The Difference A Supportive Boss Can Make in Mental Health Care

It’s important to know that the people you work with go beyond reciting the contents of the corporate pamphlets

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I am a sucker for anti-depression content. Whenever I see a title that offers foolproof methods to fight the sadness, I will click on it 100%. This is how I have become versed on the best supplements to improve your mood, I know everything about getting your sunshine and your daily walks, and about the need to socialize because, even though when you are sad, you don’t want to see anybody, being alone will make you even more miserable.

Add to that, the truth is that the world doesn’t stop when you are depressed. You still have to eat, do at least some basic maintenance of your living space, and of course, go to work so you can buy food and keep a roof over your head.

When you have a visible medical condition, let’s say you break an arm or have to get your appendix taken out, there isn’t much explaining to do. Most reasonable people will understand that you cannot go to work and need some time to recover.

But when the ailment that afflicts you has its origin in your mind, even if it comes with physical symptoms such as extreme fatigue and panic attacks, the road is not that clear.

I have learned that, despite what a workplace’s policies might say, in the end, the key to successfully protecting people’s mental health at work lies with the people you work with and their level of empathy and preparation to handle the situation.

Overcrowded classrooms are not good for your health

Back when I was a teacher, I started having some physical symptoms that the doctors couldn’t pinpoint, so everything ended up being chalked up to anxiety. I was told to relax, do some yoga, and all that jazz.

While all of this was happening, there were changes in the way the classes were structured so, even though I still had the same working hours and the same pay, suddenly I found myself with an additional 150 students, bringing my total up to around 450 spread over 11 clases while teaching three different subjects, all because the school administration decided it was a good idea to stuff the classrooms to the limit and beyond.

This most certainly did not help my anxiety levels, and I was seriously depressed, not to mention completely burnt out.

One day, the union representatives visited my school and held a meeting, and they made it a point to boast how they had secured our right to receive “mental health” support. This interested me enormously, so I quickly raised my hand and asked for details about how exactly we could receive this help.

I realized I had caught them off guard. They bumbled something about how all I needed to do was go to my assigned clinic and “ask for help.” I pointed out that I had already done that, with very little result, and that I thought their bombastic statements meant they had actually achieved something new…something useful.

Oh, my, they changed the topic so quickly.

In the end, I didn’t receive much support, nor did the situation improve. And, come to think of it, even if they had given me appointments with all of the psychologists in the world and prescriptions for the most advanced medications, the reason for my anxiety and depression wasn’t something ethereal and mysterious: it was simply the systemically exploitative conditions that were now the rule of the land.

There is no pill for that, except if your only goal is to live in numbness.

You see, many workplaces like to announce that they care for their employees’ well-being, and that working for them means being part of a family. However, as many of you have probably noticed, a lot of that is nothing but propaganda, with very little to back it up.

Yes, they have written the manuals and created their policies, but they serve very little if the people in charge of enforcing them are not up to the task.

The customer service life

A little after I left my teaching job, I worked for a few months at a call center, of all places. The idea was to gain experience in different kinds of skills while practicing my English. Since I live in a Mexican border town, I had a variety of choices for my incursion into the Customer Service experience, and I decided to go with the one that was famous for hiring people who lacked experience in that type of job.

I went through the training, and once I started taking calls and speaking to customers, although a bit scared due to this new experience, I felt comfortable most of the time, and started to think that maybe I was going to be there for at least a couple of years.

However, my anxiety came back.

I’m uncertain of exactly what triggered it. Maybe it was the fact that, due to the schedule, I wasn’t getting enough sleep, or perhaps it was the family issues that had me running multiple errands. It could also had been due to the little recovery time between calls, especially when I got one in which the customer had been extremely rude.

Whatever it was, it happened to me that I started having panic attacks while at work, which is funny only in hindsight. Well, funny to me now that I remember. However, what mortified me the most was the idea that now everyone knew that something wasn’t entirely right with me.

However, a little bit after it happened, my boss pulled me aside and asked me if there was anything he could do to help. “Was something going on at home?”

I remember pausing because it made me uncomfortable to talk to my boss about the situation. Plus, since some of my coworkers were wary of me, I imagined his offer was nothing but something he had to do to check off a box in some corporate form.

Of course there was stress at home, but explaining it would require revealing too much of my personal life, something I really didn’t want to do. But all of this was being magnified by the very same nature of the job I was doing, which sometimes required me to deal with extremely rude people to whom I had to be extra polite, no matter what they said.

For context, you should know that my boss was a very temperamental man who would sometimes explode in anger when things weren’t going right. However, the big contradiction was that time after time, he proved that he had our backs and would support us in any way he could.

I decided to risk it and mentioned that yes, there were issues at home — without going into details — and that sometimes the back-to-back flow of calls didn’t give me a chance to recover to the point I was considering quitting.

Without realizing it, I had given the right answer.

He told me he could arrange for me to be moved to a different campaign, one in which the flow of calls wasn’t as heavy, with the added benefit that, even though I would need additional training, what I already knew would give me an advantage. I would even get a better schedule, and my salary would remain the same.

I was stunned. This man asked me if I needed help, listened to my concerns, and then quickly came up with a solution to actually help me.

“I would rather lose you to another campaign than you leaving for good. Plus, if later you feel better, you could come back to this team. Your English level is very good; we need you.”

After thinking about it for a little while, I decided to accept his proposal and thanked him.

Turns out he was absolutely right. In my new position, I was doing way better, not only emotionally, but also financially, because my performance improved so much that I was even getting extra bonuses. My new schedule was even adjusted so I would never have to miss an appointment with my psychiatrist.

After a few months, I left the job — it proved to be something I didn’t want to develop a career in; the bosses were supportive, but the job itself stinks, if you know what I mean. Still, the time I spent working there served me well; I developed new skills, and I will always be grateful for the quick actions my boss took.

Policies without the right people are nothing but empty words

I’m convinced that, if it hadn’t been for my intense, yet caring boss, I wouldn’t have lasted long at that job. I realize that, given the nature of the work at a call center, he probably had to deal with situations like mine several times, and therefore knew what was actually helpful to employees, instead of giving just platitudes.

I never told him, but when he got angry, he kind of reminded me of my father when he had his outbursts, meaning that in my case, this wasn’t a good thing. It wasn’t until I saw the supportive actions he took for different members of the team and for me that I felt safe and as if someone actually had my back.

That’s the only thing that can make a difference: knowing that the people you work with go beyond reciting the contents of the corporate pamphlets and instead focus on the actions that actually work for the employees. Even from a business point of view, this is the correct course of action. Why invest in training and paying the salaries of people who are just too stressed out to do their jobs the correct way?

In the end, the customer service life wasn’t for me, but at least I got the chance to find that out in a supportive environment. It still shocks me that a call center helped me manage my mental health better than a school, but I guess that’s what they mean when they say life is full of surprises. Come what may, now I know what a supportive boss behaves like.

I started an experiment: I’m recording myself while writing! To witness the process, visit this link.

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