From Presenteeism to Productivity: The Business Case for Positive Psychology Interventions in the Workplace

New productivity tools and research demonstrate that poor mental health status among employees is one of the leading financial drains in the workplace. Traditional worksite approaches to mental status have focused exclusively on cost reduction strategies, leaving a gap on the revenue-generating side of the ledger. Good evidence from the field of epidemiology indicates that universal interventions can serve as cost avoidance and productivity-enhancing strategies by improving productivity and reducing new incidences of disorder. Positive psychology offers numerous empirically-validated approaches that can be implemented as universal mental health interventions in a workplace setting, positioning it as both a cost avoidance and productivity enhancing strategy. This science enables employers to shift from a disease-mitigation paradigm to a productivity-maximizing paradigm. By linking the empirical approaches of positive psychology, the epidemiological approach of population-wide intervention, the ability to measure changes in worker output, and performance improvement methodology, employers have the tools to gain competitive edge in cost avoidance and a productivity enhancement strategies, simultaneously building both employee psychological well-being and organizational financial well-being.