Texas Mental Health: Bosses Have Bigger Impact than Therapists

From Dallas to El Paso, Lubbock to Galveston, and everywhere in between, Texans are working day and night to support themselves and create a life they can be proud of.

The average person spends around one third of their life at work. Despite only spending around 8 hours a day physically working, many of us wake up and fall asleep thinking about our jobs. Whether it’s thinking about the project you are working on, a big meeting coming up, or anything else, it consumes us.

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Because of how much time and thought goes into our jobs, it is important to enjoy what you do and feel like you have a safe and healthy environment to work in. A negative workplace can create stress not only at work, but in your personal life.

In fact, a report by the Workforce Institute at UKG surveyed 2,200 employees and 1,200 leaders from 10 different countries and found that managers have a bigger influence on employee mental health than therapists or doctors.

60% of the employees surveyed said that their job was the most impactful factor in their mental health.

• 69% said their managers had the greatest impact on their mental health and that impact was the same as that of their partners
• 43% of employees report they are exhausted
• 78% say stress negatively impacts their work performance
• 71% say stress at work negatively impinges on their home life
• 64% say it detracts from their wellbeing
• 62% say it degrades their relationships

It was also shown that leaders have very different experiences from their employees. Nine out of ten human resource and C-suite leaders said that their company had a positive impact on their employee’s mental health. Only half of the employees working for those leaders agreed with that sentiment.

This shows how important it is to communicate with your employees and strive for a healthy and positive work environment.

If you are a manager and you don’t think your employee’s mental health is important, you don’t create a safe space for them to be honest about their experiences, or you ignore signs that your employees are experiencing a negative impaction their mental health due to the current work environment, I encourage you to reevaluate and strive to improve.