COMMENT: In the past couple of years, LionHeart has put particular emphasis on developing our work in the area of mental health and concentrating on how and why we support wellbeing in the workplace as well as out of it. So just why is a charity for chartered surveyors involved in this work, and what is it exactly that we do? writes LionHeart chief executive Davina Goodchild.
Mental health is important to us because we can see for ourselves how the world has changed and continues to change. The demands placed on people are also continually evolving: modern life is busy and can be very stressful.
So as things have changed for the people we are here to support, it has been essential for us as a charity to make sure our services also evolve to keep pace with this.
As the benevolent fund for the RICS, LionHeart has been providing grants and other services to RICS members in the UK and across the world for more than a century.
When it was established, it was people’s financial health that was at the centre of our work – we helped mostly the widows and children of surveyors who were struggling to cope.
Over the years, we started to add other services that would support RICS professionals. These were mostly focused upon people’s physical health – so grants for people to perhaps help adapt their homes after a disability or serious illness, help to cope with mobility issues or with recuperation.
In the past 10-15 years we have been looking at more than financial and physical health in order to support people’s mental health too, hence the development of our counselling service and workshops.
Towards the end of 2016, we launched a major mental health project called the John O’Halloran Initiative. It aims to promote positive wellbeing within the property industry – a notoriously stressful, high-pressured and, dare we say it, “macho” industry.
The project has its roots in a tragic incident and takes its name from a retired Fellow of the RICS who sadly took his own life after silently suffering from depression for most of his adult life.
We are extremely proud to work with the JOH steering committee, which is made up of some of John’s former colleagues, friends, and his son, Rob, all of whom are passionate about developing a project that has a lasting, positive impact.
Throughout May, LionHeart is holding several John O’Halloran Symposium mental health awareness events in London, Cardiff, Manchester and Edinburgh.
We hope these help raise awareness and promote a more open culture. Most importantly, we want people to understand that there is help available and that, with the right support, it is possible to recover from a period of mental ill health – and that it doesn’t have to mean the end of your career.
During the time we have been working alongside the RICS, the working environment for surveyors has changed dramatically.
The largest change, I think, is probably the way in which technology has introduced an immediacy and urgency that can increase stress and pressure for people alongside the ease and simplicity it also provides.
The result of this can be seen whenever we do a survey with RICS professionals, which always highlight concerns about work-life balance and the challenge of maintaining that in the industry.
It used to be that RICS professionals would call us at times of crisis; they still do, in fact, but now they don’t only call us in times of crisis. They call us because they know we can help them to overcome an unexpected challenge before it becomes a crisis.
We have noticed an increase in the number of calls for help we now get because of people’s mental health.
According to our latest figures for the financial year ending in April 2018, these were the top five reasons people call our helpline:
- 15% were people requesting our free, professional counselling service. We have made a big effort to promote the fact that this is available to RICS professionals, but I suspect part of the increase is down to a growing awareness of the importance of mental health and importance of talking therapies.
- 14% were in relation to serious ill health and physical disability, including things such as cancer, strokes or accidents that had left people unable to work for a period of time.
- 13% of callers were people facing a period of unemployment or redundancy who needed some support to get back on their feet.
- 10% of calls were about legal issues which included contract concerns, workplace bullying, marriage breakdown or divorce
- Mental ill health is now in the top five reasons for calls to our service – common issues such as stress, anxiety and depression
The feedback we get from the people we help is amazingly positive.
Time and again we hear what a relief it has been to talk to one of our support officers or counsellors.
It’s our hope that through our mental health initiative and the work we are doing with our corporate partners in the property industry that more and more people will get that “it’s good to talk”.
If we can prevent even one more family from having to come to terms with the death of a loved one through suicide, it will be worthwhile.
Click here to find out more about the John O’Halloran Initiative. Watch a video of LionHeart’s mental health ambassadors sharing their own experiences.
