Ahead of World Mental Health Day, HSE’s Working Minds campaign is urging employers to listen to their workers, identify the risks of work-related stress and take practical action to prevent it.

Work-related stress remains the leading cause of work-related ill health in Great Britain.

An estimated 964,000 workers experience work-related stress, depression or anxiety, resulting in 22.1 million working days lost each year.

This year’s World Mental Health Day theme is ‘Lived experiences heard: real voices, real change’, highlighting the importance of listening to people’s first-hand experiences. Reaching out and talking to workers about the pressures they face can help employers recognise risks and understand what needs to change.

Listening alone is not enough, employers have a legal duty to assess the risk of stress-related ill health arising from work activities and take appropriate measures to control that risk.

The Working Minds website provides free tools, guidance and online learning to help employers prevent work-related stress through effective risk management.

Employers can:

• Reach out: start conversations with your team using the Stress Talking Toolkit
• Recognise: identify the causes of stress, learn more about assessing risk and complete the free online learning module
• Respond: download a risk assessment template and record the actions you’ll take to address the risks you’ve identified
• Reflect: review what you already have in place and refresh your knowledge with a mini-game
• Make it Routine: regularly check in on how people are coping and save the date for Stress Awareness Week from 2 to 6 November