Businesses say wellbeing needs to be a priority before Covid-19 dust settles

Friday, 4 September 2020

Businesses will see the effects of Covid-19 on mental health when the dust starts to settle, hospitality entrepreneur Chris Monaghan warns.

Monaghan has run several hospitality businesses over the past 20 years, and says that despite the strides New Zealand had made in discussing mental health in recent years, Covid-19 put wellbeing on the back burner.

“Businesses are still in survival mode. But when the adrenaline wears off, wellbeing will become topical again and I fear then it will be the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff,” Monaghan says.

Small businesses are struggling to cope with the recent level changes after the Auckland outbreak, he says.

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Chris Monaghan hospitality entrepreneur says businesses haven’t been able to prioritise mental health while trying to survive financially as a result of Covid-19.

Auckland’s city centre is still “dead” in level 2.5, he says.

“At the moment small businesses are that leaky boat that is soon going to sink to the bottom of the sea.

“I've spoken to a lot of business owners who no longer have the enthusiasm for their businesses because of the toll running it has taken on their health and relationships.”

Xero’s latest survey of 1000 small New Zealand businesses shows 58 per cent of employees did not talk about wellbeing at work and more than a third were not offered wellbeing support but would have liked it.

Paint Vine founder Alex Hamilton says his business took a 65 per cent revenue dip when Covid-19 hit.

At least a quarter said their mental health suffered during the alert level 4 lockdown earlier in the year, according to the survey.

The software company has started its own program to allow staff employers to check in with their staff to see how they were coping.

Auckland events business Paint Vine owner, Alex Hamilton, who has started using the program says it is important for employers to understand how their staff work.

“Quality of work drops because of burn out,” Hamilton says.

There needs to be more help from the Government to support business owners too, he says.

Frog Recruitment managing director Shannon Barlow says “there is the danger of burnout when you're putting too much focus and your office is in your lounge room”.

Hamilton who was in the United States before Covid-19 hit says he had a head start to move his business online. Despite this, his business took a 65 per cent revenue hit.

Paint Vine started offering paint and canvas kits for people to use its video tutorials from more than 50 artists to entertain themselves or their bubble during the lockdown.

While having to change his entire business model, he has the added pressure to keep his staff feeling upbeat and confident to work, he says.

“It's really tricky to predict the future and know where you want to go.

“Uncertainty makes it hard for businesses to plan and give employees certainty about their future. All you can do is plan week to week, because another lockdown may come,” Hamilton says.

Best of Today founder Anna Gibbons says there was a spike in interest from businesses on wellbeing management during Covid-19 lockdowns.

Frog Recruitment’s Shannon Barlow says that while there has been more discussion about employee wellbeing improving business performance, Covid-19 is forcing many businesses to take it more seriously.

Working from home during lockdown levels is taking a toll on some people as many struggled to transition into working remotely, she says.

“Some companies we work with had increased workloads while working from home during lockdown. There is the danger of burnout when you're putting too much focus and your office is in your lounge room,” Burlow says.

More than a quarter of its respondents to Xero’s survey said their mental health suffered during the alert level 4 lockdown earlier in the year.

“Mental health is not something that will go away.”

Anna Gibbons started a mental health program to target employee wellbeing last year.

Best of Today is an eight-week programme highlighting areas that require attention for people to feel good, including communication, eating and sleeping well, and exercising.

Those how take part receive boxes containing tangible tools and gifts to strengthen the learning, Gibbons said.

Despite moving his Paint Vine business to operate online because of Covid-19, Alex Hamilton’s company suffered a 65 per cent income hit.

During Covid-19 interest in the programme spiked, which led her to register with the government’s Covid-19 Business Recovery Fund to make the service more accessible to small businesses.

“When we started it was seen as something nice to have but since Covid-19 it's almost become a necessity. People are having panic attacks at work,” Gibbons says.

“Humans don't like not knowing what's going to happen and don't understand what is causing the anxiety because they feel like they've lost control.”

In Australia, supermarket giant Woolworth Group created a new position of chief medical officer, last month.

The appointment of Dr Rob McCartney was a first for an Australian retailer, which is an industry that does not have inherent safety hazards associated with its jobs like mining or aviation, and was created to provide Woolworths with medical advice to shape policies around Covid-19.

McCartney is also responsible for Woolworth’s New Zealand subsidiary, Countdown.

Gibbons says this will become more common as the world adjusts to life during a pandemic.

The financial turmoil caused by Covid-19 means many businesses are not in a position to afford wellbeing programmes, she says.

“We’re working on ways to make our services even more affordable because it is a very hard time for businesses all around.”

Hamilton says it is important for business owners to take a step back, because their mental state can have a negative impact their business.

It is hard to get a grip from the outside of what's going on, he says.

“As a business owner you don’t associate your behaviours and actions as a deterioration of your mental health. That becomes more pronounced when you're in lockdown, stuck at home all day, easily irritable, or frustrated.”

Monaghan says that over the course of his career he had learnt ways to cope with stress and keeping a work-life balance.

“Life balance skills are something I learnt the hard way. When I started 18 years ago I was going at 100kmh, burnt out and my personal life suffered because I had a single-minded focus. There's no rule book and it's not until you get mature enough to work out how to find that balance.”

Monaghan says he is considering starting an advisory company to help businesses include wellbeing in their business plans.

Business owners needed to take preventative measures now to cope with their mental health at this time, he says.

“There are a lot of people out there taking stress about a lot of things they can't control. You have to understand what you can and can't control. We can control how we operate, how kind we are, our feelings and our brand,” he says.