Job Titles of the Future: Director of Mental Health and Wellness

While there definitely has been increased focus on wellness and wellbeing in the workplace in the last 10 or so years, most of that focus has been on the physical dimension of wellness - with programs and tools designed to help employees get more physically active, to quit smoking, to get a handle on better ways to manage long-term and (often) preventable health risks. But less attention (it seems to me anyway), has been paid to other aspects of wellness/wellbeing - and in particular, mental health. And mental health, and how employee mental health impacts people and the organization is a huge deal. I mean huge.

How huge?

According to some data from the Depression Center from the University of Michigan:

Depressive illnesses, including major depression and bipolar disorder, are highly prevalent in the United States, affecting nearly one in five adults at some point in their life. These conditions are also among the top five causes of disability globally, and depression ranks as the #1 contributor to disability in the U.S. and Canada. An estimated 6.7% of adults in the U.S. had at least one major depressive episode in the past year. Depression is one of the most costly health conditions for American employers. The annual cost of depression in the U.S. is estimated at $210.5 billion, with approximately 45% attributable to direct costs, 5% to suicide-related costs, and 50% to workplace costs. A majority of these workplace costs are due to lost productivity in the workplace from both absenteeism (missed days of work) and "presenteeism" (reduced productivity at work). Presenteeism represents nearly 75% of workplace costs and 37% of the overall economic burden of depression.

And that is just one set of data points from one source on the significant impact the mental health challenges and depression in particular makes on organizations, not to mention the personal and family impact depression has on people, families, and communities.

So it makes sense that organizations are and should be addressing mental health and depression as just as important a dimension of employee wellness with as much focus as they have with physical wellness. And at least one organization, maybe one you wouldn't think would 'have' to worry about the mental health of its workforce is doing just that.

The organization is the National Basketball Association, (don't worry, this is not turning into a 'sports' post). From a recent piece on the NBA.com site:

Kevin Love and DeMar DeRozan -- two All-Stars -- who became the latest NBA players to detail their public battles with mental wellness. Love wrote a first-person account last week in The Players’ Tribune of the panic attack he suffered earlier this season. DeRozan spoke last month of the depression he’s dealing with during what may be his most successful NBA season.

Their disclosures came as the NBA and the National Basketball Players Association are close to naming a Director of Mental Health and Wellness, who will run an independent mental wellness program that is being jointly funded by the league and union.

It might seem surprising that NBA players - generally young, wealthy, successful, admired, and in great physical health would be affected by mental health issues, panic attacks, and depression. But the fact that we can have that kind of a reaction - 'Gee, what do these guys have to be depressed about?', reminds us that it is too easy to fail to take mental health issues seriously, or to want to treat them as not real issues for employees because we can't 'see' them.

And I am pretty sure that is going to change, or it will have to change, as these issues become more common in the US and by extension, in the workplace. The National Institute of Health’s National Institute of Mental Health estimates that, in 2016, more than 44 million Americans suffered from some form of mental illness, ranging from mild to moderate to severe, and impacting more than 18 percent of all U.S. adults.

As an NBA fan, I like that the league is doing more to actively recognize, address, support and mostly not to hide from the mental health challenges that players are facing - even if we think these don't or shouldn't exist, the accounts of Love, DeRozan, and others show us the problems are real. And with the data showing that mental health issues and illnesses growing at a consistent rate, it makes sense for organizations to think about today's Job Title of the Future - Director of Mental Health and Wellness. Maybe you should too.

Have a great weekend!

Introducing the Human Friendly Workplace Podcast

I'm super excited to share with you the debut episode of the newest podcast on the HR Happy Hour Podcast Network - The Human Friendly Workplace Podcast hosted by employee engagement and workplace culture expert Jason Lauritsen. 

On the Human Friendly Workplace Podcast, Jason will speak with HR and business leaders who are actively engaged with making their workplaces better - and more human.

For Jason's debut episode, he talks with Graham Moody, People and Culture Manager at ansarada, an Australian company that has seen rapid growth, and has had to make sure their unique culture could scale.

Here are the details for the show - and many thanks and a welcome to Jason - we are thrilled to have you be a part of the HR Happy Hour family.

The Human Friendly Workplace 1 - Creating a Human Friendly Workplace

Host: Jason Lauritsen

Guest: Graham Moody, People and Culture Manager at ansarada

Listen to the show HERE

How can understanding employees’ personal values help create a stronger and more self-aware workplace? What does it mean to reevaluate and decide to change your company values, and how can you make sure employees connect with the new values?

