PROFESSOR DYLAN JONES-EVANS

A few years ago, mental health was not seen as an important issue within many workplaces across the UK. Fortunately, this issue has changed and it is now seen as not only a key concern personally for a growing number of employees but as a major influencer on productivity within the UK economy. For example, recent studies have shown that mental health issues results in 91 million working days lost in the UK every year which is equivalent to nearly £100 billion. For example, a report published by the medical technology company Mynerva which suggested that around 7.5 million workers in the UK are suffering from some sort of mental health issue and, worst still, 44 per cent have not informed their employer as they feel it may damage their job prospects. Another study – the Stress Epidemic – showed that found that over two thirds of UK workers experienced high to moderate stress levels with 42 per cent of regularly losing sleep because of workplace stress. One key issue regarding men...

The issue of mental health within the workforce has become a key concern for many employers over the last 12 months. More relevantly, both the UK and Welsh Governments have recognised that this issue is one in which they can intervene by promoting better wellbeing within both public and private organisations. A report last year by Monitor Deloitte - the multinational strategy consulting practice of Deloitte Consulting - showed the extent of this problem within the UK and, more relevantly, the negative impact on the UK economy. It estimated that poor mental health costs UK employers between £33 billion and £42 billion each year which is made up largely of absence from work (£8 billion), presenteeism i.e. attending work whilst ill and therefore not performing at full ability (£17 billion-£26 billion) and employee turnover due to mental health (£8 billion). Whilst the public sector makes up roughly a fifth of the UK labour force, it is responsible for around a quarter of the tota...

Last year, one of the most popular articles from my weekly column for the Western Mail examined happiness in the workplace and the growing realisation by many organisations that a failure to look after your workforce could impact performance and profitability. And this important issue of wellbeing in the workplace looks set to continue with many organisational analysts suggesting that it will be one of the key trends affecting business in 2018. In fact, with one in six workers being affected by anxiety and depression, this is becoming an issue not for individual organisations but for the UK economy as whole. This is not surprising given that there is increasing evidence of high staff turnover in a growing number of industries that is being caused by high levels of stress and burnout amongst employees. In the past, most of the emphasis by organisations has been on the physical wellbeing of their employees through programmes such as gym memberships, subsidised bicycle programmes...

One of the things we rarely do is to take the time to consider who we are, what we are doing and where we are going. In fact, I can’t remember the last time I did this myself and so I am finally taking the opportunity to do this over the next few weeks and to work out what is important to me going forward. As part of the preparations for this, I have been doing some homework that is well outside of my comfort zone and whatever I read, the challenge all comes back to one simple issue, namely that of managing your ego. Many will say that the ego is a vital part of business, giving you the drive and single-mindedness to succeed although there is now an increasing body of opinion to suggest that rather than driving forward business success, it actually holds it back. I have digested dozens of articles on this subject (yes, there may be a book on the way!) and the conclusion is that it is probably one of the most challenging things any of us will have to deal with, if we choose t...

One of the defining academic papers on enterprise is the “Dark Side of Entrepreneurship” by Manfred Kets De Vries. Whereas much of the previous research into the motivations of business founders had focused on positive traits such as achievement, this study took a very different view on what made entrepreneurs different to the rest of the population. Yet it is a theme that few have returned to in recent times although there have been increasing concerns that those who start-up businesses, enthused by caricatures of those highly successful entrepreneurs who work 100 hour weeks, are starting to suffer because they are usually ill-equipped to deal with such pressures. With such terms such as “failure is not an option” “sleep is for wimps” and “pick yourself up by your bootstraps” bandied about many start-up ecosystems across the World, it is somewhat surprising to find that some entrepreneurs have begun to talk about the real problems they faced every day in running their busines...