The rise in poor mental health amongst students remains a hot topic for employers since these students are bright, hard- working and ambitious and provide a unique talent pool. In order, for them to succeed both during the recruitment process, which is becoming ever more competitive, and in the workplace, employers must be able to provide the support they require to flourish and recognise their duty of care.
To successfully do this, employers need not only to understand the pressures and anxieties that are experienced in the transition from education to employment, but also provide the support required to enable individuals to excel in the tough environments that they will invariably find themselves in.
For this Café, we were joined by Farimah Darbyshire, Head of Programmes and Lead for Early Years Recruitment from the City Mental Health Alliance (CMHA) who set the scene by highlighting how prevalent mental ill health is amongst university students by sharing detail around the occurrence of specific anxieties and concerns that students have.
Farimah also shared some key stats from research that CMHA carried out in February 2020 focused on the perceptions of young jobseekers of employers and the support they provide for mental health. With 76% having experienced poor mental health, such as anxiety, depression or suicidal thoughts and 91% being more likely to apply to an employer that shows commitment to supporting mental health and wellbeing of employees, this shows how important it is for businesses to prioritise mental health support if they want to stand out to young people.
Whilst the research carried out by CMHA was pre-pandemic research carried out by Students Minds around ‘University Mental Health: Life in a Pandemic’ found that the growth of mental ill health amongst students has been exacerbated by the pandemic with ‘74% of students reporting that Covid-19 has had a negative impact on their mental health and wellbeing at university’. Read the full report.
Farimah went on to talk about CMHA’s ‘Standards for Mentally Healthy Recruitment and Induction in Early Careers’ aimed at helping an employer to design an early careers recruitment and induction process that supports the mental health of young people and helps them thrive from the start, as they make the stressful transition from education. To see CMHA’s standards visit their website
With James Martin from Walking the Walk drawing attention to the fact that 15.4 million working days are lost to work-related stress, depression or anxiety in 2017/18 according to Labour Force Survey and 1 in 4 people in the UK experiencing a mental health problem each year according to Mind, it’s not just about recruitment, it’s about supporting all employees.
We then moved on to hear from employers; Norton Rose Fulbright, Hogan Lovells, EY, Barclays about what they are doing to reduce the stigma that exists around mental health, and how they are encouraging openness amongst their employees enabling them to provide the required levels of support. Some of our employer speaker also spoke of their own experience with mental ill emphasising how the support their employer has in place has helped them.
Whilst each employer has unique and innovative ideas that they are exploring or have implemented there were some common themes and advice that came through from what the employers shared. These were all very much centred on education and improving awareness to help normalise mental ill health, so that being open becomes part of a company’s culture and ensures that support is provided, and employees know how to access it.
Reducing the stigma around mental ill health: Employer recommendations
• Senior level sponsorship: encourage advocates higher up the organisation to provide support and have mental health at the front of mind as a consideration for all managers.
• Regular communications: share resources available and best practices to help normalise the conversation. Run clinics for employees to access on a regular basis.
• Education: Implement training around how to have conversations about mental health and discussing wellbeing for leaders/senior managers, for recruiters and HR. James – listening to people
• Employer support: occupational health, councillors, wellbeing programmes, running sessions on how to manage mental health and apps providing well-being support
• Peer support: Creating employee networks and communities of employees to bring people together to speak and share what they do. Sharing stories aligns colleagues with similar backgrounds, encouraging people to come forward and opens up conversations so employees can support each other.
The aim of this Café was to help employers learn more about the subject of mental ill health and in doing so be able to take another step to remove the negativity, fear and silence that exists around this subject. By building the confidence to have relevant conversations with applicants and employees, it enables them to have the support they require to excel in their role.
Thank you to all our speakers for their time and willingness in sharing their experience and progress made around supporting the mental wellbeing of their current and future employees.
Speakers:
Rose Colville
Rose is a Manager at EY, working in the People Advisory Services (PAS) practice. She designed and implemented the PAS Wellbeing Champion’s network and is co-chair for the EY Mental Health Community, which supports the whole UK firm.
Rose is passionate about creating work environments that are mentally healthy and enable people to thrive. Through the EY Mental Health Community she runs regular events, webinars and drop in calls and advocates for positive mental health support at any opportunity. Influenced by her own experiences of depression throughout school, university and her career at EY, as well as living and working with anxiety, Rose is a firm believer that our mental health “challenges” can (eventually) be a phenomenal source of strengths, and bring a diversity of thought that is essential to a workplace. In 2020 Rose was awarded a special recognition award from the EY Race and Ethnicity Network in recognition of the support provided to the network and the EY Black Community in the wake of the Black Lives Matter protests. This is one of her proudest moments in her career so far.
