October 10th was World Mental Health Day! The purpose of this day is to bring awareness of mental health disorders and mobilize resources and support.

This is an opportunity to highlight mental health in your workplace! Remember! You don’t have to do everything on THE day – October 10th, but you could start thinking about how you want to bring awareness to your organization and might commit to some yearlong goals within your workforce.

  1. Consider sharing your own and encouraging leaders to share their mental health journeys. One of the most effective ways that an organization can open the dialogue about mental health is to have open discussions and sharing about it. Often, mental health is not a topic of regular discussion at work. When a leader shares their personal experiences and normalizes it for the workforce, it becomes more accessible.
  2. Share mental health screening tools such as: https://screening.mhanational.org/screening-tools/. These tools are not intended to diagnose but bring awareness and opportunities to explore further with a mental health professional.
  3. Promote your company’s mental health benefits! Just because you have them, doesn’t mean that they are front of mind. Remind your staff regularly of the features of your EAP. What kind of counseling is offered? What kind of coaching? Mindfulness support? Share it all and regularly! Make it real! Are you seeing new parents? Make sure they know what is available for them! Are you growing and seeing your staff working an increase of hours, make sure they know what resilience tools could help. The EAP is one to keep in mind AND what does your health plan include and feature on the mental health side? What other mental health access points exist at your organization?
  4. Work and life gets busy! It can be hard to find time for therapy and psychiatry appointments. Consider offering time off during the workday for appointments. Mental health self-care will not only benefit your employee, their families but also your organization.

Would you like to talk to us about how your organization can further push mental health? Let us know! We’d love to brainstorm with you!