Melissa Doman

That's really what is required.

For the mental health at work movement for so long, it was all about building awareness.

Now, that's very important.

Many people have a lot of assumptions about mental health and mental illness and stress that are based in their own experiences and not necessarily on what those topics actually are and what they mean.

Now, the difference between a productive conversation versus a risky one is when people don't know the purpose of those conversations, what they're trying to achieve, the conversations that are meant for the workplace and not meant for the workplace.

And also when there's a lack of social permission and psychological safety to have those conversations, because if people are not on the same page, there's not really a chance to have the conversation be productive and it does become all risk.

When people say the wrong thing, they don't get the help they need.

Someone maybe says something that is illegal.

That's why we talk about the importance of understanding workplace mental health compliance, because it guides those conversations.

So the difference is having the education, literally knowing the language.

of what to say and how to deploy and receive those conversations and understanding the boundaries around them.

We can't just encourage people to have workplace mental health conversations without giving them a framework to do it with because then it's unproductive and very risky.

It's so sad.

So I have to say a hard truth first.

Some workplaces just don't have the nomenclature.

They don't have the knowledge, but they're willing to learn.

Other places have no desire to have the nomenclature.

We're being honest here.

No desire to get the education, the nomenclature to develop the social permission.

Of the 8 billion people on this planet, we cannot sit here and say that every company, every team will be open to this conversation because it's just not true.