Mind the gap

According to mental health support charity Mind, almost one in three people have experienced mental health issues while in employment and mental ill-health is the leading cause of sickness absence in the UK, costing an average of £1,035 per employee per year.

Mind research also shows that employers who tackled stigma around mental health in their business and offered support have seen a real difference to sickness absence rates, presenteeism levels, staff wellbeing and productivity and retention rates.

Andre Mannini, operations director for M Restaurants whose staff wellbeing focus includes giving all its team four paid ‘M-indful’ days off every year says: “It was important for us to focus on wellbeing support for staff as we had a desire to create something we are proud of and pioneer the way towards a new and fresh approach to employee engagement.”

Mannini feels hospitality operators need to be more progressive with staff wellbeing support

He says: “Our industry is facing – among a perfect storm of other challenges – a chronic staff shortage. We need to align the hospitality sector with more forward-thinking industries who seem to be miles ahead of us. While Google is adding more slides to their offices and giving unlimited holidays, our sector is still, in some cases, struggling with a bullying culture, and an old school army-like top down mentality.”

Natasha Waterfield, HR director at New World Trading Company, adds: “Our duty of care around mental health and wellbeing is perhaps even heightened within this industry, as we employ many young people in an industry that demands long and flexible shift patterns.”

She adds: “By enriching, enhancing and particularly supporting one another, we can better improve and develop both everyone as individuals and sustain a culture that we are proud of.”

Time to Change

At present, out of 999 employers who have signed up to the ‘Time to Change Pledge’, which involves employers working with the Time to Change organisation to develop an action plan to get employees talking about mental health, only a handful are hospitality operators and suppliers. Those signed up include Pizza Hut Restaurants, Greggs, Brakes, Heineken and Diageo.

But, there is increasing momentum in the industry to help improve and provide more mental health and wellbeing support to employees being driven both from operators themselves, charities including the Licensed Trade Charity and Hospitality Action and training and support providers such Healthy Hospo.

Wagamama is one of the companies putting a signiicant focus on the mental wellbeing of both staff and customers. In January the TRG-owned brand launched an ‘open mouths, open minds’ campaign to encourage more conversation around mental health among its teams and customers. It is also working with Mind to provide employees with top tips for keeping mentally well and will be fundraising for the charity this year through team challenges and volunteering. The brand has also provided staff with free access to the ‘buddhify’ mindfulness app, which is also being promoted to customers on the brand’s website.

Wagamama is also continuing an initiative launched last year to support Mind by donating 25p from its ‘super green’ power juices to help raise funds for the charity’s support call line. The company hosted a panel discussion with mental health experts at its noodle lab restaurant in Soho on ‘Time to Talk Day’ in February and the brand’s mindfulness campaign has also included changing the its iconic placemats into mindful adult colouring mats last year.

Kate Dell, Wagamama’s regional marketing manager, said: “We’ve created a movement within our teams. The reaction we have had from them and guests has been incredible, with more and more people across the business wanting to open up and help others do the same.

“We have also created a video series, with team members from the restaurants to the CEO openly sharing their personal experiences to encourage more people to open up.”

Control over the working week

Giving employees paid time-off to do things which help their wellbeing is an approach being adopted by operators including the 11-site Scottish bar/restaurant operator Buzzworks Holdings, which introduced a ‘Live Life’ initiative to offer staff more control over their working week. MD Kenny Blair says: “Staff have the option to apply for flexible time to attend family events, pursue a hobby or volunteer.”

Even single site operators are pushing the boundaries with staff wellbeing support. Hotel The Gallivant in East Sussex, owned by entrepreneur Harry Cragoe, offers staff free yoga and monthly treatments at the hotel, a free annual flu jab and a reward of £300 to staff who stop smoking for three months. There are also monthly stress counselling and physiotherapy sessions for staff, annual health screening and staff Fitbits launching soon.

Cragoe said: “Happier staff are more able to create happier environments for our guests to be in and we ultimately gauge that by our guest feedback. It’s good and getting better so the approach appears to be working.”

The M-indful Days introduced at M Restaurants last year have had a positive impact on staff according to operations director Mannini, with around 70% of them using the days since their introduction last year for reasons ranging from spending time with loved ones to recovering after a particularly challenging week, to spa ans post-party recovery days.

Mannini says: “This is precisely what we wanted – we encourage rest and focus on well-being as a preferred use but ultimately the choice is theirs. They do have to use a ‘mandatory’ Urban Massage gift voucher from us though.”

Treating the body and mind

At New World Trading Company a number of innovative initiatives around mental health support are being introduced including a new ‘Space Traveller’s’ theme staff handbook featuring wellbeing support content including physical exercise, nutrition, technology overload, mental health, personal and professional development.

It also features a wellbeing challenge to help team members who want to improve their wellbeing set their own achievable goals and focuses.

NWTC’s Natasha Waterfield says: “This could be a small change like drinking enough water every day, eating less sugar, going for a run, or meditating daily.

