Companies adjust as social upheaval takes its toll on workers

After the coronavirus pandemic and the murder of George Floyd had rocked Minneapolis in 2020, executives at US data security company Entrust noticed a spike in the number of workers filing mental health claims, and in the complaints about staff performance.

Employees at Entrust’s headquarters — located just half an hour’s drive from the epicentre of protests that consumed the nation after the killing — were requesting more leaves of absence, as well. The protests also divided the staff, says Beth Klehr, human resources chief at the group.

This internal turmoil prompted Klehr to restructure Entrust’s employee wellness programmes, offering staff one-on-one sessions with a mental health coach, meditation seminars, and social gatherings.

“When we taught our managers how to manage, we told them to be careful, don’t talk about mental health, like everyone,” Klehr says. “But when we saw that increase in mental health claims, our very innovative HR teams started working on these solutions for our colleagues, and that held us through.”

Companies are now increasingly reliant on programmes like these to manage mental health crises and stress created by more recent events, such as the wars in Ukraine and Israel, according to Klehr and other HR executives. Some Entrust employees have family members directly affected by the conflicts, Klehr points out.

When we taught our managers how to manage, we told them to be careful, don’t talk about mental health, like everyone

Overall, 74 per cent of HR executives have reported an increase in staff requests for leaves of absence or accommodations for mental health-related issues over the past year, according to employment-focused law firm Littler, in a survey published this month.

Expansive corporate wellness initiatives are a common solution. Entrust is among the 80 per cent of US companies with 200 or more employees that offered staff wellbeing programmes last year, according to KFF, a non-profit health policy research body.

These can include a wide range of benefits to promote employees’ health, from weight management clinics and biometric screenings to elective vitamin infusions and spa services.

For most businesses, offering wellness benefits began primarily as a tool to limit their healthcare costs. US employers typically cover 83 per cent of their employees’ medical insurance premiums — spending $7,034 for a employee-only plan or $17,393 for a family healthcare plan in 2023, according to KFF.

Benefits providers say that encouraging workers to live healthier lifestyles can dramatically reduce the number of insurance claims they file and sick days they take, while improving staff retention rates.

Hotel operator Hilton, for example, offers educational resources to staff battling drug and alcohol addiction, aware that substance use disorder is twice as prevalent among workers in hospitality than in other industries.

The programme is operated by Shatterproof, a group focused on tackling addiction that was founded by an alum of the hospitality sector — a fact that the hotel chain says gave it confidence that the group could understand the complications of fighting the disease while working in hotels.

“Wellness and mental wellbeing is something that has been moving up the list for all generations as something that is really important in the macro feedback that we are getting when we survey our team members,” says Lora Lawler, a senior vice-president at Hilton who oversees HR technology.

“We are really deliberate in asking about their comfort in talking about mental wellbeing and what they need from us.”

Wellness programmes first became a fixture in corporate America after Johnson & Johnson rolled out its Live for Life programme in 1979. By helping employees stop smoking, manage their blood pressure, and become physically active, the pharmaceutical group[ said it saved $250mn on healthcare over a decade.

But, at Entrust, similar efforts were not an immediate success. Klehr has run several pilot programmes to figure out what the company’s employees would benefit from most since taking over Entrust’s people strategy in 2018. She ended up scrapping the firm’s programme, which had offered short-term counselling to help staff deal with things such as grief or trauma.

Onsite gyms at some of Entrust’s satellite offices were also closed as the sites shifted to hybrid work, offering online group fitness classes instead.

Initiatives focused on sleep and nutrition proved to be hits, however. An average of 139 of the company’s 3,300 employees participate in its fitness programme each month, according to Entrust. Membership of its employee groups has grown from 10 per cent in 2022 to 20.6 per cent in 2024.

Corporate wellness programmes still have their critics, though. Some employees say they would rather see budgets allocated towards flexible working locations or cash bonuses.

Still, Klehr says the results of Entrust’s programme speak for themselves. “On our employment surveys, we get comments that would blow you away,” she says. “Like: ‘this changed my life’; ‘it’s changed how I support my family, how I look at others.’ At the end of the day, this is putting the human back into the workplace.”