Managers at UK creative agency Uniform Group have an outlet to help staff experiencing mental health difficulties. Rather than counsel teams themselves, they can point employees to a corporate perk: free therapy sessions.
“You see people who are struggling and it’s often a number of reasons,” says Nick Howe, chief executive. “It can be a lot going on outside of work, combined with a cost of living anxiety plus a stressful period at work. [But] we can’t be their therapist.”
Uniform is one of many organisations offering employees in-house therapy, providing a tool for managers of the post-pandemic workforce at a time when public healthcare systems are stretched.
The Bank of England has offered psychological support to staff since the 1970s. Now companies including top law firms Hogan Lovells and Linklaters, and US banks, JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs, are among the employers with psychologists and counsellors available online and on-site. The benefit can signal to staff that managers are supportive and help get the best from their teams.
Howe says in-house provision was not just personally helpful during a difficult period with his own work and health pressures but also “an opportunity for managers to signpost [employees] to a therapist”.
About 30 per cent of US employers either offered or were planning to offer on-site counselling or therapy in 2022, up from 25 per cent at the start of the pandemic, according to the latest Business Group on Health survey in partnership...
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