A ‘Mindful Manual’, authorised by a professional counsellor, is also being introduced featuring a six-week challenge to cultivate 30 minutes a day of mindfulness by the end of the course. A Mindfulness programme is also going live this year as part of the company’s management academy training for managers and chefs. Waterfield says: “This will be the most impactful way to innovate our culture to a mindful approach to work and life, making it part of the training as a solid investment into our people. having every manager in the business trained on this aspect of stress management and mental health awareness is key to the success of team engagement.”

Mental health first training is being made available to senior managers and chef in every site, and also to team members from any level who have a genuine interest towards mental health focus.

Waterfield adds: “Tapping into the existing passions of team members is vital for success on mental health initiatives and culture innovation.”

The company has also established a mental health committee which is leading the launch of ‘New World Minds’ an internal employee assistance programme currently being built, Waterfield adds: “We will have a bank of communication and resources to help our teams and also our own confidential help-line and WhatsApp number which will be run by those who have received mental health first aider training.”

Sabbaticals on the rise

The number of operators offering paid sabbaticals is also on the increase. BrewDog offers paid four-week staff sabbaticals. Dean Pugh from its UK retail team is among employees who have taken one and used it to travel. He says: “I found that when it came to returning to work, I could take a step back and look at the bigger picture of what was important, and where to focus my energy more.”

BrewDog is also among companies who offer their staff access to counselling services. The company offer private healthcare for every employee and has just upgraded it to include mental health coverage including counselling and CBT. Fiona Hunter, BrewDog’s head of people, says: “We have done this to ensure that our team has quick access to the services they told us they would find most useful.”

Around 30% of M-Restaurants company’s staff have used counselling app Spill, which offers advice with a counsellor by text and since its introduction last year 15% have used it regularly since downloading.

Mannini says: “The general feedback from Spill is that our team are using it to stay in a good place as much as if they have any ‘problems’. It is very easy to use when you are busy and would normally not have time or headspace to plan a weekly counselling or well-being session.”

Providing staff with help to engage in fitness, a well-known contributor towards good well-being, is among the strategies of companies including The Coaching Inn Group who offer staff a £200 ‘Healthy Body, Healthy Mind’ grant every year with has been used on anything from gym and Weight Watchers memberships to bikes and kayaks.

Lee Melton, the company’s head of learning and development, says: “The list of things people do with the grant seems endless and take-up levels are high. It has had some amazing results from an employee losing five stone in weight, to us having to purchase a permanent bike shelter at HQ for the incredible increase in cycle usage.

He adds: “A real focus on wellbeing started a couple of years ago. It became clear that a better work/life balance should be promoted, which in turn would make for a happier employment experience. If we could achieve this, then the belief was that not only would each employee benefit but so would the business and ultimately the guest.”

BrewDog also helps encourage fitness and has a gym at its HQ in Aberdeenshire which has 150 staff registered, is open 24/7 and features around £20k of kit. Lunchtime runs are also becoming increasingly popular with staff at HQ taking advantage of 1 mile, 5km and 10km routes around the brewery.

Focus on perks

An increasing number of companies are using third party employee assistance programmes (EAP) such as Perkbox to give staff mental health and wellbeing support or subscribe to an EAP run by industry charity Hospitality Action, which is used by around 180 companies and continues to grow. The Licensed Trade Charity also offers a free support helpline to employees with Mitchells & Butlers among those whose staff use it. Caroline Davies, head of employee relations at M&B, says: “It is fantastic that we are able to offer our employees a free helpline to support them in a wide range of challenges that they may face in their daily lives. This directly replaced a fee paying EAP service and there are many other benefits to the Licensed Trade Charity service.”

The Licensed Trade Charity is also providing pubco managers free one-day training sessions through its ‘Mental Health & Wellbeing in The Workplace’ regional events, running each month until 2021 and covering issues such on how to spot the warning signs of mental health issues amongst their workforce and deal with their problems.

By May managers from companies including JD Wetherspoon, Fuller’s, Young’s, Mitchells & Butlers, Ei Group and Star Pubs & Bars will have attended training sessions.

Healthy Hospo, a not-for-profit community interest company, is another organisation offering services including mental health training support, free-to-attend wellbeing workshops, online resources and creativity retreats with the aim to build a “healthier, happier, more sustainable hospitality industry.”

It was founded last year by Tim Etherington-Judge who has worked in the hospitality industry for 20 years and through the pressures of working in the sector, and the too often associated unhealthy lifestyle, had a mental breakdown and tried to commit suicide.

He recommends operators have a dedicated day to focus on wellbeing such as a ‘Wellbeing Wednesday’. He says: “A dedicated days that helps promote action and gets people talking about it is a good thing.”

NWTC is among companies who will be running initiatives during ‘Mental Health Awareness Week’ (13 to 19 May 2019), hosted by the Mental Health Foundation, which provides a good opportunity for employers to focus on this increasingly important area.

Because as Etherington-Judge adds: “Things are improving because people are having more conversations about mental health not had before, but there is still a long way to go.”

The Gallivant owner Cragoe agrees, adding: “The hospitality industry is changing. I believe you can’t expect to hire good people purely based on wages, increasingly everyone is looking for a more holistic approach to work / life and employers now have the ability to act if they care to. Those that do in my opinion will be the winners. It’s also a lot nicer to work in an environment of friends who actually enjoy coming to work.”