How Business Leaders Are Managing Their Employee’s Mental Health

Claire Small
Authored by Claire Small
Posted Thursday, January 21, 2021 - 8:42pm

The number of employee positions considered to be permanently remote, also known as teleworking positions, has been slowly increasing over the past decade. This is a figure that has understandably grown alongside the improvement of technology, enabling businesses to more efficiently and safely operate at a distance.

While there have been many predictions relating to remote working becoming a more widely accepted and standardised practice, the COVID-19 pandemic and resulting lockdowns accelerated its adoption among businesses around the world. As of April 2020, nearly half of all employees within the UK performed at least a portion of their role from within their own home, with 80% citing the pandemic as a reason for doing so.

While circumstances necessitated the adoption of teleworking, after seeing the potential benefits, especially those of cost-saving and productivity, a number of businesses are keeping these newly established remote positions within their operation. The pandemic, it seems, was a push in the right direction, with major companies now leading the way in teleworking culture. Facebook, for example, now estimates that half of its 48,000 contracted employees could be working remotely within ten years.

Understanding the Effects

From the greater number of recently remote employees comes a wealth of useful data. We already have a wealth of evidence that illuminates the positive environmental and financial benefits. However, the studies are not always so hopeful. While much data is still being understood, the effects that remote working positions have upon mental health are becoming immediately clear. A Nuffield Health survey discovered that 80% of employees believed remote working had negatively affected their mental health. This is a figure too large to overlook, leading many to make discussing the wellbeing of teleworkers their priority.

Throughout the second series of Learning From Leaders, People Group Services have spoken to a number of business leaders to discuss their experiences overseeing a remote workforce, as well as the mental health challenges faced. Janine Chidlow, managing director of Alexander Mann Solutions, described a new and essential need for “Open dialogue, without fear, about personal mental health experiences” having seen the difficulties employees can experience when isolated from shared working spaces.

The Challenges Faced

Remote employees are removed from the shared space of a central office and, instead, must manage their tasks virtually, assisted by numerous cloud-based technologies. While these assets continue to be improved, delivering more efficacious services, they may also lead to a number of challenges.

  • Work/life balance: Being unable to physically distance oneself from a workspace prevents a mind from easily separating the two
  • Personnel issues: Video calls and text-based interactions can be both difficult to interpret and draining
  • Social Isolation: Without the ability to socialise and interact with other employees easily, feelings of detachment can occur
  • Overworking: Despite misconceptions, remote working actually leads to an increase in working hours

Tackling these issues as a company and overseeing that employees are given the necessary support is an essential part of a new business normal. Managers must begin to bring mental health challenges into their considerations if operations are to succeed. Neil Carberry, in his Learning From Leaders interview, notes “It’s a sustainability issue. Do you want performance that lasts a month or do you want performance that lasts a year?”

Adapting Business

While the greater benefit of remote working continues to entice businesses, they must also ensure that their management and appropriate departments are adapting accordingly.

“It has pulled a lot of companies back to people-centricity,” Chidlow mentions, discussing how businesses are both forced and encouraged to pay greater attention to the human element of the business, whereas, previously, this may have been underestimated.

 

 

 

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