Open Mind to survey employer attitudes to mental health in the workplace

31 August 2005

Open Mind is delighted to accept a contract to work with Mentality (at the Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health) on a research project designed to gain insight into employer attitudes to mental health at work. The focus will be on small businesses but the project will also cover the voluntary and statutory sectors in the borough.

The aim of the project is to publicise and promote the use of the Department of Health's employer toolkit for supporting workplace mental health to employers (including the local authority, health trusts, voluntary organisations and small businesses) across Hackney. It will raise awareness of the links between positive mental health and good employment practice and reduce barriers to employment for people with mental health problems.

Engaging with small businesses can be particularly challenging because they frequently lack the formalised HR structures present within larger organisations and are often unable to devote much time to them. However, their need for strategies to manage mental health issues in the workplace is the same.

Over the course of the next few months, Open Mind will work with Mentality designing and developing a questionnaire and employer engagement strategy.

A minimum of 100 businesses will be invited to complete the questionnaire and the results of this should give a good insight into small business attitudes to mental health in the workplace.

Open Mind was specifically selected because of its experience in working with small and medium sized employers in deprived areas - something it has been doing over the past 5 years.

Notes for editors:

mentality, is the first national charity dedicated to promoting mental health it is is based in Borough High Street, London SE1 but undertakes work both nationally and internationally and this project is exclusively based within the London Borough of Hackney. mentality is a department within the Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health .

Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health is the leading charity with a focus on mental health and employment. For further information visit http://www.scmh.org.uk

[back]