How healthy is your workplace now? Understanding where you are on the journey will inform your strategy or approach and how you communicate it to the organisation. If you are new to talking about mental health in the workplace, we recommend you gradually introduce the topic to the organisation, sensitising and raising awareness, before rolling out MHFA England courses. What is your strategy? Your wellbeing strategy should centre around making sure all staff are safe and supported to bring their whole selves to work. It therefore needs to link closely into other strategies, such as on race equity. Mental health is one element of wellbeing alongside others such as physical, financial and emotional wellbeing, which are all connected in a whole person approach. The Thriving at Work report sets out six ‘mental health core standards’ – a set of actions for employers to support mental health. You can use these to build the mental health element of your wellbeing strategy: 1. Produce, implement and communicate a mental health at work plan 2. Develop mental health awareness among employees 3. Encourage open conversations about mental health and the support available when employees are struggling 4. Provide your employees with good working conditions 5. Promote effective people management 6. Routinely monitor employee mental health and wellbeing Lay the groundwork for the whole organisation
Rolling out MHFA England training as part of your whole organisation approach can help you meet core standards two and three, and training line managers will also feed into core standard five. Links Guidance on becoming an anti-racist organisation My Whole Self – resources to create a workplace culture where people have the safety and freedom to choose which parts of their identity they share at work Thriving at Work: a review of mental health and employers The independent review of mental health and employers by Lord Dennis Stevenson and Paul Farmer The role of managers – Make employee wellbeing a key responsibility for your managers. Give them the time, resource and training to proactively support the wellbeing of their teams – Recruit, promote and support managers with excellent interpersonal skills – Put support in place for your managers’ own wellbeing
3
Made with FlippingBook - Online magazine maker