supporting mental health in and outside of work.

When management harms the mental health of our employees, we typically respond by offering them yoga or meditation spaces or maybe a lunchtime session on stress management. We never look at the system. We offer them ways to better cope with the broken system, but we never take responsibility for what the workplace is doing to their mental health. This survey data should be a wake-up call to managers everywhere, but I know better. It won’t lead to widespread change.

But, if you’re a manager, maybe you’ll start considering your impact on your reports.

https://www.ukg.com/resources/white-paper/mental-health-work-managers-and-money

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