Mental Health in the workplace: It’s time to show up for your people
First published for Mental Health Awareness Week 2025. Updated September 2026 with the latest HSE and Deloitte figures.
Nearly a million UK workers said last year that work had caused or worsened stress, depression or anxiety. That's not a wellbeing-week statistic. It's a description of the people in your Monday meeting. Building a workplace people don't have to recover from isn't about kindness alone, though kindness is a fine place to start. It's what keeps good people, keeps them well, and keeps the business working.
Mental health is a workplace issue, not just a personal one
It affects focus, judgement, relationships and how much of someone turns up each day. And yet in most organisations it's still handled quietly: a word with HR, a period of leave nobody explains, a resignation that "came out of nowhere". More connected than ever, and still a lot of people getting through the week on their own.
What the numbers say
Every figure here is sourced, because the ones that get passed around often aren't.
An estimated 964,000 workers suffered from work-related stress, depression or anxiety in 2024/25, and 22.1 million working days were lost to it. That's 52% of all work-related ill health (HSE, November 2025).
Poor mental health costs UK employers around £51 billion a year, and roughly £24 billion of that is presenteeism: people at work but not really working (Deloitte, May 2024).
63% of workers show at least one sign of burnout (Deloitte, 2024).
In 2022, 28% of UK employees had left their job in the previous year or planned to leave in the next, and 61% of those gave poor mental health as a reason (Deloitte, 2022).
Around 15% of UK workers have an existing mental health condition (Stevenson and Farmer, Thriving at Work, via the Mental Health Foundation).
Globally, depression and anxiety cost an estimated 12 billion working days and US$1 trillion in lost productivity every year (World Health Organization).
"There is no health without mental health." The WHO has been saying it for years. The figures above are what it costs to disagree.
Behind every number is someone deciding whether to say anything
Some people resign. More stay and quietly burn out, which costs the business just as much and takes longer to notice. The gap between a workplace where someone says "I'm not coping" in week two and one where they hand in their notice in month six is the whole subject of this post.
What real support looks like
Awareness is the start. Consistent action is the rest. Six practices that hold up:
Make it normal to talk. People take their cue from the top. A leader who says "I've had a rough month and I've been getting some help" does more for disclosure rates than any campaign.
Train managers to notice and respond. Managers are the first line of support and usually the least prepared for it. Give them the training to spot early signs, have the conversation without diagnosing, and know where to point people.
Offer flexibility that's real. Hybrid and flexible arrangements aren't perks. Trust people to manage their time and most will repay it with loyalty and effort; the few who don't are a performance conversation, not a reason to withdraw it from everyone. Our own survey of 116 insurers found companies with fixed hours were twice as likely to report a fall in wellbeing as a rise: what the working policy survey found.
Make support easy to find. An employee assistance programme nobody knows about is a line in a budget. Put it in the induction, the intranet, the manager's toolkit, and mention it before someone's in crisis.
Create space. Encourage breaks, provide somewhere quiet, and make it safe to speak up in meetings as well as in private.
Keep it up all year. Awareness weeks are a spotlight. Regular check-ins, refresher training and a wellbeing question in the survey are what change the day-to-day.
Where hiring comes into it
This is a recruitment company's blog, so we'll be honest about the connection. Managers carry most of the load above, which means who you promote and hire into management, and what you train them to do in their first ninety days, is a wellbeing decision as much as a commercial one. The behaviours are testable at interview; hiring for fit rather than headcount explains how. And candidates notice. The way you treat people during the hiring process is the first evidence they get of how you'll treat them when they're struggling, which is why candidate experience and employer brand are the same subject.
The business case, in case you need one
Supporting mental health is the right thing to do. It also pays. Deloitte's 2024 analysis puts the average return at about £4.70 for every £1 employers spend on mental health and wellbeing, through lower absence, less presenteeism and fewer people leaving. Separately, Oxford University researchers found happy workers are around 13% more productive, in a study of BT call-centre staff rather than a survey of intentions.
Be the workplace they don't have to recover from
Don't let this be a box ticked once a year. Ask your team one question this week: "What would make it easier to say you're struggling here?" Then listen to the answer, and change one thing.
If you or someone you work with needs support now: Samaritans are available 24 hours a day on 116 123. Mind and the Mental Health Foundation have guidance for employees and employers.
Sources: HSE: work-related stress, depression or anxiety statistics 2024/25, HSE press release, 20 November 2025, Deloitte: poor mental health costs UK employers £51 billion a year (May 2024), Deloitte 2022 findings via Work in Mind, Mental Health Foundation: mental health at work statistics, University of Oxford: happy workers are 13% more productive
Mental health at work, answered
Three things, in outline. Under the Health and Safety at Work Act, the duty of care covers mental health as well as physical, and the HSE expects employers to assess and manage the risk of work-related stress in the same way as any other hazard; its Management Standards set out how. Under the Equality Act, where a mental health condition is long-term and has a substantial effect on day-to-day life it can count as a disability, which brings a duty to make reasonable adjustments and protection from less favourable treatment. And for anyone off sick, the usual sick pay and absence rules apply. This is general commentary rather than legal advice, so check the specifics with an employment adviser.
Listen first, and resist the urge to fix it in the same conversation. Thank them for saying so, ask what would help rather than guessing, and don't diagnose. Agree something practical and small: a change to hours or workload for a few weeks, a quieter space, a later start. Point them to what the business offers, whether that's an employee assistance programme, occupational health or simply encouragement to see their GP. Keep it confidential beyond the people who need to know, and put a date in the diary to check in again, because the follow-up is the part most managers miss and the part people remember.
Look at what people do, not what the poster says. Absence and its stated reasons, turnover and the themes in exit interviews, uptake of the employee assistance programme, and whether survey scores on 'I can raise a concern with my manager' move over time. The most telling sign is when people disclose earlier: a team where someone says 'I'm not coping' in week two rather than resigning in month six is one where the support is real. If nothing is measured, you have a policy, not a practice.