- Lisa, Phil, welcome.
Phil, to you first.
We're talking about mental health so much more.
I think that's a given,
especially in the workplace.
But are we where we should be?
- No, I would say we're really
in the bottom of the first inning.
You know, I spent the last eight years
before Project Healthy Minds at BlackRock
where I worked on a lot of the climate and ESG issues,
and I was saying to Lisa the other day,
it feels to me like we are today on mental health
where a lot of corporate America was on climate
about 10 years ago.
And you have, coming out of the pandemic,
every business now is focused on what can they do
for their employees on mental health,
but they're really just at the very beginning stages of it.
And I think the next 10 years
is going to be about companies rethinking
what is the obligation of the company
to help employees on mental health?
You know, there's an interesting study
that came out from MetLife.
In 2019, MetLife looked at,
surveyed a whole bunch of employees
to look at what expectations do companies have
for their employers on mental health?
And in 2019, before the pandemic,
60% of employees
said that they don't want their companies involved at all
in their own mental health.
A year later, that number had inverted.
62% of employees now expect their companies
to do something on mental health.
So I would say we're in the bottom of the first inning.
- Lisa, what does all this mean for the workplace?
- Well, I think what it means is,
one, getting companies to join Project Healthy Minds
and the studies that we're doing
and we've made some tremendous progress.
The other is, and I've seen it just in the past six weeks
with Boston Consulting Group,
where I'm an executive coach within Boston Consulting Group,
and my emails have lit up in the past few weeks
asking me if I have time,
which, of course, the answer is yes,
to coach... in this case,
it's been a handful of young women
who are on a high career trajectory
who are feeling overwhelmed and inundated
and they want to be coached
by someone who has been through it before.
And I think companies knowing,
"Wow, BCG has this resource."
And I also think being more open about it in the workplace.
And Phil and I have talked about this a lot,
but Thursdays at three o'clock Pacific Time,
I have therapy.
Someone says, "Could you meet them?"
I'm like, "No, I have therapy then."
Instead of just saying I'm busy,
making it more of a conversation
because what I'm finding is so many people
admire senior executives that have accomplished a lot
and it all looks so easy.
And I think it's really a important
to share that I'm in therapy,
my kids are all in therapy,
how much it helps us,
how much it helps us in the workplace.
And I just think being more open about it in the workplace
will be a key transition.
You can't manage what you don't measure.
And most companies today
have no real measurement framework in place
for measuring the mental health of their own workforce.
They look at benefits utilization data.
They look at how many people are calling the EAP.
But it's a really insufficient way.
I mean, for example,
if the EAP utilization goes up,
if more people are calling a hotline,
is that a net positive or a net negative?
You could argue both sides of that.
And so I think investing the resources
in actually building real measurement programs
so that you can understand how your workforce is doing
and understanding that not all...
you can't think about mental health
of your workforce as a singular question.
What female leaders are going through is different
than what a 23-year-old living in an urban center
with no family to care for is going through.
And so I think that's part of what,
sort of this next frontier looks like.
- Phil, Lisa, thank you so much.
- Thank you.
- Thanks for having us.