Thursday, November 5, 2009

British bosses blowing billions

NICE published some new guidance today - subject: the incredibly obvious. The MHF have been making the business case for health at work and against stress at work for several years now. In 2008, Men's Health Week was devoted to the subject; we published reams on malehealth and also looked at work addiction.

It's good to see NICE responding with some new guidance called Promoting mental wellbeing at work. Of course, they have no authority over British business who will no doubt continue with the sort of short-termism that has made them famous. But NICE have, at last, put a figure on the amount of money industry is wasting by not taking stress at work seriously: £28.3 billion a year. Bottom-line numbers like that ought to make even the most self-centred, narrow-minded, unimaginative of bosses take note. After all, just think of the bonuses they could pay themselves with savings like that.

(This report has already done wonders for my health at work. Pointing out the short-comings in British bosses may be as easy as hitting the proverbial posterior of a bovine with a banjo buy, hey, it gets us through the day.)

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