Compassionate Management of Mental Health in the Modern Workplace

ISBN-13: 9783319715407 / Angielski / Twarda / 2018 / 215 str.

John A. Quelch; Carin-Isabel Knoop

Recenzje

"Business school experts provide a sparkling description of what the rest of us in medicine and related fields have struggled to understand for decades. Rather remarkably, the authors emphasize compassion as a means of improving mental health in the modern workplace. ... When I think of where we should be in the third decade of the new millennium, this is the type of book that I think will take us there." (John T. Pierce, Doody's Book Reviews, February, 2019)

Spis treści

Chapter 1: Making the Argument that Good (Mental) Health Means Good (or Better) Business

The book begins by demonstrating the increasing importance of mental wellness in the knowledge economy by reviewing the latest thinking about the connection between mental health, physical health, and business productivity. The authors want to show how expensive the issue of poor mental health is for organizations and society, while also addressing the challenges of measuring returns on investment in mental health. The authors define key terms and concepts.

Chapter 2: The Organizational Context

In this chapter the authors argue that while the challenge caused by poor mental health among employees and leaders touches organizations of all sizes and types, companies and organizations have different needs, norms, and resources that will shape managerial options to prevent illness and maximize mental wellness.

In addition, the more transience in employment, the less firms invest in the mental wellness of particular employees. The authors explain how maximizing mental wellness depends on aligning the needs of employees and managers; with that starts with careful recruiting and onboarding and then a continual monitoring of an employee's ability to perform to his or her potential. There has to be a three-way fit to maximize mental wellness and performance at work. The authors include a set of questions that recruiters and managers can ask to ascertain fit – general questions if answered unsatisfactorily will be potential stressors. Employees should think more about what type of employer to choose.

Managers also need to be honest about best potential fit – a company with very tight shipping deadlines may be an ideal fit for a very anxious person, for example, who will do his or her utmost to make the deadline, but uncertain and unpredictable deadlines might be a greater

source of stress for this individual. The company and employee need to ensure that the essential duties of the work can be performed and remain on the constant lookout for congruence, including their own.

Chapter 3: Focusing Managerial Attention

Just as the line managers operate in different contexts, their employees are not homogeneous and are likely to have different needs at different points in their lives. Within various organizational forms (small, big, private, and public), there are key inflection points and population subgroups that are at most risk for severe declines in mental wellness. Assuming a normal distribution of mental wellness and that management time is already tight, should efforts focus on the most ill and potentially more dangerous employees, or on the largest population? The authors believe that managers have four sets of workers around which to tailor messaging and interventions — those who do not suffer

from mental illness and do not get involved in any maintenance work (the well/uninvolved); those who do not suffer from mental illness but are very committed to maintaining mental wellness (the well/involved), for example, taking care in company-sponsored mindfulness training and taking real vacation; those who suffer from mental illness and do not or cannot get care (the unwell/uninvolved), for example, those who remain at work either resigned about being unwell, or too afraid to disclose; and those who suffer from mental illness and are committed and able to seek support and improvement (the unwell/involved), for example, by seeking out Employee Assistance Program services.

Chapter 4: Warning: More Stressors Ahead

This chapter examines trends that could further increase stress in the workplace, from greater uncertainty to the challenges posed by technology. Even the most advanced organizations must realize that what might work

today might no longer be appropriate tomorrow, as both organizations and people are changing. About a quarter of the next generation of workers is already showing signs of depression and anxiety as teenagers and young adults.

The world and workplace are increasingly volatile, uncertain, chaotic, and ambiguous. Some threats are more remote and diffuse, such as climate change and terrorism, but more present thanks to technology. Constant news from across the world makes it seem more unstable than ever; rising income inequality and extensive reporting make the world seem more unfair than ever. Business is now widely expected to do well by doing good — an imperative that often places line managers in stressful positions. Ethical dilemmas abound. Jobs are constantly morphing and family lives become increasingly complicated in today's "never on/never off," sleep-deprived life. Telecommuting makes it harder to commune with and be close to employees, and fewer firms co

nduct annual performance reviews, potentially depriving managers of a more systematic check-in.

Chapter 5: Barriers to Changing the Way We Think About Mental Wellness

Despite increasing attention to and openness about mental illness in the workplace, most of us cover up mental illness at work and at home for fear of retribution or shame. Organizations and the individuals within them need to be open, not just allowing personal improvements to become organizational improvement, but also to conveying the message that sharing personal difficulties is acceptable.

Further, we learn early on that to be part of an organization, we sacrifice parts of our identity to conform. Recently leadership researchers have been focused on the challenge of authenticity — or the freedom from being false at work. But while, in theory, top managers may derive power from the ability to be themselves and hence appear more trustwort

hy to followers, it is a tricky process for middle managers and an even more fraught one for their employees. Employees also need to carefully read the organizational tea leaves about how much transparency about mental health challenges a group or organization will welcome. These challenges are illustrated with material from interviews with leaders describing how they approached sharing their own past and contemporary mental health issues and what impact doing so had on them and their colleagues. The authors would also want to tease out how such active management of the issue plays out in different organizations (large vs. small, listed vs. private, established vs. start up, etc.). Admitting imperfection is challenging in the age of social media, which trains us to portray our lives as perfect. This poses a particular challenge to managers seeking to engage with employees – if they are to interact authentically, both will need to drop their masks.

