Shedding light on mental health in the workplace

Mental health advocates commend the Personnel Office of the Chief Personnel Officer (CPO) for its survey on mental health and encourage the organisation to continue bringing light to the issue.

However, they believe the Employee Assistance Programme (EAP) was not as effective as it could be because of a lack of trust in the system.

The survey’s findings were discussed at the launch of a review of the EAP in the public service at the Hyatt Regency, Port of Spain, on Friday.

The survey participants were 1,207 public service workers, 79.1 per cent of women, 18.9 per cent men, and two per cent who identified as other, whose ages ranged from 18 to “over 65.”

The results said 52.8 per cent of participants believed the psychological well-being of staff was not prioritised by their employers and 60.7 per cent felt senior management did not consider the psychological health of employees to be of great importance.

Less than 50 per cent felt their contributions to resolving mental health concerns were taken into consideration by senior management and 58.4 per cent felt no participation and consultation took place with respect to psychological health and safety.

Former independent senator and founder of The Shelter Diana Mahabir-Wyatt told Newsday it was wonderful that the brought the issue of mental health to public attention, even though the sample size was relatively small.

“It gives the government the information it needs. Now, I want to know if they are going to act on it.”

She said one of the biggest industrial relations problems in the country was that employers and supervisors did not listen to workers or, if they are even asked, their views or opinions were not taken into consideration.

"It is really important that we know that the morale of people that we managers are leading, that they are happy and comfortable in the workplace. Because people work a lot better and a lot more efficiently if they're happy. And they're not going to be happy if they feel that their views don't matter.

"Now, having said that, I think we also have to take into consideration that managers are people and they are often not very happy either. And it's very hard to treat other people well when you are feeling anxious, disaffected and unhappy yourself."

In addition to work stresses, she said, people had to deal with spending hours in traffic on mornings and afternoons which meant they spent 12-16 hours a day away from their homes and families. They also have to deal with the frustration of pot holes, finding a parking space, travelling for those who did not have cars and much more.

She said that did not include things like floods, rising food prices, financial problems, crime, and having to care for elderly parents as well as children.

She suggested managers and supervisors be trained to recognise the signs of poor mental health, especially anxiety and depression.

"If managers don't recognise them (signs of mental illness), it can build up into grievances, insubordination, fighting on the job, poor performance, etc.

"If we had the supervisors or managers trained in how to detect signs of mental disturbance and mental illness, and how to help your employees cope with it, when we probably wouldn't have all the problems we have.”

She also encouraged people to get together and work, as communities, to find solutions to issues causing distress and frustration.

Mahabir-Wyatt added that the “curious cultural bias” towards mental health in TT could prevent people from seeking help from the EAP. She said people may not trust a manager or human resource officer to refrain from speaking about the problems confided. Or, they could be concerned if people hear they were referred to the EAP, other coworkers may want to know why or gossip about them.

“People just love to talk about other people’s misfortunes and people will take advantage of that. I’m sorry but it’s a cultural thing. Trinis are macocious.”

While Mahabir-Wyatt pointed out trust issues with managers and coworkers, clinical psychologist Victoria Siewnarine-Geelalsingh said some people did not trust the EAP itself.

“Even though companies provided an EAP service, many people did not feel safe using the EAP service, because they did not think that their confidentiality would be honoured. Because of course, to access EAP, you have to go through HR and you have to submit certain things.”

She recalled the case of someone being demoted, although their salary was maintained, after accessing EAP and being diagnosed with severe anxiety. That loss of duties increased the employee’s anxiety levels because they felt less confident.

The 2010 EAP Policy for the public service of TT said : The EAP is designed to facilitate improved employee well-being and organisational productivity through the provision of a suite of confidential, short-term counselling and consultation services which may be accessed by public service employees and organisations.

Siewnarine-Geelalsingh said EAP provided three or four sessions but, in order to truly benefit from talk therapy, at least eight to 12 sessions were necessary.

“So when you go to four sessions, you’re really now just starting and haven't necessarily leaned coping mechanisms. There are some people who choose to do therapy outside of EAP, or they do their four sessions in EAP continue afterwards because they realise, they've started to make some progress, but they want to continue their progress. But of course, when you go to a private person outside of your ERP provider, you have to now pay for it.”

She suggested the EAP increase the number of sessions afforded to employees. She also asked that the EAP give the same level of professional, competent service to those who access therapy through employee assistance as they would to those who access services privately. And that any report that had to be sent to the company should be clinical and professional without giving details or breaking confidentiality.

In addition, she believed people should be allowed flexi-time, to leave the office early, or even to take a day off if they get their tasks done as it would help with their work/life balance, and stress and anxiety levels.

She said the priority of an employer or supervisor was profitability and that the employees tasks were completed. While the mental health of employees was of much lower priority, she said they should realise an employee who was mentally well was more productive and efficient than one struggling with mental distress.

“When those kinds of things are allowed at work, the attitude towards work changes. It’s less stressful. It changes how depressed a person might be, what their capability is, what their self-competences are, even what their perceived value in the organisation is.

“And if you allow that, and they feel valued in the organisation, then they work better. Then their work output is greater and a better quality. That is, if the supervisors and managers show they are willing to make allowances, within reason, for their mental health.”

Public Administration Minister Allyson West said the EAP was often not given the priority it should and often fell by the wayside so the uptake was reduced.

She said some people were reluctant to admit they had stress- or mental-related issues so the EAP needed to re-brand. She said, in some countries, EAP sessions were re-branded to “coaching sessions” which led to significant increase in uptake.

“The second thing is we need to make people more aware of the fact that stress related issues are real. It's not just physical medical problems that we need to treat with that will impact an employee's performance. It is also stress related and mental related issues. So both the employer and the employee has to be sensitised to that issue, to identify it and then be encouraged to treat with it.”

West added that they type of resources needed in HR had changed over the years and so those new resources had to be the focus.

“What we need are HR professionals who can identify issues like that, who can look to what kind of training people need, what kind of career development they should be focussed on, what their career path should be and guiding them in that way.

“And among those things that they should be identifying and talking to people about are stress related issues that impact their performance and how they can seek to treat with it.”