Championing Mental Health in Business

Welcome to the Eclipse podcast. I'm your host, Toni McKee.

In the post-COVID era, global companies are prioritizing mental health, recognizing its crucial role in building thriving communities and addressing sustainability challenges.

Today's guest, Jeffery Tan, is a trailblazer in this movement. As a Group General Counsel and Chief Sustainability Officer at Jardine Cycle and Carriage, or JCNC, he is also the CEO of Mindset Singapore, a Jardine Matheson charity focused on the area of mental health.

Join us for his insights into the intersection of corporate responsibility and mental well-being.

Jeffery, so nice to see you. Thanks for being here.

Well, thank you for having me, Toni.

How did you come to wear so many hats and what sparked your focus on mental health?

Maybe just a quick introduction. I do have a legal role looking out of the group's legal matters for Jardine Matheson, based out here in Singapore. But the group also has got a charity called Jardine Mindset, which was established since 2011, that focuses on mental health and well-being. And this goes all the way back to 2011, and you’re probably wondering why mental health? Because when we, as a group, surveyed the landscape and said, you know, where can we be able to make an impact, to be able to get back to the community, surprisingly everything from elderly care, alleviation of poor children, all very well served but the area of mental health was one that was terribly underserved. In fact if anything else people tended to sort of step away from this particular area, so that was one area that we thought we could be able to try and bring something to, in terms of our resource and efforts to raise awareness and to be able to help highlight this particular area, in terms of mental health being as important as physical health. So really that's how we started and then being in Singapore with my role there was something that I was drawn to in terms of trying to be a part of this effort and this initiative.

 Why were you drawn to it? What's your personal interest in this topic?

I guess if one were to look at this and speak very candidly, I mean, not just myself, but all of us would have either family members or close friends, people we associate with, that would have at one point or other grapple with mental health issues. And in my life journey, I've had those opportunities, to journey with people who have been going through those times. And when you think about mental health, it could be something as simple as depression. Of course, we are very familiar with that. Panic attacks, anxiety, stress of a nature which, at times paralyzes people from being able to function in the normal usual way.

The big challenge, of course, is one, to be able to have a safe space for people to even want to share about it, talk about it and then to be able to be guided into being directed to getting the help that they need. And I felt that this is something which, when I started this journey, a journey with the people in my life that had these challenges, even a very simple thing, what's the distinction between a psychiatrist and a psychologist or a therapist and how does one overlap another in terms of the support structure, one to another collaborating to help the individual that needs that support.

Oh, that's very interesting. You mentioned some of the challenges that people already face in terms of mental health, like anxiety, stress, and panic attacks, and things like that. But if you look at it from a sort of broader perspective, what do you think are the challenges in terms of getting help, particularly in Singapore or Southeast Asia more broadly?

I guess it's one to even be able to recognize that one is requiring some degree of help or support in journeying through this particular challenges itself. If you're familiar with Asian societies, we don't often connect and talk about things that are not easily seen, much less to talk about things that are of a mental health nature, primarily because there is so much of stereotypical labelling out there.

When you tell someone that you may have a mental health challenge, people tend to self-stick a label and say, "Oh, that somebody who is a little bit loony, will he or will he not be able to fit into the larger community, particularly whether it's in a workplace or even within a social network?" People tend to go away thinking that it's hard for people to be able to overcome that. And even if they did overcome it, how do you sort of be inclusive to welcome them back into the community?

So, from that standpoint, it's been something that we've been working to try and overcome the stigma by greater awareness, by greater sharing of knowledge so that people don't look at this in itself. So,OK if somebody had a mental health issue, then he or she is going to be consigned to an area where it's very difficult to help them, which is not the case, because as we can see, the more we talk about it, the more we normalize the conversation around it, and in the process pushback against the stigma, which is otherwise usually associated with mental health issues.

That sounds like a very familiar challenge, I would say. that's happening in all areas of the world. That stigma challenge, but I guess we are kind of seeing that people are taking action and breaking that down. That's the first step. It's really nice to hear that that's a focus for mindset and that you're actually seeing some movement in that area,in your region as well.

Right. One big part of this whole effort is the awareness and the outreach and the sharing of the knowledge, so that people can be able to look at this and with a more enlightened lens on, as opposed to just relying on typical labelling that often gets put on to mental health challenges.

 So, awareness and outreach, are those the main actions that Mindset is taking?

That would be the first step, going out and making people aware and having the outreach, but just as important would be in terms of inclusiveness.

And by inclusiveness, if I can be able to elaborate, oftentimes people will say, are you accepting of people who may have a mental health challenge? Are you prepared to embrace them into the community? Most often times the answer would be yes. But the acid test really is that will you then be willing to accept somebody who is in recovery back into the workplace? And this is the part where often it is what I would call the acid test, because people can be able to say all of the nice and positive things, but when you then challenge them and say would you then be willing to offer an employment opportunity to somebody who is coming out of depression, of anxiety, into the workplace, and it's kind of interesting.

