A former broker has called for a radical change in the way mental health is handled in the workplace after finding the stigma often attached to mental health was preventing people from seeking help.
Mel Joseph, who worked as a private banking and structured investment broker for 22 years, left the city life in 2014 after experiencing two mental breakdowns.
She now runs Mente — a firm dedicated to improving the way staff and employers think about mental health.
According to Ms Joseph, the "denial" and "ego" found in the finance sector provides a perfect breeding ground for mental health issues and people suffering burnouts.
She said: "What you’ve got with financial advisers is that they’re responsible for other people’s money. In that world, you’re always on. You have to be very competent and you’ve got to do it well.
"There’s a culture of independent financial advisers and other finance workers who battle their ego and don’t tell people when it’s really hard work and [they are] potentially getting too much."
Ms Joseph said the impact of this on an adviser as a person and on their revenue was massive as there was a real pressure to the job which was "difficult to get right".
She went on to say that she experienced pressure from the industry not to talk about or make known any mental health problems or feelings of burnout because she would be "deemed as not fit for the job".
She said: "The job is driven by money and performance and in this industry, when you show signs of burnout you show signs of weakness."
In fact when Ms Joseph first published a blog post about her mental health experiences in the finance world, many people messaged her telling her to take it down and described the post as "career suicide", she said.
Ms Joseph said the lifestyle of those in the financial sector often included after work dinner and drinks either with clients or colleagues, which meant "nine hour days often turned into 16 hour slogs" which opened up an avenue for substance reliance.
She said: "For example, if you’re working nine hour days, meeting with clients after work, going out drinking, getting home and popping a sleeping pill then getting up five hours later to do it all again, it’s going to catch up with you."
Ms Joseph spoke about ‘double diagnosis’ — where someone deals with stress or anxiety through drinking or other drugs — as a prevalent feature among working people.
She said: "A culture definitely exists around substances and mental health. Many who struggle with their health can turn to alcohol without understanding it’s actually perpetuating the issue."
Findings from Lifesearch, published last week (May 30), showed almost half of British adults ‘self-medicate’ their mental health issues and symptoms.
The study found one in five used alcohol, over-the-counter meds or illegal drugs to medicate while others were drawn to gambling, sex, food, or spending to alleviate chronic mental health symptoms such as anxiety, insomnia or depression.
Ms Joseph said: "My advice to an adviser that is struggling and frightened of the reaction from a company on discussing your mental health due to career damage [is to] first look to an external professional for help.
"Do not see a therapist as weak, see it as someone who like a personal trainer will work to get your physical health back in shape, a therapist will do the same for your mental health.
"By taking the lead you may prevent your health declining into illness. Recovery from poor mental health is 100 per cent possible."
Mente, of which Ms Joseph is a co-founder, promotes the idea that businesses should treat their employees’ mental health problems as a health and safety issue.
The firm provides a mental health support service to businesses, including mental health training, e-learning courses, awareness seminars for all staff and legal support.
According to the company, businesses need to pay careful attention to stress and look at the risk it has on the business and the legal implications it can have if they fail in their duty of care.
Ms Joseph said: "It is also within the best interest of the company to take a moral stance because employees who are happy at work and have access to external support and feel valued will perform and are ultimately good for business."
According to Mente companies have a responsibility to protect their staff from excessive stress.
Ms Joseph warned there had been an increase in "stress lawyers" and that litigation in this field was at an all time high and a company could be blamed for an employee’s mental health problems if it did not have the relevant safeguards in place.
Dan White, of White Financial Services, said he thought the approach of Mente was "fantastic" and that tackling mental health in this way would really resonate with big companies.
He added that he agreed the industry was very "ego driven" and that this could lead to a culture where "everyone's trying to prove something".
He said: "If you go on twitter and follow a bunch of other advisers, you see a barrage of advisers going on about how much work they've done or how many APIs they've submitted for clients.
"It's like there's a constant urge to do more work."
Mr White went on to say that if advisers are feeling "burnt out" or down the industry should be the one that supports people and helps them out.
"They should be able to talk about it for sure. But I would be careful when it's business to consumer as clients may go to someone else if they don't want to add pressure or extra work on."
Although Mr White said he understood how the "city life" could perpetuate drinking and the going out culture, he maintained that these aspects were more of a personal lifestyle choice.
He added: "I think tech is the biggest barrier to good mental health. Everybody can constantly check e-mails and tax — they're working all the time.
"Companies could promote their employees not working extra hours, limiting target culture and suggesting no e-mails are looked at out of hours."
imogen.tew@ft.com
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