Mental Health Awareness in the UK: Create a Workplace Community

Businesses thrive when their workforces thrive. This means having colleagues who are engaged and motivated and who feel connected to their teams and the business as a whole. This is not always easy to achieve — people’s lives are complicated, outside pressures can often spill into the workplace, and the pressures of management and business uncertainty can impact morale. We know that good work is good for mental health and well-being. What are some of the barriers and challenges to creating a strong workplace community, and how can leaders and people teams have a positive impact?

Challenges

There is a challenge in forging strong teams and relationships between consistency and prescription and allowing individuals space and autonomy. One of the keys to creating workplace communities is allowing room for different views to be shared while setting clear expectations and boundaries that encourage team cohesion. This can be done through clear policies and processes that are consistently applied across an organization, but also by allowing safe avenues where voices can be heard and by giving agency to those voices. 

For example, do managers have an open mindset, keen to hear about different ways of managing a process? Are your managers confident to allow another’s view to be heard or be considered? Does the business encourage innovation and development by allowing new ideas to be raised?

Isolation

When you read about the top HR trends, most will talk about employee isolation as being a key issue. Not wishing to wade into the remote/onsite working debate, I can see pros and cons in each argument. One must accept that for some, working remotely may not be conducive to creating a sense of belonging and community. That said, many workers who work on a site, in a factory, or in an office can also feel isolated by colleagues, their manager, or the general culture of a business. One’s place of work is not the only factor in what creates a feeling of isolation. Isolation impacts motivation and productivity, encourages “quiet quitting,” and negatively impacting one’s mental health and well-being.

To foster a better sense of togetherness, businesses could consider initiatives such as rearranging the office space to create a more collaborative feel, asking those who work remotely to give feedback on their experiences, creating digital forums, getting more talk time together, or implementing coffee mornings or team tea breaks. Also, ensure managers are aware of what is going on in their teams: Are people disengaged? What is attendance like? Is someone being left out? Managers play a key role in ensuring that isolation does not go unchecked.

Poor Communication

Another barrier to community is often poor communication: colleagues feeling left out or feeling that decisions are being made for them and not with them. This is not to say that managers have to consult staff on every decision (except where legally required to do so), but can businesses adopt a more collegiate approach to information sharing? Monthly newsletters, shout-outs, and town halls are all good examples of businesses sharing information about what is going on. 

Managers should also think about how they communicate with their teams. For example, is the approach on a need-to-know basis, are there special cliques that have formed, or are managers as open as they can be with information? It is also important that your managers have the confidence to give feedback — positive as well as constructive.

Feeling Valued

Feeling valued is not necessarily about shaking the magic money tree for a pay raise. Yes, money is a motivator, but feeling valued is more. We also need to feel valued at whichever level we sit within an organization — even our CEOs need to feel valued! Awards, individual and team recognition, celebrations, a public “well done” — all of these create a sense of connection with our teams but also with the wider business.

Purpose and Goals

How good is your organization about explaining and demonstrating its purpose, mission statement or goals? Talking the talk, but also walking the walk? Purpose and goals should be top-down as well as bottom-up. Businesses should have goals, but so should teams and individuals. Individuals should be able to see, and also know, that what they are doing is making a difference because their goals align with the goals of the teamor business.

Motivating by purpose is a strong engagement tool. When people feel that they are working toward something, they are more invested in it and they feel more engaged as well as connected. Consider reviewing your review or appraisal process to ensure it factors in the alignment of goals. 

A Good Onboarding Process

Let’s start as we mean to go on. Goals, values, and fostering good and cohesive individual and team relationships all start with first impressions. Do you lavish your new recruits with adoration and a well-ordered introduction, or when they join, is it a bit of a surprise? Yes, discussing handbooks, policies, and a first-day coffee is great, but where are the check-ins, the reviews, or the objective setting? 

Asking managers to share their plans, projects, or current work can help new recruits understand priorities and where they can make a difference. As the U.K. government moves forward in passing the Employment Rights Bill, the onboarding and probation process will be in the spotlight with the planned changes to unfair dismissal rights, so this is something for U.K. employers to work on now.

Engaged Leaders

We expect much from our leaders and, to an extent, we should — their role, after all, is to “manage.” However, when did you last take the temperature of your management population? Managers are your business’s role models and ambassadors, but are they engaged and motivated? A lack of connection and community on their part will have a negative impact on their teams. Ensure the ones who are encouraging connectivity also feel connected themselves by investing in your management population through training and leadership development courses, creating safe channels where managers can meet and share ideas, and looking for ways in which managers can collaborate.

Having Fun 

We spend a lot of time at work, and it is important that we enjoy where we work and who we work with. Having fun doesn’t have to be big or extravagant — it could be in person or digitally. Think about internal networking events, “speed mentoring,” or encouraging different groups to work together. There is much to celebrate, so make this as much a part of the team culture as it is the business’s.

Building Community

Building internal connections and a workplace community can bring longer-term benefits to employees, managers, and the overall well-being of the business. In challenging times, it is that sense of belonging that can bring people together — and businesses are no different.

Emma O’Connor is an attorney with Doyle Clayton Solicitors in Reading, England; London; and Bristol, England. © 2025 Doyle Clayton Solicitors. All rights reserved. Reposted with permission of Lexology.