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New short course illuminates workplace wellbeing

Learning to recognise, understand, and effectively manage employee mental health issues.

Unabated mental health issues in our workforce not only have a potentially huge impact on productivity, but are also deeply affecting on a personal level for millions of Australian employees.

A new one-day short course from the Tasmanian School of Business and Economics (TSBE) aims to teach professionals in – or aspiring to – supervisory positions how to better manage employees’ mental health issues.

Managing Employee Mental Health is led by TSBE’s Dr Sarah Dawkins and Professor Angela Martin, who have significant combined experience in psychology and organisational behaviour.

“It’s about making mental health a priority just like physical health and safety. It’s really important for productive and healthy workplaces,” Dr Dawkins said.

Supporting workers with mental illness is increasingly becoming a job demand that managers are facing, but often feel ill-prepared for.

The course demonstrates how supervisors can identify and respond to mental health issues with a plan which provides appropriate, ongoing management to improve outcomes for employees.

Supervisors are also taught the legal, ethical, and situational nuances that can influence their response to an employee mental health issue.

It can be quite a stressful demand, and sometimes they [managers] have to navigate it on their own. They’re also concerned with how best to help their staff – they don’t want to upset the situation, or do more harm, however well-intentioned their actions might be.

The course offers highly-practical lessons and no prior experience or knowledge is required.

Interested in studying the Managing Employee Mental Health short course? Explore short courses.