December 18, 1998

By Edgardo Pérez, M.D.

The depression of people and the depression of corporate productivity are companions in an economy, a workplace, and a society that have been rattled by discontinuous change and invasive uncertainty. And these factors are costing us billions of dollars and the mental health of millions of people.

This is one theme explored by Mindsets-Mental Health: The Ultimate Productivity Weapon, which was written by Bill Wilkerson and me.

I am chief executive officer and medical chief of staff of the Homewood Health Centre, a specialized psychiatric hospital in Guelph, Ontario. Bill Wilkerson, a businessman, is president of the Canadian Business and Economic Roundtable on Mental Health and former president of Liberty Health, one of Canada's largest health benefits companies. We are codirectors of the Homewood Centre for Organizational Health at Riverslea, an affiliate of the Homewood Health Centre.

Mindsets is our commentary on the links between mental illness and business performance. The report, published by the Homewood Centre for Organizational Health at Riverslea, was released in book form at the first commemoration of World Mental Health Day in Canada on October 8. I attended this event and represented APA.

Global Business Agenda

Mindsets outlines a new management agenda taking shape in the global economy that links human health and economic performance.

At the heart of the new agenda-in pragmatic dollars-and-cents terms-is the mental well-being of employees as the vector of productivity and profit. But there is a threat to the beat of this new heart, this new agenda. The incidence of mental illness is rising just as industry is turning to human resiliency and the human mind as the "backbone" of the information economy.

As the report says: "Mental illness is, in many heartbreaking ways, a voice of our times. We live in an emotionally unsafe and conflicted society, a place where the future has been overtaken for many by unremitting uncertainty. Fundamental givens-once basic-homes, funded retirement, a job after university-are now unanchored for millions."

The report also questions conventional thinking about mental illness as some kind of invisible, untouchable force; discusses this thread of new insights from journalists, technologists, management experts, and CEO's; explores and calls for the human capitalization of the workplace; and examines the dollar value of mental health and the nonmedical investments that produce a measurable return.

Through experts across Canada and the United States, Mindsets says that "dysfunctioning companies develop behaviors akin to dysfunctional persons or family. Organizations can become diseased. Financial results can be high and morale low. Share value can increase while the emotional hardiness of employee groups recedes."

Hurried and Worried Society

The report also draws a connection between a "hurried and worried" society and the perpetual intensification of the competitive efforts of business organizations struggling to grow or retain market share in the shrinking global information economy.

The result is a kind of "permanent turmoil" descending upon human beings and affecting their personal lives and their emotional state at every level of the organization from the executive suite to the work station. In fact, Mindsets dispels the myth that stress is a white-collar ailment. It now also belongs to blue-collar workers.

The report also articulates specific principles to guide the nonmedical management of mental illness in the workplace:

• Employees are a quantifiable capital asset, not a liability as they currently show on a balance sheet, in contrast to machines.



• Health is a strategic issue, not a tactical cost, and should have a place in organizational and asset planning.



• Jobs are not just what people go to; they represent the community that workers belong to. Research tells us that work is the activity that North Americans most identify with and that is making them most ill.



• The structure, culture, and governing processes of organizations can cause or reduce affective disorders to an extent rivaling or surpassing employee lifestyle behaviors.



• Nonmedical investments in health are necessary to complement the cost-effective expenditure of dollars on health care. Without this complementarity, the health status of our working population will not be enhanced sufficiently or at all.

Search for Health and Productivity

Mindsets assigns a dollar value to the emotional health of employees-a currency exchanged in motivation, trust, clear expectations of what is required of them by their superiors, and the appropriate matching of employees and jobs. The report includes case examples of some of the largest corporations in the world in their efforts to define a health-based productivity model and to liberate literally millions of workers from "work and life" constraints that impair their capacity to function productively at work.

In detail, Mindsets chronicles the efforts-under way and hoped for-to prepare the 20th century workplace for a 21st century workforce that will be a decisive determinant of corporate health to an extent not envisioned even a half decade ago.

The report concludes: "The outstanding qualities of outstanding people are resilience, values, outlook, and mindset, all of which contribute to emotional well-being and generate human capital. And all of which define mental health as the ultimate productivity weapon of the 21st century."

Copies of Mindsets-Mental Health: The Ultimate Productivity Weapon, may be obtained by contacting Carol O'Brien at Homewood Centre for Organizational Health at Riverslea at (519) 824-1010, ext. 218; fax: (519) 824-3361.