Mental health gets primary focus at chamber event

Amy Carr: A four-day workweek is a permanent addition at Jordan Valley.

The centerpiece of the Springfield Area Chamber of Commerce’s Health Care Outlook was a panel discussion on the importance of employee wellness and mental health in an employment landscape altered by the coronavirus pandemic.

Dr. Curtis Mattson, director of clinics at CoxHealth, addressed the audience of roughly 275 May 18 at the DoubleTree by Hilton, noting mental health has moved more to the forefront of conversations about workplace challenges.

“Certainly, the last two years have been really tricky for a lot of us to navigate. It’s great that we’re talking about it,” he said of mental health. “The challenge is what is your company’s culture doing to actually put some infrastructure behind that discussion?”

Mattson participated in the panel moderated by Krisi Schell, executive vice president of human resources at SRC Holdings Corp. It also included Emily Alloway, director of human resources at Campaignium; Gary Ehlers, chief human resources officer at Bass Pro Shops; and Dr. Philip Swope, a psychologist at Burrell Behavioral Health.

“Mental health is part of your wellness package. Whether you know it or not, it is,” Mattson said. “Part of what we have to understand from the culture standpoint is where is the rubber meeting the road.”

He said CoxHealth is having internal and external conversations and rolling out integrated behavioral health programs in its clinics. The goal is to put those programs before its patients, which he said also happens to include its over 12,000 employees systemwide.

“It’s that culture piece that you have to understand. This is what drives retention,” Mattson said. “This is what drives people looking at your organization that aren’t already there. They say, ‘This is the place I want to be because they’re going to make sure that all of my needs are taken care of and addressed.’”

Amy Carr, director of human resources at Jordan Valley Community Health Center, who attended the event, said COVID turned everyone in health care on their heads and forced employees to tackle their jobs differently and work longer hours. That quickly led Jordan Valley’s executive team to find a way to better support its staff.

“One of the first things that we did was move to four-day workweeks for our teams,” she said, adding that started in summer 2020 to give employees an extra personal day per week. “That’s a permanent part of our workforce.”

The company also created an employee liaison position in May 2021, currently held by Emily Smith.

“She’s an amazing resource for our staff for any kind of need,” Carr said, noting that includes mental health issues or connecting them with an employee assistance program, which offers free and confidential assessments, short-term counseling, referrals and follow-up services for those who have personal or work-related problems.

Time off
Mercy Springfield Communities also has employee assistance program resources, said Marie Moore, executive director of operations. She said the panelists’ discussion about taking mental health days resonated with her and has long been a focus for the health care system.

“Mental health for our coworkers and balancing their life and work is so important,” she said, noting the demand on the health care workforce is showing no signs of decline for the next decade.

Employment in health care occupations is projected to grow 16% from 2020 to 2030, much faster than the average for all occupations, adding about 2.6 million new jobs, according to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data. The average wage in the 10-county Springfield region for all jobs is $43,521, while it’s $52,891 for health care positions.

Swope said employers who utilize paid time off for their workers should look at how it’s structured and organized. For some, PTO may be an umbrella term that includes all types of days off, be it for vacation, illness or mental health. He stopped short of telling companies to specifically designate mental health days but said it’s worth consideration.

“If you have specific mental health days built into your days off – if it’s specifically labeled mental health – it really communicates to them that you are taking their mental health into consideration, that you care about them,” he said. “But the downside of that obviously is that there’s a limit to the nonmental health days possible.”

Alloway said people sometimes don’t realize the value of using PTO, no matter the reason, and let it pile up every year. It’s a practice that can be damaging to mental and physical health for the worker, she said.

“Use it, use it, use it, because it’s so important,” she said. “Helping your employees understand how important that is for their mental health is extremely important.”

Conversation starter
Campaignium, the digital marketing and creative services company, added health care coverage to its benefits package two years ago, Alloway said.

“We invited the employee in on that conversation. We had some really good conversations about what would be of value to them as an employee,” she said. “We got a lot of great information and then went shopping.”

Alloway said the company selected a benefit plan through the Missouri Chamber Federation, and it’s administered by Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield. It’s available to small group employers in Missouri who have up to 50 eligible employees.

“It’s been a great recruiting tool. Over the last couple of years, that’s probably been one of the first pieces of conversations during interviews that I’ve had,” she said, referring to the company’s benefits package.

Bass Pro’s Ehlers said the company’s leaders are encouraged to get to know their employees.

“As simple as that sounds, you never know what someone is going through on the other side,” he said. “If you’re running a department that’s hot and you’re pushing them, you’ve got to stop and ask the question, ‘Is everything OK?’ If you feel it’s running hot, then take a pause, along with the mental health day.”

One new way Bass Pro is looking to address workforce health is the launch of its Family Health Center. The health care center for employees and their dependents is slated to open this fall at its corporate campus on East Kearney Street, according to past Springfield Business Journal reporting. Bass Pro is partnering with Brentwood, Tennessee-based health care provider Premise Health to offer primary care, preventative wellness and treatment of acute and chronic conditions.

Ehlers said Bass Pro talked with companies such as Toyota and Walmart, which have made similar past investments.

“We came to the realization that this is not only our commitment to Springfield but our commitment to the employee to make it easy for you to not only get a pharmacy right across the street but go see a doctor,” he said. “It’s an important employee value proposition that we can offer.”

This year’s Health Care Outlook marked a return to an in-person event, as the 2021 edition was livestreamed due to COVID-19 pandemic concerns. The pandemic also led to cancellation of the 2020 event. Next in the chamber’s annual Outlook series is the 2022 Economic Outlook, set for Aug. 24 at the Oasis Hotel & Convention Center.