Working Together:

Promoting mental health and wellbeing at work

Foreword This guide, Working Together: Promoting mental health and wellbeing at work, is a key initiative of As One—APS Disability Employment Strategy. The guide aims to empower managers and employees to work together to build inclusive workplace cultures and effective systems for promoting mental health in the Australian Public Service (APS).

We will all be touched by mental ill health at some stage in our lives and some of us live with a mental health condition. Leaders and managers must build their levels of confidence around mental health issues to better include people with mental ill health in our teams, and to enable appropriate support of employees during illness and recovery. The guidance in Working Together is of two types—technical (improved processes and procedures, including early intervention) and cultural (attitudinal and behavioural changes, such as understanding and connecting with each other). The former we can implement relatively quickly, but the latter may take time. The success of the guide relies on its adoption. This will require perseverance, courage, commitment and leadership. Healthy workplaces deliver greater productivity, improve workforce participation and increase social inclusion. It’s important to get this right because the consequences of ill health on individuals, their families, communities and the economy are profound.

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Working Together: Promoting mental health and wellbeing at work

We are excited that this guide can help us to do more for mental health and wellbeing at work. In its development, we have consulted with experts including employees with lived experience of mental ill health, the National Mental Health Commission, beyondblue, the Australian Human Rights Commission, the Diversity Council and our colleagues across the APS. We wish to thank the great number of people who contributed, particularly Dr Peter Cotton and Dr Mark Creamer for their expertise. We are determined to promote a quality of working life that is good for everyone’s mental health and to do what we can to support people with mental health conditions to fulfil their potential at work.

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Foreword

Stephen Sedgwick AO

Paul O’Connor

Australian Public Service Commissioner

CEO Comcare

‘Please don’t put the label ‘ill’ on me for the rest of my life. My attitude is that I’m living and functioning with a health condition, just like many others. It is this attitude that helps me be a higher achiever and maintain my dignity and self-respect in the face of stigma.’ An APS employee

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Working Together: Promoting mental health and wellbeing at work

Contents Foreword .................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... ii

Part one—Introduction ............................................................................................................................................................................................................... 1

...... 1.1 A working life approach to mental health in the APS ...................................................................................................................... 1

...... 1.2 How to use this guide .................................................................................................................................................................................................. 1

...... 1.3 The case for investing in mental health and wellbeing ...................................................................................................................... 3

Part two—Information sheets ....................................