1 August

Diversity Network celebrates This is Me

Showcasing the power of collaboration to create change and end stigma around mental health, Diversity Network interviewed This is Me Steering Committee Member Richard Martin to create an article for their worldwide members. Reaching people from 90 countries, the network aims to amplify the messages of diversity, equity and inclusion at work and help make change happen. 

Read the full article below... 

Since it began eight years ago, #ThisIsMe has broken down the stigma of talking about mental illness in the corporate workplace and wider society. The initiative has done this through encouraging participants to tell their own personal stories in the workplace and beyond through online videos and events.

The movement pioneered the wearing of green ribbons to open up the conversation about mental health at work as well as lighting up buildings such as the Bank of England in green in the City of London.

Richard Martin, one of the original steering committee members of #ThisIsMe, explains how the campaign continues to change lives both in the UK and increasingly abroad.

Why has #ThisIsMe made such an impact?

“It’s that permission piece to enable ordinary people to share their stories, to reduce stigma, have conversations and to seek help. The concept of storytelling is to open up the conversation: if I tell you I’ve got a dog, you can ask me about my dog. That applies to mental health as well. When we tell stories, we connect and it gives permission in different ways to talk about mental health: I can ask you about it, I can ask how I can help you and what you need from your organisation to support you.

There are two key elements of storytelling, one of which is hope. We don’t want to understate the pain of mental distress but #ThisIsMe offers people who are suffering, the ability to see that others have gone through it and recovered. Secondly, by sharing stories it helps to put mental health in the context of a wider person – ‘I am a lawyer, I’m a dad, I play football, oh, and I have schizophrenia’. Too often, when people say they have a diagnosis, they are then assumed just to be that diagnosis.”

Can you give an example?

“One of our events was at the Mansion House, which is the Lord Mayor of London’s home. There were about 200 people in the room – the great and good of the city. A partner from PwC stood up and told his story of mental illness and recovery. I was on the stage listening to him and I thought ‘This is extraordinary’. If it had been five years ago, everyone would have been embarrassed hoping someone from HR would take him away. But he inspired everyone in the room. Another example is when my old law firm produced a video and asked me to go along to the launch. I was sitting at the front of the room on the stage, and the people who were in the video were all in the front row with a couple of hundred in the room sitting behind them. What I could see but what no one else could see was that everyone was in tears.”

How did it begin?

“In early 2015 or so Barclays put together a video of a number of people talking about their experience of mental illness. At the time, the idea was extraordinary: Barclays wanted to reduce stigma and normalise the conversation. About a year or so later The Lord Mayor of the City of London’s charity team heard about it and asked if they could support the initiative. 

Over the past eight years, storytelling remains the key thing but we have also had the Green Ribbon campaign to encourage people to go green for mental health, which was begun by PwC. By wearing green ribbons and lighting up buildings in green around the world for Mental Health Awareness Week in May, we are demonstrating support and opening up conversations. Every time I wear a green ribbon on my jacket, someone will ask me what it is for.

Opening up the conversation is not always easy – someone always needs to go first. Before I was ill, I thought mental illness was about other people. But when it is your colleague, you realise mental health can look just like you. Like so many things, such as social mobility, neurodiversity and other invisible stuff, it’s when you have that permission to tell the story that people open up.”

The business case for talking about mental health

“The cost of mental illness absence is around £1700 per employee per year. Presenteeism but underperforming costs about double that because people don’t recognise they have an issue or feel they don’t deserve help or don’t reach help. Poor mental health will affect work performance if a person self-stigmatises or gets themselves into a crisis if they are not asking for help.”  

What’s next for #ThisIsMe?

“The message has spread to Singapore and we hope to work more internationally. Intersectionality is very important, and we want different types of people to share their stories to open up others’ perspectives to help understand the human dynamic behind the statistics.

Lots of organisations are now involved – law firms, corporate services and so on. But we are increasingly recognising the diverse experiences of mental health according to a person’s intersectionality and the type of organisation they work for. Someone’s experience of mental health, the causes of their distress and the quality of healthcare that they receive will be influenced by many different factors. For example, if I were a black African disabled woman in a wheelchair, there might be different attitudes towards me, I may have different abilities to access support, and the exclusion I feel in the workplace might contribute to my mental health.”

How can people get involved?

“Lots of organisations have created professional videos with music and pro-cameramen. This is fantastic, although not everyone has the resources to produce a corporate video. So we encourage people to share their stories in different ways – such as simple one-to-one discussions, blogs and writing about mental illness. It is important to say that no one should be forced into talking about their experience of mental health when they would prefer to keep it private or they are not ready yet.

When Barclays made that first video, they had done a lot of work around raising awareness in the organisation before people were willing to talk about their experience of mental health. A key thing to say is that organisations should lay the foundations for an open culture before expecting individuals to share.

One of the challenges we come up against is that it’s relatively safe now for someone like me who has privilege to stand up and tell my story. But it is less safe for someone already carrying challenges of gender or race or sexuality, for example.

It is not always easy to find people from under-represented groups to tell their story. But we hope by sharing about intersectionality, more people will come forward.”