World Mental Health Day: India Inc hastens plans to protect mental well-being of employees

India Inc is pushing for mental well-being initiatives for employees like never before as the pandemic has blurred the lines between work and personal life and led to increased stress levels – a recent LinkedIn survey found that 55% of the country’s employed professionals were feeling stressed.

Companies such as Johnson & Johnson, ITC, Microsoft, Tech Mahindra, Cisco, EY, L’Oréal, Byju’s, Accenture, Hinduja Global Solutions, Mphasis, Publicis Sapient and Godrej Housing Finance are rolling out new initiatives as well as strengthening those launched earlier.

From music therapy classes, mindful exercises, healing day-off and switch-off days, emotionally intelligent chatbots, mental well-being ambassadors, training managers to identify mental health risks and conducting pulse surveys to understand team sentiment, companies are seeking to ensure employee well-being through several new measures.


Special initiatives are also being taken ahead of the World Mental Health Day on October 10. Kristal.AI has launched Mental Health Week, with complimentary therapy sessions for the whole organisation while Future Generali India Insurance has announced the day off on October 11.

This month, Tech Mahindra introduced ‘Mind Plan’, a mental health initiative to provide daily doses of mindful tips and exercises to employees. “This will help associates relax and feel positive during challenging times,” said Harshvendra Soin, global chief people officer. It has also assigned employees as wellness warriors.

At EY India, Flextober is a unique initiative where the month of October is being dedicated to enable people to disconnect from work and re-energise “Promoting the well-being of our people - emotional, mental and physical – has always been EY’s top-most priority,” said Sandeep Kohli, talent leader, EY India.

Godrej Housing Finance recently organised a ‘Switch Off Day’ to provide employees an extended three-day weekend to unwind and recharge. “The effort is to imbibe a culture of work-life balance and normalise taking breaks and time off,” said chief human resources officer Ruhie Pande.

Publicis Sapient has encouraged employees to quit working at 3 pm every Friday throughout October as part of the company's ‘Free at Three’ campaign.

At Microsoft India, more than double the number of people availed the Microsoft-enabled MS Cares counselling services during the pandemic than they did before, said its head of human resources, Ira Gupta.

Accenture has upgraded its medical insurance policy to include mental health consultancy reimbursements for dependent family members. It recently organised a virtual session by a well-known comedian and a leading psychiatrist to raise awareness about mental health, said its lead-human resources, Lakshmi C.

L’Oréal India is using ‘Wysa’, an emotionally intelligent chatbot to offer round-the-clock assistance on mental well-being and has introduced a ‘Healing Day off’ for self-care, as well as a ‘Healing Week’ designed to lift employee spirits. Cisco has implemented ‘A Day for Me’ initiative, where employees take a day off to unplug and recharge, knowing that burnout has been an elevated risk over the past year.

In the coming months, Johnson & Johnson is planning to roll out sessions on supporting mental health concerns in the workplace among other issues, said Dr Vandita Gupta, Mental Health Diplomat India Lead.

While Mphasis is conducting music therapy sessions, Compass India Development Centre is using music as a de-stress tool. It has introduced an initiative, ‘Art for Heart’, wherein employees curate and offer their art pieces and participate in an in-house auction.

ITC has strengthened existing interventions and facilitated a series of engagements between experts and employees and their families on mental well-being, focusing on resilience, countering fatigue and managing grief.

Byju’s has updated existing policies and implemented new ones like the insurance policy which includes parents, parents-in-law, siblings, same-gender partners, said chief people officer Pravin Prakash. The ed-tech unicorn has aligned this with an app that will also provide unlimited free doctor consultations, fitness sessions and mindfulness sessions.

Comviva recently extended its Counselling Services Support programme with ‘YourDost’, which was started in India, to all its employees across the globe.