Workplace safety is of the utmost importance if you want to prevent accidents, injuries, and employee discontent on your job site. However, many factors play into the safety of your working environment, many of which you may not routinely consider.
For example, there is a direct link between mental health and safety in the workplace. Both elements affect each other, and taking steps to improve employee psychological well-being can make your work environment safer overall.
This guide will help you understand this valuable connection and how to promote a positive work environment. For further assistance, reach out to WorkSafe for help with occupational health in Wichita, KS.
How Mental Health and Workplace Safety Impact Each Other
Workers spend as much as one-third of their lives at work, equating to approximately 90,000 hours across their lifetimes. When their work environments are not conducive to mental well-being, completing their job duties can take a significant toll on their psychological health. This effect spans beyond occupational burnout, affecting a worker’s quality of life.
Working in an unsafe environment can certainly affect a person’s psychological well-being, but the reverse is also true: being in an unhealthy state of mind can put employees and their coworkers at risk of workplace accidents.
How Mental Health Affects Workplace Safety
A person’s psychological state impacts many aspects of their life, including their ability to:
- Follow instructions
- Think ahead
- Adhere to deadlines
- Make sound decisions
All of these effects can also impact safety at work.
No matter your work environment, you want employees to have the mental capacity to complete job duties to the best of their abilities. But when a worker suffers from occupational burnout, stress, anxiety, depression, or virtually any other psychological condition, their ability to complete tasks to the necessary standards becomes weakened.
How Workplace Safety Affects Mental Health
Clocking into a work environment each day that puts employees at risk of injury can be extremely stressful. If your company’s workplace safety leaves much to be desired, this could put your employees’ mental health at risk, along with their physical health.
Any of the following safety issues can affect a worker’s psychological health:
- Fearing an accident at work
- Witnessing other employees being involved in workplace accidents
- Feeling overworked
- Being harassed by coworkers or managers
- Having too little time to complete tasks
These issues can lead to stress, burnout, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and more.
Tips To Promote Better Employee Mental Health
The connection between mental health and safety in the workplace cannot be ignored. Thankfully, your business can take several measures to promote employee mental well-being, improving workplace safety in turn.
One of the primary steps is fostering a safer workplace environment, which can help workers feel more positive entering the workplace each day. These other tips can also help boost mental health at work:
- Offering a supportive work environment: Reducing stress in the workplace begins with creating a supportive environment where employees can comfortably talk to their managers about concerns, safety issues, harassment, and other problems that may be impacting their mental well-being. Never punish workers for bringing these problems to your attention; always take them seriously.
- Providing flexible work options: If possible, allow employees to work from home occasionally or offer other flexibility within their work schedules or environments.
- Offering Employee Assistance Programs (EAPs): Through an EAP benefit, employees can gain direct access to mental healthcare sponsored by your company. This can eliminate barriers to psychological treatment and make employees more likely to seek therapy before their conditions worsen.
- Taking measures to eliminate workplace harassment: When workers bring discrimination or harassment to your attention, do everything you can to prevent these problems from recurring. This may involve moving certain employees to different teams or even firing the offending workers.
- Teaching good stress management: Offer seminars on topics like stress management, anxiety reduction, and work-life balance. Employees can learn to better manage mental health and safety at work and know that your company takes these issues seriously.
- Working through the mental health stigma: Mental illness often comes with a bit of a stigma. Create a welcoming environment where employees feel safe to share their feelings with management and seek support.
WorkSafe Can Help You Create a Safer Work Environment
Now that you understand the psychological effects of workplace safety, it’s time to prioritize mental health and safety in the workplace. WorkSafe can help you prevent and manage work-related injuries through a range of customized solutions, including ones focused on psychological health. Contact us today at 316-262-8800 to request a free consultation.