HMRC Aberdeen- The See Me in Work Process

HMRC Aberdeen- The See Me in Work Process

Case Study 

HMRC in Aberdeen became one of our first See Me in Work partners after making a commitment to improve mental health and tackle stigma in the organisation.

The HMRC Aberdeen Health & Wellbeing team wanted to make mental health awareness, and eradicating the stigma of mental illness, one of their key health and wellbeing priorities when they started their partnership with See Me.

They started off by carrying out a Mental Health Check of their organisation, which highlighted a number of positive areas, including a strong central recruitment policy and existing mental health support. However it also found that more attention was needed on supporting staff and equipping staff to be able to support others with their mental health.

After this they drew up an action plan, concentrating on a number of main areas, including:

• Opening up communication channels with staff to create an environment where they feel comfortable speaking about mental illness.
• Raising the profile of the mental health awareness training provided by See Me and Civil Service Learning to allow staff to explore the subject and consider how they would deal with mental illness including how they could support colleagues, family members or friends.
• Raising the profile of mental health awareness training, in particular for managers and senior leaders.

One of the most important things the team wanted to do, was to make their health and wellbeing activities fun, but without losing the serious message. They have now involved almost all of their staff in Aberdeen in at least one of the numerous activities or campaigns that they have organised, including:

• See Me for Tea.
• Walk a Mile at lunchtime.
• Pass the Badge launch event.
• Viewing See Me information videos such as the Power of Okay at team meetings.

The level of engagement from the staff has been great and the impact of them has remained with staff. They have also encouraged their senior managers to undertake See Me online training.

Mark Chapman, from HMRC in Aberdeen, said: “HMRC recognises the importance of the mental health and wellbeing of its people, and we wanted to provide an environment where everyone could talk about mental health without fear of being judged. 

“The road to becoming a See Me in Work partner has seen us educate and support our people to tackle stigma and improve mental health in our office in Aberdeen. 

“We’ve always wanted to say that we need to tackle stigma and discrimination with regard to mental health, but becoming a See Me in Work partner has allowed us to take action to noticeably make a difference for our staff, with our education and information campaigns, and See Me supported events. 

“We believe that this has made a positive change to the culture in our office and we hope that we can share our success story across other HMRC locations in the future.”