We are pleased to announce that we have recently completed the roll out of our ‘Mates in Mind’ Mental Health Awareness Programme.
Putting mental health into perspective, about 1 in 4 of adults in the UK will have mental health issues in their lifetime and 75% of this group will never seek or receive treatment. In the past this has been a challenging subject to address but thanks to construction industry initiatives like ‘Mates in Mind’, the Government backed Stevenson Farmer review and a more positive societal attitude, our industry is becoming far more aware of the importance of promoting good mental health and equipping our people to deal with stress at work and home.
We believe this programme will have a major impact on raising the awareness of this important subject within our business. The sessions have to date involved 143 of our staff receiving training and coaching with mental health professionals from the British Safety Council. These sessions range from a 3-hour ‘Manage the Conversation’ session for managers and supervisors to a 1-hour ‘Start the Conversation’ overview for everybody else and introduces the subject of mental health awareness. The purpose of the programme is to remove the stigma of mental health, help our staff to be aware of the signs of poor mental health both in themselves and others and most importantly provide a variety of options to help colleagues, friends and family deal with these issues.
To establish mental health support in the business on an ongoing basis we are also training 14 Mental Health First Aiders throughout our business both office and site based to provide a focus for mental health awareness and support for our staff. One of our first employees to undergo this training was Chairman, Jeremy Browne. Jeremy said, “Mental Health First Aid training has been one of the most valuable things I have done in my career. The 2-day programme helped me firstly understand the scale of mental health as a factor in people’s overall well- being and emphasised the responsibility we have in providing training and support for our people. I am very proud of the efforts we are making along with key clients like Thames Water to make a real difference.”