In our last post we highlighted some research findings about employers answers to questions about employee mental health. Readers will have noted that some 90% of those canvassed considered that they were sympathetic to employees with mental health problems, and that a good number recognise that mental health issues in today’s workplace are here to stay.
Unfortunately, it seems that employee’s perceptions of the issue are very different as this very interesting and useful post suggests. Does this perhaps suggest that employers think they are giving the rights signals to employees but aren’t, that employees are bringing their own fears and prejudices on the issue without finding out what their employers reactions are, or perhaps employers want to be seen to be saying all the right things but the reality is very different. Maybe it’s a mixture of all these elements, which makes some sense to us.
Worth remembering of course that defining a mental health issue is very tricky in itself. Some conditions are now clearly defined and measurable such as schizophrenia whereas stress and depression can of course often be subjective and transitory in nature, so it is possible that employers might be answering that a clear menatal health diagnosis would be something they are sympathetic to but what is their reaction to an employee signed off on a short term basis for stress ?
This is an issue which impacts on millions of people a year, we would be very interested to hear from you with your views and experiences, so please post a comment or otherwise get in touch.