Companies must do more, mental health charity CEO tells Swindon business leaders

A third of a million workers leave employment or are signed off every due to mental illness, with lost productivity costing the average employer £1,500 per worker per year, the CEO of national mental health charity Mind told Swindon employers.

Addressing the relaunched Swindon Mindful Employer Network, Paul Farmer welcomed the efforts that have been made to address workplace mental health over the past decade, but said employers could still do more – like making a mental health check part of employees’ annual appraisals.

By giving employees the opportunity to disclose their mental health problems at regular intervals, the charity’s Wellness Recovery Action Plan has a structure in place to provide employees with any necessary ongoing support.

The network also heard from former Newsnight and the BBC World Service editor Rosie Runciman, who in 2011 set up Sound Doctor with BBC colleague Dominic Arkwright to improve quality of life for people with long-term mental and physical health problems through easily accessible, high-quality audio and video content.

Rosie told networkers that 57 percent of long-term absence from work is stress-related, and cited a recent survey around mental health stigma that showed employees would rather disclose having diarrhoea than a mental health issue to their employer.

Debbie Jennings of Swindon law firm Royds Withy King gave a brief introduction to mindfulness in the workplace, and told delegates that since measures were implemented in 2018, staff satisfaction had increased by 17 percent.

And Melanie Richens, chairman of the Swindon Mindful Employer Network, warned employers of the risk of letting stressed employees ‘drift away’. Part of the £45bn annual cost of ill mental health to UK employers is in replacing and training staff who have ‘drifted away’ from their positions due to stress or other mental health conditions, she warned.

The Swindon Mindful Employer Network is a meeting of the town’s top 100 employers. It was relaunched last October, and the recent seminar at Wrag Barn Golf Club – delivered by Business West and Swindon and Gloucestershire Mind and funded by Swindon Borough Council – was its first event of 2020. The network next meets on May 11 – Time to Talk Day.