The topic of mental health resonates because it is intensely personal, David Cordani, chairman and CEO of The Cigna Group, told a roomful of senior business executives, federal policymakers, and community leaders who gathered recently in our nation’s capital for the Workforce Mental Health Summit. Cordani and Joshua Bolten, CEO of Business Roundtable, hosted the event, which focused on the steps corporate leaders can take to improve mental health among their workforces, in their communities, and across the United States.
Cordani chairs Business Roundtable’s Mental Health Initiative, a CEO-led effort to promote and support workforce mental health. He and Bolten were joined onstage by senators Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) and Pete Ricketts (R-Neb.), Julie Sweet, chair and CEO of Accenture, Wayne Peacock, president and CEO of USAA, and Blake Moret, chairman and CEO of Rockwell Automation.
“This topic is relevant across the board,” Cordani said. “The World Health Organization notes that 30 countries around the globe have mental health and mental well-being as their No. 1 health issue.” In the United States, statistics show that 1 in 4 people are dealing with mental health challenges, he said, and some people wait as long as 10 years to seek help. When they do, many confront roadblocks to care, including stigma and a shortage of available and accessible mental health professionals.
“We also know that our youth, the next-generation workers and leaders of this society, are dealing with significant challenges around mental well-being,” he said.
Despite those grim statistics, he is optimistic that solutions can be found. “Part of that optimism is informed by what we all experienced with COVID,” he said. “During that once-in-a-generation pandemic, we saw some of the best of our society. We saw public-private partnerships come together with a level of fluidity, and interestingly – from an employer standpoint – we saw a level of trust that elevated the employer-employee relationship. This challenge with mental well-being presents the same opportunity.”
A bipartisan look at the issue and possible solutions
During a fireside chat led by Cordani, Sen. Murphy and Sen. Ricketts stressed the importance of a collective effort to tackle the mental health crisis in our country. Private companies, government, and community groups need to work together to build better solutions for issues such as loneliness and other mental health challenges and to support broader access to care and treatments for substance use disorders.
Sen. Ricketts said he believes virtual care options such as telehealth can help improve access to mental health care, especially in rural areas. As former governor of Nebraska during COVID, he expanded access to telehealth services and later expanded broadband to rural parts of the state to expand digital equity. He also put a greater focus on creating job opportunities and encouraging health care professions.
“Telehealth is a great solution for a lot of reasons,” he said. “Not everybody sees mental health like they see physical health, especially in rural communities. Stigma is still a factor. Everybody knows everybody. A lot of people just don’t want to park their car at the doctor’s office, but they can get care through telehealth.”
Sen. Murphy focused on the role that social connection and purpose can serve when overcoming mental health concerns like loneliness. “The quickest conduit to happiness is positive relationships,” he said. “I think we can pull some levers to try to give people a better chance at finding connection. We’re also going to have to have a conversation in this country about how we rebuild a sense of communitarianism, where we care a little bit more about our neighbors and maybe a little bit less about ourselves.”
Data shows that mental health and physical health are connected, Cordani said, and both are powerful components of vitality, an individual’s ability to thrive.
Loneliness also affects mental well-being, Sen. Ricketts said, and he is part of a bipartisan effort to determine how to measure loneliness and isolation. “We all recognize the issue and that we need to do something about it,” he said.
Half of all Americans have three or fewer friends, Sen. Murphy said, and 12% say they have no friends at all. People report that the time they spend with friends has fallen by 50% over the last 35 years. “That doesn’t come without a cost,” he said. “I don’t think it’s a coincidence that during that period of time, you’ve seen rises in rates of self-harm, of addiction, of political instability.”
Shaping the future of workforce mental health
In a CEO panel discussion, USAA’s Peacock shared his “aha” moment – the moment he realized companies needed to do more to support employees struggling with mental health challenges.
“There was a Saturday morning when one of our employees died by suicide on our campus,” he said. “That showed me that we really did need to step up our efforts.”
Robin Roberts of ABC's Good Morning America moderated a discussion on the future of workforce mental health with Accenture CEO Julie Sweet, USAA CEO Wayne Peacock, and Rockwell Automation CEO Blake Moret.
All three CEOs agreed that there is no once-size-fits-all approach to solving the mental health crisis. Every company is made up of different communities and backgrounds.
It’s important to respect their differences while cultivating a culture of care, kindness and connection.
“As companies, we need to recognize that,” Accenture’s Sweet said. “And so, for example, we work with our partners to make sure that we have therapists who reflect different cultures.”
According to Peacock, it’s important for organizations to enable employees to find their community within the workplace. “Finding a community inside of the workplace matters a lot because life really works around the social connections of that community,” he said.
Rockwell Automation’s Moret talked about a program his organization launched in partnership with Manpower. The Academy of Advanced Manufacturing is a 12-week curriculum created for field service technicians who were veterans returning to civilian service to give them the opportunity to learn skills that would enable them to compete successfully for technician jobs all over the U.S. “We pay for their room, their food, and we give them a stipend,” he said. “The first hurdle was convincing them that this wasn’t bogus. Once we got past that, the biggest hurdle was getting the support, the ecosystem to address all of the mental health needs of veterans coming back into civilian life. It was the most personally satisfying thing I’ve done in my career.”
Moret’s biggest call to action for those in the audience? Work to increase access to qualified care so people know where they can go early on when they need help.
For Peacock, the message for other employers is simple: “Recognize our role to be a convener, to be a force for good in the communities where we work and live,” he said, adding that when companies create an environment where employees feel safe to be themselves and feel comfortable talking about their challenges and issues, the end result is happier, healthier and more productive employees, which is also good for business.
Sweet’s top piece of advice for the audience was around partnership – because no one can go at it alone. “Our partnership with Cigna gives us access to important data and insights, and it’s something we couldn’t do alone. This is not our expertise,” she said. Sweet also suggested establishing mental health education programs at work, citing that Accenture has 22,000 people around the world who are trained as mental health allies.
Harnessing the multiplier effect
While there is no silver bullet, we can make a difference one community at a time, Cordani said, which can have a powerful multiplier effect. He asked those in the room to keep this work moving forward.
“Take your own amplified microphone and your opportunities to drive less stigma, more openness and more opportunity because the products, programs, and services that are available are meaningful,” he said. “The good news is there are ample bright spots, some of which we just scratched the surface of here. If we fuel the bright spots, we will continue to have a positive impact going forward.”
Some quotes in this article have been edited for brevity and clarity.