Employee mental health requests have skyrocketed but only a fraction of leaders are making real changes

Workers are having a tough time. Young employees are missing nearly a day of work per week due to stress, the majority of staff members are at risk for burnout, and mental health struggles are the cause of a $47.6 billion productivity loss for the economy every year. Workers are desperate for psychological support, but few bosses are actually attending to their needs. 

There was a 74% surge in employees requesting leave or accommodations for mental health-related issues over the past year, according to a new report from Littler, an employment and labor law company. That was followed by a 53% rise in pregnancy-related requests, 50% more hybrid and flexible work inquiries, and a 48% swell in paid sick leave demands. 

“People are still dealing with the after effects of the pandemic,” Devjani H. Mishra, a partner at Littler, tells Fortune. “In tandem with that, you have some people newly being diagnosed with mental health conditions that they may have never sought help for before, along with employees becoming more familiar with asking for some kind of accommodation.”

Mishra adds that the data also shows that more staffers are comfortable voicing their concerns to managers. 

“Over the last several years there’s been a destigmatizing of people asking for help, and self identifying as needing an accommodation related to mental health,” she says. Venting and sharing feelings on social media while being isolated during the pandemic changed communication styles. 

But just because workers are more willing to disclose their mental health struggles with employers doesn’t mean those employers are helping. Only 22% of leaders say their organizations have improved accommodations and leave of absence policies to meet mental health demands over the past year, according to the report. By comparison, 38% of bosses made such concessions for pregnancy conditions and 28% did so for paid sick leave.

Mishra says this care gap largely stems from leaders being untrained on how to identify mental health problems and create adequate solutions. She adds that psychological problems can be complicated, and vary widely person to person. “If someone is having some sort of cognitive difficulty, they can kind of tell you ways that that might manifest, but they can’t tell you all of the ways. It’s not really predictable,” she says. This, combined with employers’ general lack of mental health knowledge, makes it hard for companies to set accommodations. 

There is also structural weakness at play when it comes to companies tackling the mental health crisis; company policies tend to lag a couple years behind in adjusting to new workplace dynamics. As organizations are playing catch-up, a gap in care emerges between the time an issue is recognized and when it can be fixed, according to the report. 

To best serve workers with psychological conditions, Mishra says that businesses should hire HR managers and business leaders who are educated and equipped to deal with the mental health aspects of the workforce.

“We need to have people that are equipped and better trained to recognize this is a real thing that we’re going to need to deal with.”

Emma Burleigh
emma.burleigh@fortune.com

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