Mental health in the workplace is everyone’s business, given that unidentified and unmanaged mental health cost businesses up to £102 billion each year in lost productivity, sick days and increased turnover according to the World Health Organisation. Yet recent UK Government research (2023 – see here) found that 49% of small and medium businesses owners surveyed did not know where to start in identifying and implementing employee mental health support packages and lacked the time to figure it out. Their research also found that SME business owners being able to access consultation and guidance on mental health solutions is statistically likely to improve implementation rates.
Enter mental health audit: your one-stop shop for identifying, understanding and improving employee mental health and well-being to enable you to improve productivity, retention and workplace culture, conducted by a specialist in mental health and research design. Here is our overview of what mental health audits are and 5 benefits for your organisation.
What is a mental health audit?
A mental health audit is the application of specialist research and audit skills to assess your employees’ mental health, risk factors for work-related stress, and provide recommendations for improving employee well-being. It should be conducted by someone who is trained in understanding and treating mental health and applying advanced research and audit skills.
It begins with an initial consultation to identify the questions that need answering and the desired aims and outcomes, which guides the strategies the audit will employ. See our infographic below for an example of the stages involved in an audit.
Mental health audits often involves a mixture of the following:
· Examining your organisational policies and procedures regarding employee mental health
This involves a mental health expert reading through your policies, procedures and their implementation compared to the existing evidence.
· Assessing your existing offerings of support
This involves examining what is offered comparative to best practice, rates of uptake, outcomes and overall engagement.
· Exploring organisational culture and workplace practices
This involves understanding the values, ethos and workplace atmosphere through questioning and surveys, and examining risk factors such as workload, supervision and work-related stressors.
· Employee surveys
A mixture of bespoke surveys and validated psychometric questionnaires will be administered to employees, depending on the desired outcome. These can be repeated at a later date to assess whether any subsequent interventions have been effective or not.
· Interviews or listening events with employees
A mixture of individual, anonymised interviews, brainstorming events or listening events can be used with employees by an external expert to add depth to the overall assessment and improve employee engagement.
Following the completion of the audit, the expert will analyse all of the data and provide evidence-based recommendations to improve employee well-being and to achieve the desired goals or aims. Further support can then be provided to design, implement and/or evaluate interventions by follow-up measures.
What are the possible outcomes of a mental health audit?
Here are three possible outcomes of a mental health audit for your business:
1) Reduced absenteeism and improved staff retention
Unmanaged mental health difficulties negatively impact physical and mental presence at work, and employees who do not feel supported are more likely to quit (Oliveira et al., 2023 - see here). By understanding the extent of work-related stress and mental health-related concerns in your workplace, they can be quickly and effectively addressed through evidence-based solutions, reducing the devastating impact that mental health problems in the workplace can have.
2) Improved employee engagement and workplace atmosphere
Because a mental health audit is led and conducted by an external individual and involves direct engagement with employees focused on listening, understanding and improving, it promotes employee engagement and makes them feel heard and valued. Strategies like listening events, brainstorming and interviews have been found in research to contribute to reduced work-related stress in employees in SMEs, as well as providing valuable data to improve workplace culture and atmosphere (Hogg et al., 2021 - see here).
3) Increased productivity by enabling targeted, relevant interventions
Interventions to address mental health problems delivered in the workplace, such as workshops, training and therapeutic interventions, have been shown to directly improve employee productivity by 4 hours per working week per employee (Kjørstad et al., 2022 - see here). What specific interventions are needed for your employees requires an in-depth understanding of the issues your employees face, which is what a mental health audit provides.
Top 5 benefits of a mental health audit for your business
So, with that said, what benefits can you expect from having a mental health audit? See our infographic below with the top outcomes you can expect.
Here are our top 5 key benefits for businesses:
1) Enables an in-depth understanding of the well-being and work-related issues facing your employees
Given that most SME business owners don’t know where to begin with mental health and may not have had any training or exposure to it, a mental health audit enables a specialist to give an evidence-based overview of the issues facing your employees. Armed with this knowledge, you’ll know what your options are to begin improving presenteeism, retention and workplace atmosphere.
2) Saves your time
Time is a key barrier to SMEs identifying and addressing mental health concerns: a mental health audit by a qualified professional does this piece of work for you, saving you time and providing you with a practical executive summary.
3) Enables specific, relevant interventions which promotes employee engagement and outcomes
Previous research has found that the most common mental health and well-being interventions for employees in SMEs were stress management, smoking and alcohol cessation and weight management (Taylor et al., 2016 - see here). Do your employees want and need those, or something else? Buying in interventions which are not relevant to, desired by or needed by your employees risks them feeling missed, unheard and ultimately not engaging. A mental health audit will inform you of their needs so that you can save money by meeting them directly with suitable interventions.
4) Saves your organisation money
Although mental health audits involve an upfront cost, the cost-savings can be massive and wide-ranging. Cost savings from mental health audits can include:
· Costs related to your or other staff’s time through trawling and designing surveys without expertise in research design and mental health
· Save wasted costs on ineffective mental health solutions that do not meet the needs of your employees or have inadequate up-take
· Save, on average, 82 sick days should suitable interventions be provided (Blonk et al., 2006 - see here)
· Save costs related to possible 15% improvements in productivity and presenteeism
5) Gives you specialist mental health consultation to improve your business
The process of a mental health audit, such as how surveys are designed and conducted, the positive experiences that listening events can bring, and the improved trust and belief in the culture of the organisation through investing in mental health can all have benefits for your own learning as a business owner or manager, and your employees. You will be able to repeat the audit yourself with ease if that is of benefit to your aims.
Summary and take home points
Here are our key take-away points:
· A mental health audit is the application of specialist knowledge in research, audit and mental health to understand and address mental health and work-related stress challenges in your organisation
· A mental health audit should be conducted by someone who is specialist in both mental health and trained in the application of research and audit skills
· Audits involve a range of strategies from assessing policies, surveys and interviews, which all depends on your organisation’s needs, hopes and goals
· Interventions are recommended which are relevant to your employees, which enables targeted, cost-effective and relevant solutions to promote engagement
· Outcomes can include increase productivity and presenteeism, reduced turnover, absenteeism and improved workplace culture and atmosphere
· Benefits to you and your company can be wide-ranging, including cost savings, improved employee engagement, learning and development and time saving
If you are seeking a mental health audit, we have a doctoral trained Clinical Psychologist with expertise in both mental health and research, and we offer a free initial 20-minute consultation to see how we may be able to help, so do reach out today to arrange via info@unlockpsychology.co.uk
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