“We believe that values drive behavior and that behavior drives results.” - Graham Moody

In today’s conversation Jason interviews Graham Moody with ansarada. Ansarada is headquartered in Sydney and has grown rapidly in the last 18 months, reaching nearly 200 employees while simultaneously pivoting its business model. Having strong company and personal values has always been deeply important at ansarada, and the recent changes posed a new challenge to the company culture.

In the discussion, Moody will discuss how the company preserved the company’s culture during the rapid growth and a business focus shift. Listeners today will also learn why you should create a culture of servant-based leadership and also hear the one piece of advice he would give to managers on creating a human-friendly workplace culture.

Listen to the show on the show page HERE, on your favorite podcast app, or by using the widget player below:

Today’s episode is being powered by Small Improvements.

Small Improvements is a feedback platform that helps employees grow and succeed. From Performance Check-Ins, Goals and 360s, it combines both ongoing and structured feedback to facilitate meaningful development.

Subscribe to all the HR Happy Hour Podcast Network shows wherever you get your podcasts - just search for 'HR Happy Hour'

More from the 'Robots are making people obsolete' front lines

I was fully prepared to write up a 'There's no way a robot could have done what I did this weekend' piece after having spent most of it painting some rooms in the house, building some furniture, and hanging about a million pictures and posters on the wall. The work was too imprecise, too unstructured, and required too much moving about in tight, crowded spaces for any robot (based on my current understanding of mainstream robotics capability), too manage.

So after doing all that work over the weekend I felt pretty good about my ability to remain (reasonably) useful and relevant moving forward. I mean, between coming up with sort of interesting blogs, and general domestic tasks, (I am also very handy with a chainsaw), I had a hearty chuckle to myself, thinking about the doomsayers, (sometimes me too), fretting about the impending obsolescence of the human worker in the face of technological innovation.

But these good feelings kind of dissapated a bit when I caught this piece on Fashionista (What, are you surprised I follow Fashionista?), on how some enterprising drones took the place of some fashion models at the recent Dolce & Gabbana show in Milan.

Turns out drones can 'model' as well as (or better), than the human fashion models (at least in some instances). From the piece on Fashionista:

It’s 2018, and as further proof that we’re already living in the future, what’s more fashionable than drones? Drones with handbags, according to Italian luxury fashion house Dolce & Gabanna, which sent a bunch of flying drones down its runway during the house’s fashion show in Milan on Sunday.

Here's a look at the drone runway models as seen on Twitter: (if you can't see the video, click through)

Here are @dolcegabbana’s Nice Boys pic.twitter.com/lrA7KLUPJP

— Tyler McCall (@eiffeltyler) February 25, 2018

Make progress against the robots in one area, (painting a room in bad lighting and full of odd angles and corners), and lose it in another, (looking glamorous while showing off the latest in designer handbags).

All this reminds us that the path to workplace automation, and the more widespread loss of jobs for people, is going to progress in spurts, in fits and stops, will surprise us in some ways and shock us in others, and is, probably, still inevitable.

Have a great day. Let me know if you buy one of the D & G handbags.

Are HR's diversity and inclusion strategies proprietary information?

Companies suing each other after an employee leaves one company to join another, especially when the companies are competitors, over the details in the employee's non-compete agreement is not all that uncommon. Particularly in the tech industry when many rival companies are chasing many of the same kinds of tech-driven breakthrough projects like AI, self-driving vehicles, robotics, and more - the loss of a key employee or two to a rival can have significant competitive consequences and impact.

A debate can be had whether or not the entire idea of employee non-compete agreements are beneficial or necessary (or enforceable), but for the purposes of what I wanted to call to your attention today, let's all accept that for the moment such agreements do exist, and from time to time, are actively enforced by companies trying to protect their IP from escaping to a competitor, (along with the employee).

The story I wanted to highlight is about a big tech company fight over an employee non-compete, but not one of the ones we expect - surrounding some star engineer working on the latest VR or AI tech - it centers around HR, more specifically, around a Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer heading to Microsoft from IBM.

Here are some details and context from coverage in Business Insider - Microsoft just hired a chief diversity officer - and IBM is suing them over it:

Tech companies have a less than stellar record hiring women and minorities. But these companies will apparently do whatever it takes — including launching a legal fight — to hire one type of person: a Chief Diversity Officer.