More often, than not, people will say, "Hmm, that's a little bit further than I'm willing to go. Let me think about it." But that really is, I think, the biggest hurdle to be able to bring persons in recovery back into the workplace, to be able to normalize this connection and this interaction.

I feel like I can get a really good feeling for what Mindset is working on, on the ground. Can you talk about the overall mission of Mindset? Do you have any targets in terms of how many people you wanna help or anything like that? What's the overall ambition?

Since 2011, when we've started this charity in Singapore, we've been able to help about 300 persons in recovery with mental health challenges to get gainful employment. We've been able to work with social service agencies to be able to go out there and help persons in recovery prepare themselves to get back into the workplace.

And I think it's interesting to perhaps focus a little bit more on this. It's not just about saying, you know, here's a job, here's a vacancy, and you're welcome to come back. Because it really takes a whole of the village approach to this.

Everyone from the top of an organisation, setting the right tone to say that we are willing to be inclusive in terms of offering employment opportunities to persons with mental health challenges, to supervisors, to colleagues, to peers, to people within the work environment, who are willing to sort of accept as a colleague somebody who has mental health challenges that are recovering, to be in the workforce with them. And this is not always as intuitive or easy to be able to achieve. So there's a need at the end of the day to be able to go out there and work with an organization at many different levels to be able to get this inclusiveness into an operational level.

Yeah, that makes good sense. I can see how it does take a village as you put it, and that's a really nice way to look at it. But then let's talk a little bit about JCNC in terms of your company's journey with mental health. You started mindset back in 2011, but what about internally? What's happening there? What's the journey like?

So I guess there are two sides to this the outward in terms of impacting the community outside of the organization but also in terms of of impacting our colleagues and peers within the organization itself. So everything from, we do have lunchtime talks and events where people come in to be able to share with us, what we call ‘mental health first’, just to be able to attune people to what are some of the signs to be aware of and what are some of the techniques and approaches that we could have in terms of journey and supporting people within the workplace as they go through some of these challenges on the mental health side.

Those kind of engagement methods sound really useful. Are you able to measure actually how, to what level employees are engaged in your quest for better mental health?

I guess is to be able to offer programs and techniques. I mean, everything from, you know, advocating that people will spend time with the loved ones, engaging hobbies, practicing relaxation techniques, meditation, deep breathing exercises, mindfulness, as things that individuals can be able to do to try and help alleviate their own mental health and wellness at the workplace, taking regular breaks and time away from work in terms of vacation time. And then, of course, if there's a need for individuals within the workplace environment, to offer EAP, Employee Assistance Programs. People that they can be able to reach out to on a professional level to get that help and support. So, we have that ecosystem as it were, to be able to help our colleagues and employees within the organization, journey through this. And of course from a leadership standpoint, for senior leaders to be able to talk about this openly and not in terms of what I call a defensive or slightly shameful thing to say or if you have a mental health issue you really should shouldn't talk about it, but to be able to foster a safe environment where people can be able to talk about this,

get the support, and don't feel that stigma or prejudice will creep in, into the process if people were to open up candidly or openly about their mental health challenges.

That sounds like you have a lot of activities going on there. Since you started your journey towards better mental health, have you noticed significant improvement?  

I think one big improvement is that when we've started this in 2011, a lot of people, as I may have mentioned, sort of scratch their heads and say, why mental health? Why don't you go do something a little bit more tangible that can be able to make an impact? And of course, we had COVID over the three, four years and the silver lining of COVID is that suddenly everybody around the world in our organizations, got the challenge of mental health because each one of us during the few years of grappling with COVID could understand in a personal way, what are some of the mental health challenges, whether it's in terms of you're working from home, you can't find the boundaries between you know your home life and your work life, to being isolated away from family and friends and unable to interact other than using technology, like Zoom or Teams to be able to connect, and how that void actually brought about quite a big challenge in terms of mental health for each one of us.

So, from that standpoint, now when you go out and talk to people about mental health, there is an immediate recognition and understanding what that means. as opposed to, you know, as recently as four years ago, pre-COVID, we could talk to people about it and they would also stare at you and say, "I think I understand”, but they really don't. And then when they do understand, you know, often times you then have this whole issue about stigma being, you know, coming to the forefront and how do you deal with that.

So, I think if you look at it from that standpoint, I think that needle has moved in terms of awareness. the needle has moved in terms of the community having a deeper understanding of what all this means and it's not something that only happens to a small number of people, but really could affect all of us as we have seen within the COVID years that we've all been grappling with.

