mental health at work according to the WHO

Mental health at work according to the WHO: 5 guidelines

Mental health at work according to the WHO, is “a state of mental well-being that enables people to cope with life’s stressful moments, develop their skills, learn and work well, and contribute to the betterment of their community”. 

In the summary document published under the title WHO Guidelines on Mental Health at Work, which includes the definition just mentioned, the WHO emphasizes the enormous influence that working conditions have on the mental health of millions of people around the world and how corporations must intervene deliberately to prevent and address these difficulties in the most efficient way possible. 

Mental health at work according to the WHO

Mental health at work according to the WHO

As we have just indicated, health is not reduced exclusively to the absence of problems of greater or lesser severity. Still, it is also a state that allows people to feel good, develop their talents and abilities, and relate functionally and adaptively to the environment in which they work and carry out their other activities. 

For this reason, it is essential that companies become aware of the role that working conditions play in people’s well-being, that they provide the necessary means to prevent the threats that work generates for people’s health, and that they involve employees in promoting their health. A very effective way to do this is to follow the example of the organizations that have already placed their trust in ifeel and our global corporate well-being service. 

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The abovementioned document published this year consists of an executive summary that includes twelve recommendations covering different aspects of corporate life and its influence on people’s psychological health in the workplace. However, in this article on mental health at work according to the WHO, we wanted to highlight five that seem particularly relevant because of their potential for large corporations to see their strategies and needs reflected in them. 

5 WHO recommendations on mental health

1. To make work adaptations for staff members who suffer from mental health problems, enabling their social and work integration and benefiting from the talent and skills that these people can bring to the project. 

2. To train managers for adequate management of their teams’ mental health by training in skills to turn them into “mental health managers”. At ifeel, we are convinced of the power of managers, for example, Human Resources managers, as healthy role models for their teams. 

3. Raise employees’ awareness of relevant aspects related to mental health to prevent negative or stigmatizing attitudes that may worsen the well-being of part of the team and spoil the work environment

4. Train team members and their managers to acquire healthy skills and habits inside and outside the workplace. This is important in any corporate strategy to prevent employee mental health problems

5. Appropriate approach to reintegrating a team member after being absent from their position in the context of a medical leave due to a mental health problem. Clearly, any of the above points and the rest of the guidelines in the document on mental health at work according to the WHO are closely related to this recommendation. 

Mental health at work according to the WHO

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Focusing on emotional well-being in organizations

At ifeel, we work daily to help companies find the most appropriate way to take care of their employees’ mental health, conveying to them that work should not disrupt their well-being.  

Our team of psychologists, experts in well-being in the workplace, has created an emotional well-being program for companies that brings truly relevant benefits to the entire team, including those responsible for Human Resources.

Thanks to our integrated corporate well-being service, the HR manager and their team can receive personalized, data-driven advice on improving the psychological well-being of the teams in charge. Try our program now to see how it could help you.

In addition, this program offers all company employees a complete mental health care service that they can use depending on their needs. Employees have access to an online therapy service with one of our psychologists, specialized in cases like theirs, or they can interact with one of our professionals to receive emotional support in a more specific circumstance that concerns them.

In our Resources section, you can find different materials, such as Podcasts, HR Guides on various topics (e.g., the employee experience or how to design a good HR strategy), or Interviews with HR managers. In addition, we have a Psychosocial Risk Factors Template, which you can use to comply with the requirements of the Labor Inspection.

We hope you found this post about mental health at work according to the WHO interesting. If you want more information about our emotional well-being program for companies, you have to request it, and we will contact your team as soon as possible.

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