This is by far the hardest thing for the 'workplace mental health out there' info to get realigned with mentally. For a lot of people these findings were met with absolute shock. For a lot with denial. For us at EnableOrg®, it's what we've been consulting and training on since well before Covid made 'wellbeing' the latest 'most essential'.

Another global study by McKinsey showed similar findings last year. Despite an all time high in organisations rolling out wellbeing, mental distress remained high. https://lnkd.in/gGXtbcj7

Neurologically, when we are experiencing chronic stress or psychological harm, eg toxic culture , high workload, bullying, harassment, lack of resources etc, our brains go into 'flight or fight' mode as a preservation mechanisms. The productive, innovation, problem solving parts of our brain shut down whilst this stress is ongoing. We can not absorb 'new' things in this state.

Trying to implement Wellbeing, without removing these chronic stress and psychological harm factors FIRST, is like throwing water at teflon, our brains are simply still in 'shut down' mode from the stressors and harm and will not be able to 'absorb' the wellbeing initiatives long term. Effectively throwing away the efforts, time, money and other resources spent on wellbeing when harm is not removed first.

When the harm is first removed or mitigated to maximum effect, our brains can 'open up' to normal functionality as the chronic stress and harm is no longer causing the shut down preservation of our brains. Only AFTER this is achieved are we able to neurologically take on and absorb any Wellbeing initiatives to achieve optimised capability and thriving.

In essence, Psychosocial Risk Management for prevention and mitigation needs to happen FIRST, before any employee Wellbeing initiatives can have any lasting effect. Psychosocial Risk Management absolutely DOES NOT come from surveys and assessments. For full compliance requirements see https://lnkd.in/gyDFXKKq