So obviously your employees have been your focus group, you could say, in terms of your mental health initiatives. Have you tried to engage other stakeholders,like investors, suppliers, or customers? Are they also a part of this journey with you?

They are. I think I mentioned about offering employment. Within the group itself and in Singapore, there are 15,000 employees. We do, in the different businesses that we have, try to offer employment opportunities. And within the group over the last 10-12 years, there are about 300 opportunities for employment that the group has offered. But we've also gone out and engaged our suppliers on this journey to be able to share with them the programs that we have of offering employment. And there have been some that have come alongside us and joined in this particular initiative.

So, like for example, in the group itself, we do have Mandarin Oriental hotels, and they obviously are a strong supporter in terms of offering employment opportunities. But they also work with their outsource contractors who do their laundry. And these laundry suppliers have since being exposed to what we do as a charity, have also offered up over the years employment opportunities of their own, to persons in recovery. So, these are things which are building momentum and having a greater network of suppliers and stakeholders that we are able to share the message and we have come alongside us in this journey.

Wow the idea that you can engage people throughout your supply chain and have that ripple effect that just keeps on flowing, that's brilliant. What advice do you have for companies starting their own journey towards improved mental health? Where should they begin?

I think it really begins at the top and senior leadership needs to be able to, one, understand this is something that's significant and important in the workplace and for them to be able to accept the right tone from the top, to be able to foster open conversations, create awareness, and to be able to talk about this in an open, candid manner. Because oftentimes, I mean, if you went to work, obviously one non -negotiable is that you're going to work in a safe environment where physically your safety is going to be guaranteed.

 There's no doubt about that because you want to be able to go to work and come home safely to your family, so physical safety is a non -negotiable. But oftentimes you don't talk about the mental health element and the mental health element is just as important and I think there's an increasing awareness of this. So senior leadership needs to be able to articulate this, in an easy to understand manner, and then to be able to offer those opportunities. As I mentioned earlier on, in terms of the safe environments, to be for people to talk about the mental health challenges and to be able to offer the resources, you know for them to be able to reach out and get the help that they need and then to be able to get the whole organization as it were, being aware of some of these things. Because oftentimes if you're not tuned in on some of these things, these can sometimes come out in a very bad and negative way.

So, it's kind of interesting that we're talking about this because, I just had lunch with a couple of friends who were from a law firm and they were just telling me about the very sad case of a young lawyer who had over the holidays taken his own life. And big shock to everybody in the firm. But you know, it was also a wake-up call in terms of, how to go out there and talk about this in an open manner?

And it doesn't have to be, you know, something that is specific, but as simple as “how are you” and I think you would remember where the favorite Sesame Street character Elmo had put on Twitter of now known as X, asking people, "How are you?" And there was just a torrent and outpouring of people who just came out and said, "You know, I'm not doing well. I'm feeling sad. I'm struggling with my mental health." And those kind of opportunities, oftentimes, opens up conversations, which then helps people unload as a listener, as a friend, as a family, as a co -worker. It gives people the ability to then develop that conversation and hopefully be able to help identify other challenges and how these individuals can be able to be supported in the way that's going to be able to help them get to a good place.

Yeah, that Elmo story. That is really something to learn from, right? It can be so so simple. And for some reason, we find it so difficult to talk about these things. What are your top tips for protecting your own mental health and for supporting other people who may be struggling around you?

This might sound a little bit right. I mean, all of us have gotten onto the plane and just before it takes off, as stewardess or stewards would tell us, you know, if we go to a decompression, the oxygen mask would fall and make sure that you put it on yourself before you help anybody else. And I guess that's a very powerful reminder there, that all of us need to be able to look after our own mental health, you know, whether it's in terms of being able to take sufficient time off to have rest, to be able to disengage as it were from the workplace, to be able to get ourselves focused on something else other than work, to be able to have that work-life balance. I know it sounds kind of trite, but unless we focus on it and make it a priority, it's going to be able to creep up against each one of us as well, if you're not careful about that. And in today's environment, none of us are immune from this, just because we've been in been in this space, every one of us are subjected to the same kind of pressures.

 So, putting your own mask on first, making sure you're looking after your own mental health, and then you can, and then you can help people more effectively if they're struggling.

Right.

I think as parents especially, we can get sucked into looking after everybody else all the time. And I suppose as, as a business leader as well, you think more about your employees maybe than you do about yourself. So, I don't think we can learn that lesson often enough. We need to take care of ourselves first before we can be helpful to others.

Yeah, absolutely.

It's been such an inspiring conversation. I really enjoyed talking to you and you're obviously so passionate about this topic and it seems like you're really making strides in Singapore and in Jardine Cycle and Carriage. So thanks so much for spending the time with us. us, Jeffery, it's been really inspiring.

No, thank you for having me Toni, it's been a joy sharing this.