The DHA's "Mental Wealth" announcement is A Big Deal.

From CEOs and Cabinet Ministers, to fathers, teachers, and neighbours, mental health and wellbeing matter to everyone and for good reason. Sound mental health and happiness are a nation's greatest asset: mental wealth is not "fluff".

Remediating issues like depression and anxiety could boost the GDP of nations by a whopping 4% - few economic policies have that power (Layard, 2017). The costs of depression alone are 50% more disabling than diabetes, angina, asthma, and arthritis combined. “Not feeling good today” costs the GCC region the equivalent of 37.5 million productive workdays as a result of absenteeism and presenteeism, that is, being at work but distracted and unproductive anyways (PWC, 2022).

In fact, in the GCC, days lost to presenteeism for depression and anxiety are between 11 and 26 per year and between 4 and 24 days for absenteeism. But it’s not enough to only reduce mental health issues for the 1 in 5 who suffer from them. We also need to focus on the other 4 in 5, the 80% that are overlooked because they do not qualify with a mental health issue.

In the 80%, we have the “flourishing” and “languishing”. The flourishing are magical unicorns. Blessed with good genes, these are the people who have several close friends, intimate relationships, and good health; they love their work, are optimistic, and feel a sense of purpose. The flourishing have a reason to get up in the morning and deal with whatever comes their way with a capacity to regulate their emotions efficiently.

Then, we have the languishing: they are not doing poorly but are not necessarily well either. Stuck in neutral, going through the motions of life and not finding much of interest, they pass the time. They get up, go to work, come home, watch Netflix, eat dinner and go to bed. It’s not a terrible life, but it’s not a great one either. Do little of value and over time, there becomes little of value. In fact, the odds ratio of becoming depressed over a 10-year period are 86%, according to Corey Keyes ' research (2005). The bigger tragedy? They are the biggest group. Being bored by life and waiting for it to pass are not great strategies for nations, companies or individuals.

If you’re not living your happiest life, you’re not living your full potential. We all pay the costs for that... including you.

This means that if you’re not living your best and happiest life, you’re not at your full potential. We all pay the costs for that as a society from productive days lost, unhappy marriages, distracted parenting and lost learning. But we more tragically miss opportunities to become better versions of ourselves and grow, love, learn, excel at work, start businesses, run triathlons, make money, watch kids graduate, have coffee with friends, listen to symphonies and eat cheese! Happiness and wellbeing not prevent languishing and mental health issues, they also sustain a good life and it’s an asset we all need.

Organizations also have a vested interest in getting their employee's mental wealth right. Implementing workplace wellbeing programs, not the Pop Tart and yoga kind, but where subjective wellbeing, life and job satisfaction are key drivers of organizational health, is one pathway to greater national mental wealth, as well as economic wealth.

Using Gallup data, Krekel et al.'s (2019) meta-analysis of 339 studies, 1.8 million employees, 230 organizations, 82 000 business units in 73 nations and 49 industries, showed that greater employee satisfaction with work (including one's relationship with one's manager, co-workers, and tasks) is positively correlated with [in order]: (1) customer loyalty (2) productivity (3) profitability, and (4) negatively correlated with turnover.

In other studies, productivity is greatly improved by higher levels of happiness. Bellet et al.'s (2020) study of 11 British Telecom call centers (n=1800 employees) over 6 months showed that employees scoring high on subjective wellbeing worked faster (taking fewer minutes per call), took more calls during their shift, but most of all, converted more calls to sales by 13%.

More broadly, organizations with more positive employees have shown up to a 12% increase in productivity, a 6% value-added measure per hours worked and an increase in profit and future stock-market performance (Bockerman & Ilmakunnas, 2012; Edmans, 2012; Ford et al., 2011; Oswald et al., 2012), while absenteeism, sick time, and turnover are also lower (Erdogan et al., 2012).

What does this mean for you?

