The World Health Organization and its global partners have decided to use the 2024 commemoration of World Mental Health Day (on 10 October) to shine a spotlight on what’s become a ‘hot topic’ in recent years. This year’s theme is 'Mental health at work', and it aims to emphasise that safe, healthy working environments can act as a protective factor for mental health. 

 

Organisations across the globe are committed to addressing mental health issues at work. Employee wellness programmes, counselling services, mental health days and mental health awareness campaigns are some of the initiatives available to help employees navigate mental health challenges. 

 

This approach involves services aimed at reducing mental health risk factors, including work-related stress, financial issues, substance abuse and other elements that contribute to poor mental health. Whilst this is commendable and, in most cases, sufficient to help employees deal with mental health issues, it is argued that this is a reactive “Wait for the challenge, then lend a hand!” type of approach. 

 

This is seen as problematic for several reasons, including the strain placed on mental health resources; missed prevention opportunities; delayed support; and lots more. More importantly, this approach promotes an external locus of control when dealing with mental health, as it does not place enough emphasis on the role of individual and psychological strengths in the mental health process.

 

It goes without saying that promoting initiatives which focus on asking for help and seeking professional support is pivotal in combatting mental health issues, and this should form the cornerstone of mental health drives in the workplace. However, scholars advocating a positive psychology approach to mental health argue that the preoccupation with a reactive approach that treats mental illness as it arises results in many workplaces failing to understand, identify and capitalise on employees’ innate psychological strengths – and the role these can play in helping employees thrive at work. 

 

In this regard, an unexplored area that is slowly gaining the attention of mental health scholars is ‘Character Strengths’. These refer to innate positive traits, characteristics or strengths in one’s personality that influence how we think, act, behave and ultimately manage our mental health. The VIA Institute on Character, which is the global leader on character strength research, acknowledges 24 character strengths which can be found in varying degrees in every individual. Examples of character strengths include: creativity, curiosity, honesty, bravery, love, kindness, fairness, teamwork, forgiveness, self-regulation, hope and gratitude. 

 

The school of thought promoting the role of character strengths in mental health argues that when workplaces understand character strengths and foster a culture of psychological safety, individuals will then be able to direct their coping efforts inward to draw on their personal strengths to promote greater life satisfaction and improved mental health. This allows employees to flourish and thrive by drawing on their personal resources or assets, which in turn promotes a sustainable approach to fostering positive mental states in their work and personal life. 

 

So the big question is: how can workplaces and individuals capitalise on these wonderful human strengths to help create a psychologically resilient and thriving workforce? Some ways of doing so include:

 

Employees will also need to play an active role in taking control of and mastering the use of their own personal character strengths to flourish in the workplace. This can be done by: 

 

Finally, as we commemorate World Mental Health Day, I leave you with the words of Martin Seligman, the influential American psychologist who is often referred to as the ‘father of positive psychology’: “The more we use our strengths, the more resilient we become.”