Publisher: McKinsey & Company (author: Liz Hilton Segel)
Topics: Supported Employment Practice – Best Practices, Supported Employment Practice – Inclusive Employment, Workplace Solutions – Accommodations, Workplace Solutions – Disability Specific Workplace Inclusion, Workplace Solutions – Jobseeker and Employee Engagement
Year published: 2020
Type of resource: Publication, Blog

This article provides advice on how employers can help their employees who struggle with mental health issues.

“We know that mental health occurs along a continuum, with thriving and positive mental health at one end and serious mental illnesses or addictions at the other. In between, however, there are many shades of substance use, anxiety, depression, and other conditions that vary in intensity and impact. Every leader must ask, “What are we doing to help our employees stay physically and emotionally healthy?”

Far from being a soft issue, there is an economic cost to this humanitarian clarion call. For the global economy, the loss of productivity because of poor mental health can be as high as $1 trillion per year [in the USA]. The pandemic has also created a disproportionate mental toll on women in the workplace, causing one in four senior-level women to consider leaving the workforce or downshifting their careers since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Businesses need to do more to help employees cope during these turbulent times. Consider the following actions, where we’re beginning to see impact based on feedback from our clients’ employees and our own colleagues at McKinsey.”

Access this resource here: Five ways to design a better mental-health future for a stressed-out workforce