IBM is suing Microsoft for poaching its top diversity officer, Lindsay-Rae McIntyre in a case that could prove just how important diversity, recruitment, and retention has become for tech companies.

McIntyre, who joined IBM in 2006, was named chief diversity officer of Microsoft on Sunday, after serving in the same role and as VP of human resources at IBM. IBM, in its complaint, argues that McIntyre had access to diversity data, strategies, methodologies and initiatives that are confidential, and that she "will use, rely on or divulge" these strategies in her new role.

On Monday, IBM was granted a temporary restraining order in New York federal court, which prevents McIntyre from working for Microsoft until the court decides otherwise.

"McIntyre was at the center of highly confidential and competitively sensitive information that has fueled IBM's success in these areas," a representative for IBM said in a statement. "While we understand Microsoft's need to deal with mounting criticism of its record on diversity, IBM intends to fully enforce Ms. McIntyre's non-compete agreement to protect our competitive information."

A really interesting case it seems to me. I admit to not following the ebbs and flows and latest cases in employment law all that closely, but I do follow lots of news and I don't recall seeing a major non-compete case with this kind of profile that focuses specifically on an HR executive, and perhaps more interestingly, on specific human capital management strategies. Whatever specific policies, programs, maybe even some technology applications too that IBM, under Ms. McIntyre's leadership were employing to improve diversity, IBM is contending that these combined represent IP that is not just company confidential, but also represents relevant and demonstrable competitive advantage.

It probably matters that IBM and Microsoft are highly likely to be competing for many of the same kinds of talented people across a wide spectrum of roles. And it also probably matters that (as I have pointed out on the blog for a couple of years on the CHART OF THE DAY series), that labor markets in general are really tight, and for certain 'hard-to-find' roles are incredibly tight. Recruiting and retention ratchets up the CEO's list of priorities when the people the company needs are in high demand and when your competitors are willing to go really far to beat you in the talent game - whether recruiting new grads or poaching your top execs - like Ms. McIntyre.

The diversity angle here is interesting and timely,  and probably contributed to why this was a story coverred in the general tech press. But what would be more interesting to me is to see a major non-compete battle be launched over say a CHRO or a VP of Talent, or even a Global Leader of Talent Acquisition. I'd like to see a major, Fortune 50 or so company go to battle over an HR/TA leader, contending that their particular insights, and their specific talent strategies are so important, in fact just as important as the knowledge of the latest AI hotshot, that the company is willing to battle in court to keep that HR knowledge in-house.

This is a really intriguing case, I will keep an eye on it for sure. It would be interesting and validating too, if IBM wins in this case, and HR programs and strategies are shown to be true (at least in the court's view), completive advantage. And it would be pretty cool for HR to have some more over the top recruiting and retention fights go on over HR people for once.

Have a great day!

Don't talk to me, don't even look at me - I'm busy over here

Slapping on a pair of headphones or earbuds while you are work, especially in open plan offices, in order to help yourself to focus on your work, and probably more importantly, to send a 'do not bug me right now' signal to your co-workers has been a pretty common element of work for some time now.

But what do you do when simply putting on headphones is not enough of a barrier between you and pesky co-workers, their questions, their comings and goings, and other kinds of interruptions or distractions? You could simply accede to your true nature and quit your job and take up permanent hermit status? But let's say you don't want to go that extreme, and simply want to find a way to have a little bit more privacy, focus, and send an even more aggressive 'do not bother me' message to the office?

Enter the 'FocusCap' which has been described as a kind of 'horse blinder for people'. The idea of the Focus Cap is create a 'moble, distraction-proof fortress' so that a worker can 'fully concentrate on high demanding cognitive tasks'. That sounds pretty good to me. I may even need one of those here at HR Happy Hour HQ.

Check out the videobelow, (email and RSS subscribers will need to click through).

Pretty wild, right?

Are office distractions, and the challenges that are presented by the lack of personal space and lack of privacy that modern, open plan offices generate really driving workers to try and build little personal cocoons to carve out some space and peace among the chaos? Maybe so. I have not worked in an open plan setting for quite some time, but I am pretty sure I would not enjoy it all that much. Maybe with a pair of headphones on and a pair of these horse blinders for people I could make it seem like I was in my own spacious (and private) office, or sitting on the sofa in my PJs. 

And for the record, I have no relationship at all with the makers of the FocusCap. But I do think it is cool.

Have a great week!