Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Make a hell for me Make a hell for you.
Come on, everybody, let your love shine through Whether you're a family member, a friend or a stranger Everyone everywhere Let kindness matter. Let kindness matter, Matter, matter Let kindness matter. Mental health for all.
[00:00:28] Speaker B: A message from the Barbados Psychiatric Hospital in association with the Ministry of Health and Wellness, Barbados.
[00:00:35] Speaker C: And today is going to be a very informative session as we talk about understanding mental health in the workplace. And joining me, he's become like family. Ryan Lewis, good morning to you.
[00:00:46] Speaker B: Good morning, Carol. How are you doing?
[00:00:48] Speaker C: I'm well, thank you. And Also in studio, Dr. Keogh Ford, St. Hill consultant psychiatrist. Good morning to you.
[00:00:54] Speaker D: Good morning.
[00:00:55] Speaker C: Good to have you. And let's just dig right in.
And I want to know, why should mental health in the workplace be a priority for both employees and employers? So who's going to take that one?
[00:01:09] Speaker B: I'm going to hand over to Dr. Keough for. She's a program lead for this campaign.
[00:01:13] Speaker C: Oh, fantastic.
[00:01:15] Speaker D: So, as you rightly said, Carol, it is important for both the employee and the employer. The employee's well being should be a priority in the workplace. Also, it is important for successfully built business because a well employee, a healthy employee creates a healthy workplace.
And then, you know, the employers have a legal, ethical responsibilities to ensure that the workplace is a healthy environment, not just physically in terms of, you know, there's no occupational health and safety issues, but also in the mental health of the employee. And then it's to help to. One of the reasons why this campaign would be important along with the campaigns that we've already been running at Psychiatric hospital to reduce the stigma, because there are employees within the workplace who have existing mental health conditions, those who will develop mental health conditions or have a mental health issue. And you have to feel comfortable enough in your workplace that you know you're not victimized because of it.
[00:02:22] Speaker C: Interesting. I have so many questions and there's so little time.
All right, I'm going to stick.
What are, what are the common mental health challenges faced by employees?
Yeah, just deal with that. The common ones.
[00:02:37] Speaker B: So we all know about stress and we all know about burnout. So yes, we go through periods of stress. And Dr. Ford would tell you there's good stress and there's bad stress. Stress is supposed to be peaks and valleys. You work towards a deadline, you work towards a project. Once that project is over, you should see a reduction in stress until the next project. But when that stress is sustained every.
[00:02:58] Speaker C: Day, all day after project after project, right.
[00:03:00] Speaker B: Then that becomes an issue. And this is where the employee faces challenges and it creates conflicts with work life balance, it creates conflicts with personal well being. And if you like, Dr. Forge, I said if you want a successful business, you have to have a mentally healthy workplace and a mentally healthy employee. Because your relationship with the employee and the employer to get and translate that product or service that you're rendering in your operational environment, it has to start internally first. The employee has to feel appreciated. They have to feel as a whole person. I'm sure you've been told in your younger years, Carol, that leave your problems at the door. Come in. In 2024, in this campaign we're saying bring your whole self to work. We wanted to understand you as a person and that when you go back home that you're still able to be a mother, a daughter, a brother, a wife and to live. Sometimes we go home after a whole day's work and we are nothing to ourselves. And that is a men health red flag. And that can easily develop into a mental health condition. And that is what we refer to as burnout. And of course there's those common men health disorders like depression and anxiety that flourish through our society. And I don't think a lot of us are actually acknowledging the key features that we, that may say, okay, we do have some of these symptoms and we need to address them urgently. And of course, because we don't converse about mental health openly and it remains taboo, then we isolate ourselves and we suffer in silence. And these create issues in mental health in the workplace.
[00:04:38] Speaker C: Dr. Ford St. Hill. I feel we're going to become good friends. So I'm going to call you Dr. Keough from that one.
[00:04:43] Speaker D: Yeah, that's fine.
[00:04:45] Speaker C: When you have, I mean it's one thing to say this is important, we need to look at mental health within the workplace and bring your whole self. And if there are not systems in place to deal with the whole self to really manage mental health challenges or stress or, you know, why is my employee constantly stressed out? Are there too many deadlines? What do you do there when you don't have those systems in place?
[00:05:15] Speaker D: So sorry, excuse me. That can result in a lot of different things because it is, as we've been alluding to, is a bidirectional relationship between the mental health of the employee and the productivity and the health and the success of the business. So when you have employees who have, who are suffering because of their mental health, you can, you're gonna inevitably call in sick or you're coming to work, but not really working. So what we Call presenteeism as well.
[00:06:00] Speaker C: And this whole term that they had recently, that was really used a lot in the last couple of years. Quiet quitting, Covid.
[00:06:06] Speaker D: Correct. Exactly. And then, you know, obviously you get employees who, you know, they're calling in sick, not necessarily only because they're stressed out, but because then it starts to manifest itself physically. Right. Then you have decreased productivity. And ultimately that's what the employer is interested in. So it's in their best interest to ensure that they create a safe environment, a healthy environment for their employees.
Now, they also need to be able to freely communicate within the organization. So communication is key because if me and Ryan are not communicating, like, this campaign is not going to work, because I would be like, I know who he talking to, but I'm not listening if I am in a mood. So your employees have to be able to communicate not only with each other, but also with their supervisor, with the employer. If they can't do that, then you're going to. And if they feel like they can't come to you when they're having an issue, they don't necessarily have to tell the supervisor all their business. You know, but if I don't even feel safe to say, well, honestly, I know that I was supposed to hand in XYZ on yesterday. The reason I didn't is because I'm just feeling a little tired of struggling a bit. But I'm going to finish it by the end of the week. Could I get that extension? You know, you shouldn't say, well, go through the door since you can finish what it is I asked you to do. You know, so the. And then there's also. But I guess we'll talk about that as time. As time goes on. The employee assistance programs that need to be put in place, or at least the employees actually have to know about them so that they can seek help when they need to.