Finally, if t

he manager is vested with the ability to make a difference for the better, she and her reports and peers are still operating within a broader set of organizational rules and norms. By enabling her employees to take more leaves or be more open about mental health challenges and being more willing to watch for and act upon micro-signals, she might be helping her employees thrive in the short term but harming them in the longer term and greater organizational context. In this section the authors want to address some of these challenges. Much as a lot of leadership training fails to generate a return, or disappoints because personal change is stymied by the organizational system, so an entire system must change to support new behaviors.

Chapter 6: Harnessing Mental Wellness as Competitive Advantage

In this chapter the authors showcase companies and organizations that have been particularly effective in harnessing mental wellness as c

ompetitive advantage. They draw upon their research in Asia, Latin

America, and Europe but focus mostly on the United States. This chapter includes a series of checklists for managers and employees.

O autorze

Professor John A. Quelch has served as Vice Provost of the University of Miami and Dean of Miami Business School in Miami, Florida, USA since 2017.

He was formerly the Charles Edward Wilson Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School and Professor of Health Policy and Management at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health in Boston, Massachusetts, USA.

Professor Quelch is the first person to be Dean of three leading business schools on three continents. He served as Dean of the China Europe International Business School (CEIBS) in Shanghai and Beijing; as Dean of London Business School in the United Kingdom; and as Senior Associate Dean of Harvard Business School. At CEIBS, he raised the school’s MBA Financial Times ranking to number 15 in the world. At London Business School, he raised the global ranking to number 8.

Professor Quelch is the author of 25 books on strategic marketing, global branding and consumer-centric health care. He has been a director of ten publicly quoted companies including Reebok, Pepsi Bottling Group, Aramark and WPP, the world’s largest marketing services company. He has given speeches and seminars in more than 50 countries and has consulted to many multinationals including Sinopec and Tencent. He is senior strategy advisor to JD.com.

Professor Quelch earned degrees from Oxford University, the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, Harvard Business School and Harvard School of Public Health.

Carin-Isabel Knoop is executive director of the Case Research & Writing Group at Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration in Boston, Massachusetts, USA.

Exposed as a child to the sometimes fatal consequences of a toxic workplace on mental health, Mrs. Knoop attended Harvard Business School to learn how to build better organizations. As the head of the Harvard Business School Case Research & Writing Group for the past two decades she and her team have supported the development of over 1,200 case studies. In addition to working on cases and research projects related to health care and well-being, leadership and organizational design, she has developed and refined a set of management tools focused on maximizing mental health and professional well-being. The book builds on her research, personal and managerial experience to help others understand their responsibility and opportunity to build well-performing human ecosystems.  

Mrs. Knoop, formerly a consultant in Europe, earned an MBA from Harvard Business School and a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Texas at Austin. 

Blurb

This proactive guide brings the relationship between work life and mental well-being into sharp focus, surveying common challenges and outlining real-life solutions. The authors’ approach posits managers as the chief mental health officers of their teams, offering both a science-based framework for taking stock of their own impact on the workplace and strategies for improvement. Areas for promoting mental wellness include reducing stress and stigma, building a safe climate for talking about mental health issues, recognizing at-risk employees, and embracing diversity and neurodiversity. Emphasizing key questions to which managers should be attuned, the book speaks to its readers—whether in corporate, nonprofit, start-up, or non-business organizations—as a friendly and trusted mentor.                                                                                                                                                                        

 

Featured in the coverage:

 

·         Mind the mind: how am I doing, and how can I do better?

·         Dare to care: how are my people doing, and how might I help?

·         Building blocks for mental health: how do I manage my team?

·         Stress about stressors: what is constantly changing in the environment?

·         Changing my organization and beyond: how can I have a greater impact?

 

Compassionate Management of Mental Health in the Modern Workplace holds timely relevance for managers, human resources staff, chief medical officers, development heads in professional service firms, union or employee organization leaders, legal and financial professionals, and others in leadership and coaching positions. 

“Workplace mental health: Wow! A subject that frightens most managers. If they read this book, they will strengthen their own skills and transform their workplace and our society.”

Donna E. Shalala, Trustee Professor of Political Science and Health Policy, University of Miami; former U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services

“Mental health is an underappreciated, and oft-misunderstood challenge that is growing in the modern workplace. This book provides leaders with practical advice to address mental health challenges in their organization and improve productivity and wellbeing. This is a topic that can no longer be ignored by leaders in any field, and a book that will fundamentally change the way we think about and help improve mental health in the workplace.”

 Dominic Barton, Managing Director, McKinsey & Company