Mental Health in Hospitality – Taking Care of your Team
Covid-19 and the resulting lockdown, and restrictions have placed a significant amount of stress on the entire hospitality industry. Uncertainty, reduced income, and increased exposure and risk of contracting Covid-19 in a customer-facing industry all contribute to an environment that can negatively impact the mental health and well-being of those working in it. Compounded with the already challenging issues of the industry including long, unsociable hours, stressful environments, and physically demanding work, it is vital that businesses are doing all they can to support their staff.
There are a number of ways that hospitality businesses can support team members and ensure they are creating a mentally healthy workplace. We spoke to Kelly’s Cause Foundation (the UK’s only hospitality specific provider of Mental Health First Aid training) for their advice about how to support mental health in hospitality…
Mental Health in Hospitality – The Basics
The first thing to look at when creating a mentally healthy workplace is are your team having their basic needs met? Are they sleeping well, eating well, drinking enough water, and exercising consistently?
Often because of the long hours demanded by working in hospitality employees aren’t afforded the time to look after these basic needs. As an employer it is important that you are providing your team with the time and resources to be able to maintain good mental health.
Some simples steps you can introduce:
- Healthy staff food provided at consistent times, and designated time for all staff to sit down and eat.
- Creating rotas and shift patterns that ensure people aren’t working back to back double shifts and have plenty of time to get a good night’s sleep in between shifts.
- Encouraging staff to regularly exercise and if possible providing gym memberships, yoga classes, or in-house exercise class options.
Talk it out
Speaking openly and honestly about our mental health and the struggles we may be facing is vital. By creating a workplace where open and honest discussions are encouraged team members are going to be more likely to open up about how they are feeling. To help people feel comfortable talking openly it is important that they are being actively listened to. Listening skills are not something we are explicitly taught but they account for more than half of all communication.
We can all listen more actively by following these steps:
- Becoming comfortable with silence and allowing someone to continue talking, rather than trying to fill the silence.
- Asking open-ended questions that allow someone to elaborate rather than provide yes or no answers.
- Maintaining comfortable eye contact and appropriate body language so that someone feels listened to.
Mental Health Training
To demonstrate a real commitment to their staff and creating a mentally healthy workplace it is important that businesses invest in formal mental health training for their team.
By investing in mental health training businesses are not only showing a commitment to the well-being of their staff, they are also investing in the future of their businesses.
Mental Health First Aid training is a practical, action-focused solution to create a mentally healthy workplace. Participants will learn the skills to spot the signs of poor mental health, the appropriate resources to signpost people towards, how to challenge stigma, and how to look after their own mental health.
Kelly’s Cause Foundation is the UK’s only hospitality specific provider of Mental Health First Aid training with all training delivered by people with experience working in the industry.
They offer three different courses, the two-day Mental Health First Aider, one-day Mental Health Champion, and the half-day Mental Health Aware which can be delivered online or in-person.
You can find out more about Kelly’s Cause here, or email hello@kellyscause.com
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