Why this day matters
World Mental Health Day falls on Saturday 10 October, and this year the theme set by the World Federation for Mental Health is Lived Experiences Heard: Real Voices, Real Change. It is a theme that sits very close to home for us. Thrive Law exists because of lived experience. Our Founder and Managing Partner, Jodie Hill, set the firm up in 2018 after her own mental breakdown, which she now calls her mental breakthrough.
So when we talk about supporting mental health at work, we are not talking about a poster in the staff room or a single day in October. We are talking about the everyday decisions that make a workplace somewhere people can be well.
Mental health at work is an employment law issue too
It is easy to file wellbeing under culture and leave it there. However, the legal picture matters just as much.
Under the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, employers have a duty of care for the health and safety of their staff, and that includes psychological health. The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 require suitable and sufficient risk assessments, which means that psychosocial risks, such as workload, role clarity, and working relationships, should be considered alongside physical ones.
In addition, where a mental health condition has a substantial and long-term adverse effect on someone’s ability to carry out normal daily activities, it is likely to meet the definition of a disability under the Equality Act 2010. That brings protection from discrimination and the duty to make reasonable adjustments into play.
The scale of the issue is significant. The Health and Safety Executive reported that 964,000 workers in Great Britain suffered from work related stress, depression or anxiety in 2024/25, making mental ill health the leading cause of work-related illness. HSE figures put the resulting absence at an estimated 22.1 million working days lost.
Behind every one of those numbers is a person, a team and a business feeling the impact.
If you would like to go deeper on the legal side, we have written about employers’ obligations towards employees’ mental health at work and about what the case law tells us about the mental health duty of care.
What we do at Thrive
We are often asked what ‘good mental health support’ looks like in practice, so here is an honest look at some of the things we do ourselves. None of it is complicated, and none of it needs a huge budget.
Coffee catch ups
Each week, our team has dedicated time set aside for a coffee catch up. It lasts around 30 minutes, it happens both in person and online so nobody is left out, and it is deliberately not about work. As a result, our remote colleagues stay just as connected as those in the office, and conversations that might never happen in a formal meeting happen naturally over a brew.
Wellbeing days
All of our team are entitled to wellbeing days, which are paid days to use for rest, appointments, headspace or whatever they need. Crucially, nobody has to justify or explain how they use them. Being able to take a day before you reach breaking point is far healthier than waiting until you are signed off.
Meditation sessions
We run meditation sessions for the team, again both online and in person. They give people a practical way to regulate stress during the working week rather than carrying it home. For anyone sceptical, we would say give it one session before you decide.
A personal wellbeing budget
Wellbeing is not one size fits all, so every member of the team receives a wellbeing budget to spend on whatever genuinely supports them. For one person, that might be therapy or coaching. For another, it could be a gym membership, a course, or something completely different. By handing the choice to the individual, the support actually fits the person rather than the other way round.
Our summer social, with families and friends invited
Every summer we hold a social, and it is not a team-only event. Families, partners and friends are all welcome, because the people who support our team outside work matter to us too. This year we swapped a sports day for a scavenger hunt around Leeds city centre, which involved a lot of running around the centre, a lot of laughing and a surprising amount of competitiveness. It is a small thing, but it builds the kind of connection that makes it easier to speak up on a hard day.
You can read more about how this works day-to-day in our blog on taking action for mental health at Thrive Law, including the Acas case study on reasonable adjustments for mental health that features our team.
So, is this something your workplace could offer?
Have a look at that list again and ask yourself an honest question. Which of these could your organisation realistically introduce in the next three months?
A weekly coffee catch-up costs nothing. A social that welcomes families costs very little. A modest wellbeing budget often costs far less than replacing one person who burns out and leaves.
If you are not sure where to start, these questions are a useful place to begin:
- Do your managers know what to do when someone tells them they are struggling?
- Does your stress risk assessment exist, and has anyone looked at it recently?
- Do your policies mention mental health, or only physical health?
- Would your team say they feel safe raising a problem early?
For a fuller picture, our blog on what a mentally healthy workplace actually looks like walks through both the legal and cultural side. You can also browse everything we have written on wellbeing, inclusion and employment law over on the Thrive Law blog, and Jodie shares regular videos on mental health, neurodiversity and life in the law on her YouTube channel.
Looking for ideas to mark the day itself? Mind, the Mental Health Foundation and the Calm blog all share practical suggestions for individuals and teams.
Where to find help and support
This blog is about workplaces, but mental health is personal, and reading about it can bring things to the surface. If you or someone you know is struggling, support is available and you do not need to be in crisis to use it.
- Samaritans offer free, confidential support 24 hours a day on 116 123, or visit samaritans.org
- Mind provides information and support on mental health at mind.org.uk
- Mental Health Foundation shares research, tips and resources at mentalhealth.org.uk
- NHS guidance on mental health services and how to access them is at nhs.uk
- Your GP is a good first port of call, and many employers offer an Employee Assistance Programme with free counselling, so it is worth checking what is available where you work
Let’s make it more than one day
Awareness days are brilliant at starting conversations. What matters is what happens on 11 October and every day after that.
At Thrive, we support employers, HR teams and individuals across the UK with employment law advice, HR support and training on mental health, reasonable adjustments and inclusive workplaces. If you would like a conversation about where your organisation stands, or you want help putting practical support in place, we would love to hear from you.
Get in touch at enquiries@thrivelaw.co.uk or call us on 0113 861 8101.
