How we take care of our people at Unilever

For decades, driven by social stigma and misunderstanding, the mental health crisis has been looming in the shadows. In recent years it has been so reassuring to see it finally getting the spotlight it needs and deserves.

You'll have heard me say many times that Unilever wants to make sustainable living commonplace and part of that means addressing mental health and wellbeing as a matter of urgency.

Our people

We believe people’s wellbeing is at the core of an organisation’s success. But what do we do about that? First, we take a global approach to our employee mental health and wellbeing programmes, but we then take those programmes and tailor them to suit local cultural differences and resources.

I thought it would be useful to share some of our initiatives here. This is a long piece, but I hope you will stick with it! There is a lot to learn through sharing this kind of information. I hope some readers will consider sharing what their companies are doing to make meaningful changes in tackling this mental health crisis.

Wellbeing Framework

In 2014 our Global Wellbeing Steering Committee created a four-pillar Wellbeing Framework to address the physical, mental, emotional and purposeful wellbeing of our employees. The Framework guides us in tackling the health risks we’ve identified across our business, with mental health our top priority, followed by lifestyle factors (e.g. exercise, nutrition, smoking and obesity) and ergonomic factors (e.g. repetitive strain issues). 

Lamplighter: Critical to the delivery of our Wellbeing Framework is our Lamplighter program, which delivers preventative health screening to employees regardless of seniority or duration of employment. Every year, Lamplighter supports over 76,000 employees across more than 75 countries. Lamplighter combines mental and physical health screening to identify early signs and symptoms of poor mental health before it escalates to illness. 

Thrive Workshops: In tandem with Lamplighter’s health checks and advice, we use Thrive Workshops to bring to life the four pillars of our Wellbeing Framework. During the workshops we explain each of the pillars as a battery of energy that needs to be charged and used safely, as well as replenished and cared for in a sustainable way.

Supporting our employees and their families. We believe that everyone employed by Unilever (and often their families) should be just one conversation, one phone call or one click away from support. Our global Employee Assistance Programme (EAP) delivers support 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, and is accessible via telephone, text or web chat.

Since 2015, over 50,000 employees have taken part in our Thrive workshops. 

Heads Together (UK): In 2016, we became a founding corporate partner of Heads Together, an initiative that campaigns to tackle the stigma around mental health, with fundraising for a series of innovative mental health services.

In 2018 at Unilever's Workplace Wellbeing Conference in London, HRH Prince William, Duke of Cambridge introduced a Mental Health at Work Gateway with Heads Together and Mind. The UK-wide gateway is a free resource for both employers and employees, bringing together information, advice, resources and training to improve wellbeing and give employees the mental health support they need.

2020 Global Day of Thanks: In 2020 following the outbreak of COVID-19 and in recognition of the prolonged periods of office closure and challenges that working from home can present, Unilever announced a global day of thanks, and gave employees across the world a day off from work. We wanted to give everyone the same day off so they could take a step back from work and spend time with family and friends. 

Mental Health Champions: We trained 1,600 employees to become mental health champions who support their peers by looking for signs of people struggling with mental health and connecting them to services that can help. We have an ambition to train 3,000 employees by the end of 2021. 

World Mental Health Day 2020: In 2020, we saw 90,000 people engaged through our World Mental Health Day campaign.  

The Global Business Collaboration for Better Workplace Mental Health: Launched in January 2021, this is a business-led initiative founded by Unilever, Salesforce, HSBC, Deloitte, Clifford Chance and BHP. Our mission is to advocate for, and accelerate, positive change for mental health in the workplace globally. 

• The collaboration has three key ambitions: 

1. Create a platform for collaboration – collecting the leaders of the world’s largest businesses to address mental health and stigma in the workplace across the globe 
2. Raise awareness of the importance of workplace mental health 
3. Facilitate the adoption of best practice through the collaboration and creation of a roadmap for change

We are building a global community. We are asking business leaders from around the world to sign up to the GBC pledge, a set of principles designed to speed up mental health progress in the workplace. 

Our brands

Every day 2.5 billion people around the world will use a Unilever brand. The scale we have to affect positive change is significant. Our brands invest in advertising that reduces social stigma and promotes togetherness, body positivity, and positive action.

Here are just a few examples of the work our brands are doing:  

Dove – Positioning beauty as a source of confidence, not anxiety: Aimed at creating a positive and universally accessible experience of beauty, the Dove Self-Esteem Project has become the biggest provider of self-esteem education globally. Dove works with body image experts and universities to develop evidence-based and academically validated educational tools and workshops for schools, youth leaders, parents and organisations. 

Axe – Tackling toxic masculinity and its debilitating effects on young men: Axe partnered with Ditch the Label to help young men be comfortable with who they are, without the pressures and limits of traditional masculinity, and to address bullying. The partnership has delivered advice and counselling to 1.2 million young people around the world.  

Lipton – Tackling loneliness: Lipton launched its brand purpose on World Mental Health Day in 2019 to encourage people to take time out and have a conversation with someone who might be feeling lonely. Lipton is fighting loneliness by turning billions of tea consumption moments into moments of quality connection. The 'You.Me.Tea.Now' campaign showcases the importance of making time for quality connections with others. 

Wall’s – Striving to make the world a happier place: Our ice-cream brand Wall’s is working to increase global happiness. Wall’s is the official sponsor of the UN Happiness Report. This year, Wall’s also released a manifesto for a happier world, calling on governments to replace GDP with metrics that put happiness first, asking them to adopt a more holistic measure of development that isn’t just based on economic growth.

CLEAR Resilience Challenge: Our haircare brand CLEAR partnered with Dr Michael Ungar, co-director of the Resilience Research Center (RRC) at Dalhousie University, to develop an evidence-based 14-day resilience curriculum programme. The programme covers topics such as mindfulness, building your own unique identity and showing your abilities. 

I took part in this challenge last year and I was blown away by how brilliantly put together it was. More than that, the videos that the brand produced, including interviews with experts led by Dr Ungar, were truly eye opening and really fun. I highly recommend taking part in the challenge and watching some of the brilliant conversations.

Surveying of our own workforce and utilisation of mental health tools/ services  

• We conduct several surveys throughout the year to get a pulse check on our employees' mental health, wellbeing and overall engagement.  

• We have an annual wellbeing survey, annual employee engagement survey, and also conduct monthly 'UniPulse checks'.  

• We are seeing employees and their family members using these tools in increasing numbers:

• Headspace: All employees get free access to Headspace. Our people spent 15,000+ hours devloping their mindfulness using the app. 
• Employee Assistance Program: We saw an uplift in the utilisation of our EAP in 2020, with a more than 10% increase in family members accessing the service as well. 

Further Reading:

• More information can be found on the Wellbeing section at Unilever.com
• Lessons in better mental health
• Why don't company wellbeing initiatives stick? It's time for radical change