1. If you work in an organization, ask your HR, manager, or leadership team what their plans are for building mental wealth from within. It's more than webinars, information sessions, and an EAP. It's about revising your policies, examining your practices, addressing the spaces in between people, and building a skills framework for individual and group wellbeing.
2. If you're already doing such work, measure and track it, otherwise you may be losing money intervening where it is not needed and not effectively where it is. Tracking who attended and whether they liked it is pointless; measure whether the intervention had a demonstrable effect on subjective wellbeing (& other empirically validated measures). Run these as science experiments to evaluate the effectiveness of interventions and assess the distribution of wellbeing; inequalities across organizations can be a surprise.
3. Wellbeing is not HR's job. Distribute and cascade this responsibility to all departments, leaders and line managers, including individual employees. From wellbeing KPIs to personal development plans, accountability for wellbeing has to become the norm.
4. And you. Are you as happy as you can be? Why not? If you had to die tomorrow, what would you regret not doing the most? If you had to recommend your life to your children, is it one you'd feel good recommending? Are there things you want to do with your life but you keep thinking you have time and will do it later? Big mistake. We only have 4000 Mondays to live and you've used up about half already. If you're not having at least one moment every day where you think, whoa, I love this, you're not taking up all of your space, talent and potential. Life really is short. Be the annoying person who says, "I want to try...", "I like you...", "Can you teach me...?". Doing nothing, believe it or not, is a very painful regret.

Be the annoying person who says "I want to try...," "I like you...", "Can you teach me...?" Nothing different comes from doing the same. Take a risk!

In short, all of this to say, we all need and should want mental wealth for better lives. It's an asset for countries and organizations, as much as individuals. A major congratulations to the Dubai Health Authority (2024) for launching their new Mental Wealth initiative.

Under the directives of HH Sheikh Hamdan Bin Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum , Crown Prince of Dubai, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Defence of the UAE, and Chairman of The General Secretariat Of The Executive Council - Government of Dubai , the Dubai Health Authority (DHA) launched a framework to support the mental wealth of Dubai’s community, aligning with the Dubai Social Agenda 33, making Dubai the world’s best destination for living, working, and visiting.

Leadership that cares: It doesn't get better than that.

Life is short and paying attention to how we think, feel and respond is a great place to start towards living our best lives. I look forward to this being rolled out and happiness and wellbeing, as much as mental health, being taken more seriously by everyone.

#MentalWealth #WorkplaceWellbeing #MentalHealthAwareness #Productivity #HappinessAtWork #EmployeeWellbeing #GCCHealth #CorporateWellness #Leadership #HumanResources #HappinessMatters #HappinessIsEverything #LifeSatisfaction #Purpose #LifeMeaning #LifeIsShort #Really

References

Bellet, C., De Neve, J.-E., & Ward, G. (2020). Does employee happiness have an impact on productivity? CEP Discussion Papers dp1655, Centre for Economic Performance, London School of Economics. Sa?d Business School WP 2019-13. https://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/dp1655.pdf

Bockerman, P., & Ilmakunnas, P. (2012). The job-satisfaction-productivity nexus: A study using matched survey and register data. Industrial & Labor Relations Review, 65, 244-262. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/001979391206500203

DHA Announcement: https://mediaoffice.ae/en/news/2024/july/22-07/dubai-health-authority-launches-mental-wealth-framework-with-a-budget-of-aed105-million

Edmans, A. (2012). The link between job satisfaction and firm value, with implications for corporate social responsibility. Academy of Management Perspectives, 26(4), 1-19. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2054066

Erdogan, B., Bauer, T. N., Truxillo, D. M., & Mansfield, L. R. (2012). Whistle while you work: A review of the life satisfaction literature. Journal of Management, 38, 1038-1083. https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2012-14469-005

Ford, M. T., Cerasoli, C. P., Higgins, J. A., & Decesare, A. L. (2011). Relationships between psychological, physical, and behavioural health and work performance: A review and meta-analysis. Work and Stress: An International Journal of Work, Health and Organisations, 25(3), 185–204. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02678373.2011.609035

Harter, J. K., Schmidt, F. L., & Keyes, C. L. M. (2003). Well-being in the workplace and its relationship to business outcomes: A review of the Gallup studies. In C. L. M. Keyes & J. Haidt (Eds.), Flourishing: The positive person and the good life. American Psychological Society.

Keyes, C. L. M. (2005). Mental illness and/or mental health? Investigating axioms of the complete state model of health. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 73, 539–548. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-006X.73.3.539

Krekel, C., Ward, G., & Neve, J.D. (2019). Employee wellbeing, productivity, and firm performance. Labor: Human Capital eJournal, https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3356581

Layard, R. (2017). The economics of mental health. IZA World of Labor publication no. 321. https://doi.org/10.15185/izawol.321

Oswald, A. J., Proto, E., & Sgroi, D. (2012). Happiness and productivity. University of Warwick. Retrieved from https://www.andrewoswald.com/docs/6MayOsProtoSgroi2012.pdf

PWC: https://www.pwc.com/m1/en/publications/socio-economic-impact-untreated-mental-illness.html

Dr. Khulood Alsayegh