Why mental welfare needs to be part of your wellness strategy

The common misconception of health, is “if you don’t have disease, you have health”.

But, Jade Camps-Douglas begs to differ, saying: “That’s not how it works, well-being is more than just the absence of disease, it’s about looking at your well being as a whole.”

Presently the head of wellbeing at Rolls-Royce Singapore, Jade Camps-Douglas was the keynote speaker at Employee Benefits Asia 2018, Singapore edition held on 3-4 May 2018.

Camps-Douglas went on to touch on the five dimensions of wellbeing (intellectual, social, physical, spiritual, and emotional) before diving into the focus of her presentation - mental health and wellbeing.

She believes that as much as physical health needs to be taken care of and constantly worked on, mental health also needs to be worked on.

Camps-Douglas emphasised:

One of the tools to build mental health is resilience, to which she said, “Resilience is something we all have the ability to do. But self awareness of that is very important and we need to have tools in the workplace to enable that.”

These tools, be it workshops or frameworks should be continuous, she said, adding: “You can’t just run a workshop once a year and expect employees to be resilient. It’s the same as how you don’t just go to the gym once a year and expect to be in shape.”

To show the importance of keeping mental health in check, she pointed out a number of data points.

To add to that, the United Nations defines stress as a global epidemic - a ‘silent killer’, and according to their data, depression costs 200 million lost workdays, equating to US$17-$44 billion in lost productivity, Camps-Douglas added.

With that, she shared a guide to help managers identify the common signs and symptoms of stress in these four categories.

Emotional

• Irritable
• Tearful
• Mood swings
• Sensitive to criticism
• An uncharacteristic loss of confidence
• Lose their sense of humour

Behavioural

• Arriving late
• Not taking lunch breaks
• Taking unofficial time off
• Withdrawing from team or not joining in conversations
• Becoming more introverted/ extroverted

Cognitive

• Making more mistakes than usual
• Unable to concentrate
• Difficulty making decisions
• Sudden/unexplained drop in performance

Physical

• Seem tired all the time
• Have a constant cold
• Changes in eating habits
• Rapid weight gain/loss
• Changes in self-care/appearance

Recognising the signs and symptoms without taking action isn’t enough.

With that, Camps-Douglas proposed some questions for organisations to think about when building a mentally healthy and well workplace. The checklist includes:

• Do our leaders set the right tone?
• Do we talk about mental health and wellbeing and raise awareness?
• Do we have a workplace health programme that includes all dimensions of wellbeing?
• Do our managers have access to training?
• Do all employees have access to education and training on mental health and wellbeing?
• Do we offer support to our employees who are experiencing mental health problems?

This knowledge was shared at the Human Resources’ conference, Employee Benefits Asia 2018, Singapore. To know more and attend more such events, please visit: http://www.humanresourcesonline.net/events/.

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In addition to Camps-Douglas, presenters for day one of Employee Benefits Asia 2018, Singapore included:

• Eugene Lam, regional HR director at Kimberly-Clark Corporation
• Shah Rouf, chief executive officer of group corporate solutions at AIA Group
• Marla Arnall, communications and branding leader at Mercer Marsh Benefits
• Jade Camps-Douglas, head of wellbeing at Rolls-Royce Singapore
• Ommar Butt, director of HR mergers and acquisitions at NXP Semiconductors
• Richard Wyber, head of healthcare and vitality at AIA Singapore
• Sajjad Parmar, director of regional reward business partner for Asia at eBay
• John Garrido, regional director for Asia at Virgin Pulse
• Lee U-Jin, director of human resources for Asia at Sibelco
• Rob Gosney, total rewards director, APJ, HP Inc
• Sandeep Mookharjea, managing director and head of HR, risk, Standard Chartered Bank Singapore
• Michael Haberzettl, head of human resources, ASEAN, Siemens
• Jaya Goyal Mittal, head of rewards, Maersk

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Human Resources would like to thank our sponsors and partners for making this event a reality:

Platinum sponsor

• AIA Group

Gold sponsors

• Mercer Marsh Benefits

• Virgin Pulse

Exhibitors

• Jardine Lloyd Thompson Asia

• Pacific Prime

• Prudential

• UrbanFox

Event partner

• VSP Vision Care

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Check out highlights from Employee Benefits Asia day two here: How to overhaul your wellbeing programme