Let’s Talk About Mental Health
Tags: Mental Health Services, Stress Management, Venture Capital, Blog, Healthtech

This one’s not really about HealthTech. We’ll talk a bit about Calm, Headspace and some other mental health apps and fitness equipment that have recently received venture funding, but you’d probably file this one under the ‘LOHAS & Wellness’ (Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability & Wellness) or ‘general speculation from a blogger’ section in your digital filing cabinet.

Mental health issues are by no means a new development, but I do think there has been a recent uptick in both prevalence and recognition. In a KFF Tracking Poll conducted in mid-July, 53% of adults in the United States reported that their mental health had been negatively impacted due to worry and stress over the coronavirus. Yale Medicine psychiatrist Ariadna Forray MD agrees; “Disasters and public health emergencies, such as the one we are living through right now, can lead to significant disruptions and stress.” That worry and stress can be manifested in many ways like hours at home alone with just your thoughts, fading forward slash in your work/life balance and an overall feeling that your life is kind of in a wait-and-see mode. I’d like to explore the effects of COVID on the erosion of the employer/employee relationship. More specifically, I want to understand how younger people are dealing with the loss of seriously formative years in their short professional careers.

As an MBA student I don’t have an employer at the moment so I’m probably not the best person to write about how working folk are feeling, but I get the impression that the ‘new work normal’ features increased employee burnout, frustration and overall discontent these days. At the lowest rung on the corporate ladder, young professionals already felt like they were somewhat expendable pre-COVID. Now, that feeling of expendability is exasperated and young people feel like they have to go way above and beyond their usual mandate just to make sure they remain ‘essential’ to their employers. I read an interesting article from Australia that contextualizes the issue from a different, equally stressing perspective. Basically it says that the youngest professionals (1–10 years out of college) are in the part of their careers that determines their economic wellbeing for the rest of their lives. To be unemployed or even just burnt out at this stage could have serious detrimental effects to the overall global economy down the road. Like I said in my first post, the first few years out of college are skill-accumulation years. Usually you’re not going to be in love with your first job and if you are being run into the ground at all hours of the day, chances are you aren’t really accumulating skills. More likely, you’re building a growing disinterest in work entirely and, I’m speculating here, less likely to chase the necessary experience with the fervor required of upward mobility. So when the Australians are worried about the loss of those formative professional years, so am I. If you’re still unmoved by people’s mental health concerns, Harvard Business Review quantified the loss of employee productivity as a result of mental health issues to equal over $16.8 billion annually.

So, what can employers do to help their young employees stay motivated and quell their anxiety and stress? Four-day work week! Not really, but that would be pretty awesome. In reality, many companies are training supervisors to identify emotional distress and implement strategies to assist employees who may be struggling, offering additional resources like good insurance coverage for mental health conditions, and partnering with different health and wellness services to provide young employees a healthy outlet for all their pent-up woes. Starbucks was early to the party on this topic, unrolling an app for its workforce (generally younger people) to improve their mental health and deal with anxiety and stress in the workplace. Employees interviewed about the initiatives said much of their stress came from the company cutting back on hours and relying on employees to work longer shifts with fewer people and no pay increase. That study was done in January of last year. I imagine the responses would be much more colorful this year.

Similar, more universally applicable technologies have emerged in the mental health space, often with quite a bit of venture capital funding, including Lyra Health (raised $110m in a Series D round in August for post-money valuation of $1.1bn), Calm (raised $75m in a Series C round this month for post-money valuation of $2.0bn), Headspace (raised $48m in a Series C round in June for post-money valuation of $317m) and Ginger (raised $50m in a Series D round for post-money valuation of $200m). If you look at each company’s website, they’ll provide a list of corporate partners that have already begun offering their on-demand mental health resources to employees. The main point is that the HealthTech ecosystem is actively introducing new, innovative ways to increase access to mental health resources and employers should be actively looking to partner with them to further aid their stressed and anxious employees during COVID and beyond. If you want to do some further reading, Ginger published a 38-page research report titled “Workforce Attitudes Towards Mental Health” that is worth perusing.

Another avenue that has grown in popularity recently is physical exercise to combat mental health issues. Studies have shown that exercise or lack thereof can have a meaningful impact on one’s overall mental health. While some companies have focused on the Lyra Health, Calm and Ginger’s of the world, others have partnered with fitness studios and other exercise-related companies to help their employees get through COVID with their mental health intact. My previous Company provided discounted gym membership (I think) but that’s about it. Nowadays, large employers are offering in-house gyms, membership discounts and in some rarer cases, even providing discounts on at-home fitness equipment like Pelotons. Either way, the trends are pointing towards an increased corporate focus on employees’ overall health.

Though there’s so much more that can be done to promote mental health in the workplace, I’m at least glad to see that many companies are admitting that there is an issue and actively searching for ways to help their employees. My hope is that more companies like the ones described above will sprout in the coming years and provide additional ways for the workforce to decompress and heal from all the damage done during the pandemic.