Mental ill health has a high economic impact on society and employers. Three of the study team (HB, JH, LT) delivered training sessions for senior leaders from industry settings to advocate primary prevention for mental health at work. In this training, we communicated the rising prevalence of mental ill-health at work, and the national and international policy associated with workforce support. Although training line managers in mental health is a key preventative action outlined in policy documents, there was no published evidence outlining the typology of organisations that offered line manager training, and what organisational level benefits it had, if any.

This led to our research with the wider team, which had three objectives. To explore:
(a) the prevalence and characteristics of organisations that offer line manager training in mental health,
(b) the relationship between the provision of line manager training in mental health and other mental health and wellbeing practices, and
(c) the relationship between line manager training in mental health and organisational-level outcomes.

To achieve this, we conducted secondary analysis of existing longitudinal anonymised organisational-level survey data derived from computer-assisted telephone interview surveys collected in four waves (2020:1900 firms, 2021:1551, 2022:1904, 2023:1902) in England. Data were collected by the Enterprise Research Centre in the UK, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, as part of a wider programme of work around mental health and productivity. Our secondary analysis was funded by The Productivity Institute, UK, and supported by the UK Society of Occupational Medicine, our industry partner.

This research showed that while the proportion of organisations offering line manager training increased over time, 41% of organisations still did not provide it at the final data collection point, particularly in small-to-medium-sized enterprises, and organisations with predominantly male, White and/or older workforces.

Offering line manager training in mental health was associated with the adoption of other primary, secondary and tertiary mental health and wellbeing practices by organisations, across all four years. Positive practices to support workforce wellbeing therefore clustered together.

Importantly, line manager training in mental health was significantly associated with organisational-level outcomes, including improved staff recruitment and retention, customer service, business performance, lower long-term sickness absence due to mental ill-health and presenteeism.

This is the first study to show that training line managers in mental health is directly related to diverse aspects of an organisations’ functioning and, therefore, has strategic business value for organisations. Our findings had significant reach in the national and international media, with over 2.3 million readers through global news outlets. We engaged in a wide range of knowledge-exchange activities to provide practical insights and real-world applications of our findings. This includes feeding our study findings into government consultations on work and health, sharing findings through industry-facing publications and events, documenting our research impact, and delivering a public-facing international Masterclass on Promoting Mental Health at Work hosted by the Institute of Health Promotion and Education, in which we advocate the value of workforce training.

Keywords: Workforce, training, mental health, research, knowledge-exchange.