Farimah Darbyshire
Farimah is Head of Programmes for the City Mental Health Alliance, and leads on its Early Careers Mental Health Programme. The CMHA is a membership organisation, which brings together businesses, mental health experts and partner organisations to achieve the CMHA’s shared vision that every workplace will protect, support and create positive mental health for their people. She works alongside businesses, mental health experts and people with lived experience to develop guidance, seminars and training to help employers to support young people during recruitment, induction and the first years of their career. Most recently, she has worked with Goldman Sachs, KPMG, PwC, Slaughter and May and the Bank of England to develop the first of its kind Guide To Mentally Healthy Recruitment in Early Careers.
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James Martin
James is an experienced, award winning mental health campaigner, fighting for recognition and better treatment for those living with mental ill health both in business and in wider society. He is an excellent public speaker and panelist, speaking at multiple corporate and industry events.
James himself has lived with anxiety and depression for most of his life and he is familiar with the difficulties and barriers faced by those with mental ill health. He had an extremely successful corporate career whilst also fighting and overcoming the all too familiar stigma and discrimination. He is also a community Ambassador for Movember, encouraging men to be more open about their health, especially mental health and suicide prevention.
James has been recognised for his work, being named as Most Inspiring Employee at the inaugral This Can Happen Awards in 2019 and the Movember Change Agent in 2020. He was also shortlisted for the Behind The Scenes champion at the 2020 Inside Out Awards.
In his spare time, he is not only committed to ‘Walking the Walk’ but also to running the run. He has undertaken multiple challenges to raise funds for Movember, including running 84kms a week every week in November 2019, highlighting the number of men who take their own lives every week in the UK and completing Race to the Stones, a 100km ultra, in 2021.
Siri Nomme photo
Siri Nomme
Siri is Head of Diversity & Social Purpose, EMEA, at the global law firm Norton Rose Fulbright. In this role, Siri and the diversity and inclusion team work collaboratively across the firm to ensure that Diversity and Inclusion is embedded in the business strategy and leads initiatives to attract, develop and retain a diversity of talented individuals and to promote their inclusion and career advancement at the firm. Siri also leads the social purpose team which focusses on volunteering, fundraising, charitable and pro-bono initiatives.
The firm strives to create a culture where mental health is understood without stigma and where everyone responds effectively to mental health challenges to reduce the overall incidence of mental health issues and raise the overall wellbeing of our people. The Diversity & Inclusion and Health & Wellbeing teams work collaboratively on the firm’s mental health strategy and its implementation. Key initiatives include: signatory of MIND Time to Change pledge; Mental Health First Aid officer programme; mental health employee network; annual calendar of mental health events; training for partners and senior managers; disability adjustments passport; on-site counsellor.
Matt Taylor Photo
Matt Taylor
Matt is the Reach UK Mental Health Lead at Barclays. Matt joined Barclays from a first-stage career in the Royal Navy as a Warfare Officer where he had been a proponent of the Mental Health agenda throughout his myriad of varied roles and was fortunate to benefit from the Military Talent Scheme offered by Barclays, to aide his transition to the private sector.
He now works in a specialist team within the Chief Technology Office, working to achieve efficient change management and process improvement in technology delivery. Outside of his core role, Matt is engaged with the both the Barclays Military Network and also the Reach network, working within the latter to further the Disability, Neurodiversity and Mental Health agenda across the Bank. He recently took on the role of Mental Health Lead and is passionate in expanding the purview of the Mental Health agenda within Barclays and improving the mechanisms for education and communication.
Rosie Turner photo
Rosie Turner
Rosie is an Assistant HR manager for Trainee Solicitor’s at Hogan Lovells, which is a global law firm. Rosie works mainly with employees at the early stages of their careers and understands the important role wellbeing plays for these individuals.
Rosie and the trainee development team feel that if an individual is facing mental health issues and isn’t getting the correct support, this will hinder their development. Therefore, it is a top priority to ensure that the trainees feel comfortable discussing any issues that they may be facing. When the trainees are happy and healthy, they produce the best results not only for themselves, but for the firm too.
During her time at the firm, Rosie and the team have implemented several initiatives to ensure that the trainees’ mental health is fully supported. Rosie also does a lot of work with various people around the firm to ensure they understand how they can help fully support the trainees and any challenges they may come up against.
Rosie has an open an honest approach and believes this allows trainees to feel comfortable coming forward with any issues they may be facing. Rosie encourages future joiners to disclose any disabilities or mental health related issues, so that trainees are getting the best support even before they start at the firm.
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MyPlus run a variety of these types of events for employers. For details of the different types visit our events page. For details of forthcoming Recruiters’ Club events taking place visit our events calendar page.
