8 Sins of Workplace Mental Health

In 1983, Jay Westerveld snuck into a resort in Fiji to steal a clean towel. He found one of those notes you see in every hotel: 'Reuse your towel! Save the planet!' That one encounter would end up revolutionising climate activism - and potentially the mental health movement.

Westerveld, then a student and now a veteran environmentalist, smelt BS in the resort's posturing that it cared about the island's delicate ecology and coral reefs. In fact, "They were in the middle of expanding at the time, and were building more bungalows.”

He would go on to coin an epochal term:

'Greenwashing'.

Greenwashing is the scammy corporate practice of selling an eco-friendly image while actively destroying the environment for business gains.

The word is now part of the lingua franca of climate activism.

The most nefarious greenwashers include fossil fuel and mining companies, among other worthies. I mean we've all seen those cutesy ads where giant corporations tom-tom their investments in biodiversity, glossing over their disastrous ecological footprint.

Greenwashing often involves blatant manipulation and 'alternative facts'. Exhibit A: The practice of dirty industries offsetting their carbon emissions by purchasing 'carbon credits' that rarely deliver real gains for the atmosphere.

Greenwashing isn't a mere PR stunt. It's a devious and powerful tool corporations can use to fatten their bottom lines.

A 2015 Nielsen survey showed that 66% of global consumers and 72% of millennial consumers were willing to pay more for environmentally sustainable products.

In essence, greenwashing weaponises the ideal of wellbeing - of the planet and of people - to build a perverse system of (in)justice, a banana universe where the offender, the arbitrator, and the benefactor are one and the same.

But wait. What's mental health got to do with it?

As it turns out, everything.

As the ambit of the favourite word of savvy boardrooms - 'sustainability' - grows beyond the environment, the idea of worker wellbeing has acquired renewed urgency.

And this is the latest dangerous front for greenwashing.

Some context:

In 2019, ILO declared that stress, excessively long hours and disease contribute to the deaths of ~2.8 million workers/year - road accidents kill fewer than half that number.

An additional 374 million people got injured or fell ill because of their jobs.

Work from home was naively touted as a salve, but in a survey last year, 80% workers said they would consider quitting their current position for a job that was more mental health-friendly.

Cue: The Great Resignation that has set the proverbial cat among the pigeons in the west.

Investments in ‘employee happiness’ - bean bags, pool tables, Friday beers - are ancient. But this avalanche of mental distress unleashed by the pandemic and the growing clamour for better workplace conditions has triggered an unprecedented ‘oh shit’ moment among employers.

BBC cited a 2021 report that claimed 88% of US companies are investing more in mental health. In India, Mint reported on a ‘wellbeing diagnostic survey’ where 75% of the surveyed companies said they had a mental health strategy, compared to 29% in 2018.

(Aside: Tellingly, an expert quoted in the Mint article says organisations aren’t just talking about work-life balance - they are ‘also asking *employees* to put it into practice’. It reminded me of all those glossy corporate ads where a silken voice exhorts us that ‘together, we can build a better world’, outsourcing the responsibility of cleaning up the mess created by rampaging businesses to those who suffer their consequences.

Genius!)

So we now have a situation where flaunting mental health-friendly credentials isn't just good PR, pulling it off is vital for companies to win the 'war for talent' and enhance productivity and profitability.

Ergo: 'Mental health-friendly' is the new 'eco-friendly'.

Regrettably - but predictably - far too many employers are still preoccupied with cutesy, cosmetic changes rather than a frontal attack on the real problems:

Overwork, lack of purpose, discrimination, the violent anxiety of depending on precarious employment.

For vulnerable employees, it can be hard to see through the charade. Thank God for climate activism and its long history of busting greenwashing!

In 2007, environmental marketing company TerraChoice came up with a list of ‘sins’ that give away a greenwasher.

That same list is an excellent barometer for bullshit claims about workplace mental health too.

Ready?

1. Sin of the hidden trade-off

When a company makes a feel-good claim based on a narrow set of attributes without attention to other important issues. Eg: Four-day workweeks, but without reducing the actual amount of work employees are expected to tackle. Another one: “We still follow the bell curve for performance appraisals, but hey, we have a helpline in case you want to cry about how unfair it is.”

2. Sin of no proof

A claim not substantiated by easily accessible supporting information or by a reliable third-party certification. Eg: “We are an inclusive company” without disclosing any data.

3. Sin of vagueness

A claim that is so poorly defined or broad that its real meaning is likely to be misunderstood by the consumer. All-natural is an example in the environment sector. Arsenic, uranium, mercury, and formaldehyde are all naturally occurring, and poisonous. In the workplace context, a vague claim that raises my hackles is, “We are a people-driven organisation.” I mean, what does that even mean?

4. Sin of worshipping false labels

A product that, through either words or images, gives the impression of third-party endorsement where no such endorsement exists.

5. Sin of irrelevance

A claim that may be truthful but is unimportant or unhelpful for consumers. Companies frequently advertise that their products are ‘CFC-free’, even though CFCs (chlorofluorocarbons) are banned. In the workplace context, employers talk a big game about offering creches, conveniently glossing over the fact that this could be a legal requirement.

6. Sin of the lesser of two evils

A claim that may be true within the product category but risks distracting you from the greater harmful impact of the category as a whole. Eg: fuel-efficient SUVs.

7. Sin of fibbing

Plain lies. Where to even begin.

To this list, I add an eighth sin:

8. Sin of good intentions

Claims that are based on noble intentions alone. Typically involve a lot of hand-wringing at black tie business events and start with the words “we must”. To wit: “We must become more diverse and inclusive”, “We must stop sending work emails after 6pm”, etc.

Before the pandemic, empty ‘good intentions’ meant to burnish a company’s image were despicable. Now, when human vulnerability is peaking, they are a crime.

An unabridged version of this story was first published on my independent, ad-free, reader-funded mental health journalism platform, Sanity by Tanmoy.

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