[00:07:53] Speaker C: Fantastic. So we're talking about mental health issues in the workplace. I want to know about the impact on productivity and the overall workplace culture. Now we hear about workplace culture, and some people say, well, you just come to work to work, but every single job has a specific culture. Especially you've got people who've been there for long or those who are coming in and how. What's the impact?
[00:08:16] Speaker B: Well, the impact is dire. Like Keo said, communication is key. And then sometimes if you don't have clear expected roles or the expectations of the employer versus the employee, it creates chaos, because then you're not sure what you're supposed to do in terms of providing deliverables. You're not sure what you're supposed to do in terms of your hours of service. It's almost like you keep stretching the goalpost to accommodate the needs of the day. And that is unhealthy. You need to have set guidelines. The employee need to be confident, leave some things to say, well no, I can't do that today and not feel guilty or guilt ridden into doing what the employer wants on that particular day. Because being short of staff is not necessarily an employee problem. It is an employer problem.
[00:09:09] Speaker C: It becomes the employee's problem though.
[00:09:11] Speaker B: It becomes the employee's problem. But then you still need to have then a follow up conversation to say, okay, well we're short today, we're short this week. Can you in terms of asking are not expecting that it's an automatic task to take on by the employee and then if they say no, then that they are more or less disciplined or victimized in some respects because this then creates a toxic culture. And then that can be easily component about how we manage employee relations favoring one employee over the other. Two employees will go to the supervisor with similar problems. One would be favored and the other will not be favored. So these uneven practices then will result in this toxic culture that we speak about. And you know, we are social beings, we see, we know, we understand it. So when we see these things, then you want to speak about as emptyism, you want to speak about high turnover rates, you want to speak about quitting. And those other things that we speak about, these are all other things that surface or emerges as a consequence of this as well. And we don't want that. And something is not done with an ill intent. Something happens that we need to be objective on either front, whether it's done willingly or unwillingly so that you can curb it and at least give the best experience for both the employee, the customer and the success of the business.
[00:10:34] Speaker C: It sounds like businesses need to collaborate not just with the psychiatric hospital, because we've always heard when there are troubles and the labor office gets involved and yet maybe that needs to happen. But if you look at it from this side, the mental health challenges that could arise, you know, more collaboration possibly to make this, make the work space better.
[00:10:55] Speaker B: Definitely agree.
[00:10:57] Speaker C: So what are the benefits that organizations can experience by making mental health key focus in their operations?
[00:11:05] Speaker D: So of course the bottom line, as we said before for any organization, is that product is productivity. We care. You know, the employers care about how well their business is running. You have a healthy work environment, you have healthy Employees, you will have high production, you will have better dynamics among your team members and from between management and the lower, not quote unquote, lower level employee employees.
And then it reduces the stigma so that employees are able to speak about their mental health, know that their mental health is valued and know that they're not going to be penalized or stigmatized because they're having, you know, because they're experiencing grief. And for that particular week or month, they're not as productive as they should be. And we would get to a place where, you know, we're not just giving people two days for them to, or one day to attend the funeral of their very close relative that passed away way, but acknowledging that it looks different in everybody and that these. You need to give them grace, really.
[00:12:29] Speaker C: I have one final question, because we're going to round the time just now.
The whole culture that we seem to have now overall, where people are trying to reduce staff, but then an employee has a role of, has three or four different roles. How do you address that? Because that could eventually lead to pressure, lead to stress, deadlines, and hence mental health issues. How are you going to help people to deal with that and help employers and employees to understand there has to be a balance?
[00:13:05] Speaker B: Again, a conversation. It just can't happen in the absence of a conversation. And even if you attempt to do that, then neither party is going to reap the benefits or see the expectations of what they think can happen as a result. Because I'm after real conversation, if I'm taking on two or three roles, even if I'm willing, we have to speak in terms of finances, we gotta speak in terms of my social investment because I'm gonna be spending more time away from family if I'm equipped to do that, if it's gonna be reliable each and every time, if I'm gonna have the resources to support me to do certain things. Because life happens and life happens really, really, really fast. So today we are happy, we're good. We have all the elements that can make us successful. But then we go through a loss. I lose my wife or my mother. And how do we create a contingent for that? How do you create a contingent for your business to go on in my absence? Because for me to purposely fulfill your role as a employee, I still have to fulfill the role as an individual.
[00:14:12] Speaker C: Well, well, just like that, we are out of time. And you need to keep listening to VOB 92.9 FM. This one, prioritizing mental health in the workplace. I want to say thank you to Ryan Lewis. As always, thank you very much. And joining us this morning, lead for this particular program, Dr. Keough Ford St. Hill. Thank you so much.
Have a great day.
[00:14:35] Speaker B: You, too.
[00:14:37] Speaker A: Make a hand for me. Make a help for you.
Come on, everybody. Let your love shine through. Whether you're a family member, a friend or a stranger.
Everyone everywhere. Let kindness matter. Let kindness matter.
Matter, matter.
Let kindness matter. Mental health for all.
[00:15:05] Speaker B: A message from the Barbados Psychiatric Hospital in association with the Ministry of Health and Wellness. Barbados.
