With the prospect of global vaccines on the horizon, companies worldwide continue to address the challenges of pandemic management and recovery on their businesses, the communities and constituencies they serve and especially on their employees. As companies seek to prioritize workplace and customer health and safety alongside productivity and the achievement of strategic plans, the psychological, as well as physical, well-being of employees has been brought into sharper focus this year. The urgent need to address issues of diversity, inclusion, racism and racial injustice, gender equality, and attendant financial and socioeconomic inequities has heightened attention to workplace wellness, as have pandemic-related illness and loss of life, economic and job insecurity, social isolation, lockdowns, travel restrictions and remote working and schooling.

For a long time, matters of employee wellness, mental health and emotional well-being generally had been largely only areas of internal focus for companies—and in some instances were overlooked due to unwarranted stigma attached to mental health issues within certain professions and industries and uncertainty about how to navigate stress, depression, anxiety, burnout and other conditions and illnesses and how to normalize discussion of these issues.

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