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Thursday is World Suicide Prevention Day, an annual reminder of why appreciating mental health is so important, Emily says.<\/p>\n
Stress and the significant impact it can have on people needs to be recognised by employers, she says.<\/p>\n
Companies have a legal duty of care for their employees, external<\/span><\/a>, Emily, from Burnhope near Durham, says, which includes their mental as well as physical health and safety.<\/p>\n But it should not just be seen as an onerous requirement, she says, as a healthier workforce means fewer days lost through sickness – almost 9% of workplace ill health in 2025 was stress related, according to the Office for National Statistics, external<\/span><\/a>.<\/p>\n “Humans are still the main resource, and if the people are not there, you don’t have a successful business,” Emily says.<\/p>\n Everyone wears a metaphorical backpack she says, filled with the stresses and concerns of life.<\/p>\n Work “chucks in loads more weight”, she says, and when a backpack becomes too heavy, people become unwell.<\/p>\n “Any senior leader that has any kind of empathy and compassion for people won’t want their business to be chucking weights into people’s backpacks until they fall over,” Emily says.<\/p>\n “Especially when there are things that you could actually do to help to actually take some of those weights out.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n